Chapter 14

Bunyan, who had secured the confidence and esteem of his jailer, now found his prison more like a lodging-house, and enjoyed great privileges. He frequently, if not regularly, attended the church meetings, and preached with some degree of publicity. The church at Bedford was at this time in want of a pastor, and their eyes were naturally fixed upon Bunyan to succeed to that important office. There were two weighty considerations that required Divine guidance in coming to a conclusion. One was, whether it might injuriously affect the prisoner’s comforts, and the other was, the propriety of making choice of a Christian brother to be their ministering elder, while incarcerated in a jail. Feeling these difficulties, the church held several meetings on the subject, the minutes of which are very interesting. The first was held at Hawnes, on the 24th of the eighth month (October) 1671, when ‘the improvement of the gifts of the church, and their disposal in an orderly way, were proposed to consideration, that God might be sought for direction therein; and a time further to consider and debate thereof, was appointed this day seven-night, at evening, at Bedford, where the principal brethren were desired for that purpose to come together, at brother John Fenn’s; and a church-meeting was appointed to be there that day week. The church was also minded to seek God about the choice of brother, Bunyan to the office of elder, that their way in that respect may be cleared up to them.’ At a meeting held at Bedford, on the last day of the ninth month (November), there was appointed another meeting ‘to pray and consult about concluding the affair before propounded, concerning gifts of the brethren to be improved, and the choice of brother Bunyan to office, at Gamlingay, on the 14th day, and at Hawnes, the 20th, and at Bedford, the 21st of the same instant, which it was desired might be a general meeting.’ After all this jealous care, and these fervent applications to the throne of grace for divine guidance, the result was most gratifying. ‘At a full assembly of the church at Bedford, the 21st of the tenth month,[274] after much seeking God by prayer and sober conference formally had, the congregation did at this meeting, with joynt consent, signified by solemn lifting up of their hands, call forth and appoint our brother John Bunyan to the pastoral office or eldership. And he accepting thereof, gave himself up to serve Christ and his Church, in that charge, and received of the elders the right hand of fellowship, after having preached fifteen years.’ The choice thus solemnly made, was ratified by the abundant blessings of heavenly union and great prosperity—no stranger or novice, but one whose preaching and writings had proved most acceptable to them for a series of years—on that had been owned and blessed of his God, and whom the church delighted to honour.

At the same church meeting, ‘The congregation having had long experience of the faithfulness of brother John Fenn in his care for the poor, did after the same manner solemnly choose him to the honourable office of a deacon, and committed their poor and purse to him, and he accepted thereof, and gave himself up to the Lord and them in that service.’ The church did also determine to keep the 26th inst. as a day of fasting and prayer, both here, and at Hawnes, and at Gamlingay, solemnly to commend to the grace of God brother Bunyan and brother Fenn, and to entreat his gracious assistance and presence with them in their respective works, whereunto he hath called them.

The most extraordinary circumstance that took place at this time was, that while Bunyan was a prisoner in a wretched dungeon for preaching the glad tidings of salvation, or, in the mysterious legal jargon of the period, ‘holding conventicles,’ he received his Majesty’s license to preach, and thus to hold conventicles—it was one of the first that was granted. His Majesty continued to keep him a prisoner for preaching more than six months after he had licensed him to preach!! At the same time that the permission to preach was granted to Bunyan, the house of Josiah Roughed, Bedford, was licensed by his Majesty’s command, for the use of such as do not conform to the Church of England. In this John Bunyan was authorized to teach, or in any other licensed place.[275] These were among the first licenses that were granted. The present highly-respected pastor of the church considers that this license does not refer to Roughed’s private dwelling, but rather to ‘an edifice or a barn, purchased of Robert Crompton, Esq., with a piece of ground adjoining it,’ in the parishes of St. Paul and Cuthbert, for £50, in 1672, by Roughed, Bunyan, Fenn, and others, and which was released by Fenn to Bunyan and others, November 10, 1681, two days before Fenn’s death. This building having been properly fitted up by voluntary contribution, became permanently occupied by the church as its place of meeting, until the old chapel was erected in 1707. From this we may conclude that Bunyan was engaged in his worldly occupation as a brazier, in the year that he obtained his release from prison, and to 1681.

How utterly contemptible does any Government become when they tamper with spiritual worship. At one period they punished Dissenters with imprisonment, transportation, and, to use Judge Keeling’s elegant expression in his sentence on Bunyan, ‘to stretch by the neck for it’; and anon, the very same Government, under the same king, gives them license to dissent! Human laws affecting religion can never be the standard of morality; to read the Bible is considered to be sin in Tuscany, and righteousness in Britain. The release of this great and pious man from his tedious imprisonment, has been hitherto involved in a cloud of mystery, which it will be our happiness to disperse, while we record that event in a clear, indisputable narrative of facts. His earlier biographer, Mr. Doe, not having access to archives which the lapse of time has now rendered available, attributed his release to the influence of Bishop Barlow, by the interference of Dr. Owen. It is narrated in the life of Dr. Owen, published in 1721:—‘The doctor had some friends also among the bishops, Dr. Barlow, formerly his tutor, then bishop of Lincoln, who yet upon a special occasion failed him, when he might have expected the service of his professed friendship. The case was this, Mr. John Bunyan had been confined to a jail twelve years, upon an excommunication for Nonconformity. Now there was a law, that if any two persons will go to the bishop of the diocese, and offer a cautionary bond, that the prisoner shall conform in half a year, the bishop may release him upon that bond; whereupon a friend of this poor man desired Dr. Owen to give him his letter to the bishop in his behalf, which he readily granted. It was soon after the discovery of the Popish plot, when this letter was carried to the bishop, who having read it, desired “a little time to consider of it, and if I can do it, you may be assured of my readiness.” He was waited upon again in about a fortnight, and his answer was, “I would desire you to move the Lord Chancellor in the case, and, upon his order, I will do it.” To which it was replied, “this method would be chargeable, and the man was poor, not able to expend so much money; and, being satisfied he could do it legally, it was hoped his Lordship would remember his promise, there being no straining a point in the case. But he would do it upon no other terms, which at last was done, and the poor man released.” And for this we are told that “Mr. Bunyan returned him his unfeigned thanks, and often remembered him in his prayers, as, next to God, his deliverer.”’ The whole of this story, so far as it relates to Bunyan, is not only improbable, but utterly impossible. Bunyan was never excommunicated, and he was certainly released from prison two or three years previous to Dr. Barlow becoming a bishop. The critical times to which he alludes, refer doubtless to the Popish plot, which took place in 1678, Bunyan having been released in 1672. The probability is, that Dr. Owen did about 1678 apply to the bishop of Lincoln for the release of some poor prisoner under sentence of excommunication, it being his province to release such prisoners upon their making peace with the Church. If this person was a friend of Bunyan’s, his prayers for the bishop, and acknowledgments for this act of kindness, are readily accounted for. That Barlow had nothing to do with Bunyan’s release is now perfectly clear; because all, even the minutest particulars relative to it, have been discovered. This is a very romantic history, and necessarily leads us back to the battle of Worcester. At this battle, the republicans were numerous, well disciplined, and led by experienced officers; the royal army was completely routed, and its leaders, who survived the battle, were subject to the severest privations. Charles found refuge at Boscobel House, and, disguised as a woodcutter, was hid in an oak. His adventures and hair-breadth escapes fill a volume:—the parliament offered one thousand pounds reward for his apprehension. At length, after wandering in various disguises forty days, he arrived at Brighton, then a small fishing town, and here his friends succeeded in hiring a fishing boat to take him to France. Numerous histories of this extraordinary escape were published, but no two of them agree, excepting that, to please the king, all the credit was given to Roman Catholics. Of these narratives, that by Dr. Lingard has the strangest blunder. When they left Shoreham, ‘The ship stood with easy sail towards the Isle of Wight, as if she were on her way to Deal, to which port she was bound’[276]—Deal being exactly in the contrary direction! Carte has the best account. The vessel was bound for Poole, coal-laden; they left Shoreham at seven a.m. under easy sail; and at five, being off the Isle of Wight, with the wind north, she stood over to France, and returned to Poole, no one discovering that they had been out of their course. A letter recently discovered among the archives of the Society of Friends at Devonshire House solves every difficulty. It is written by Ellis Hookes to the wife of George Fox, dated January, 1670—

‘Yesterday there was a friend (a quaker) wth the king, one that is John Groves mate, he was the may yt. was mate to the master of the fisher-boat yt carried the king away when he went from Worcester fight, and only this friend and the master knew of it in the ship, and the friend carried him (the king) ashoare on his shoulders. the king knew him again, and was very friendly to him, and told him he remembered him and of severall tings yt was done in ye ship att the same time. the friend told him the reason why he did not come all this while was yt he was satisfied in yt he had peace and satisfaction in himself yt he did what he did to releiue a man in distresse and now he desired nothing of him (the king) but that he would sett friends at libertie who were great sufferers or to that purpose and told the king he had a paper of 110 that were premunired yt had lain in prison about 6 years and none can release ym but him. Soe the king took the paper and said there was many of ym and yt they would be in again in a monthes time and yt the country gentlemen complained to him yt they were so troubled wth the quakers. So he said he would release him six. but ye friend thinkes to goe to him again, for he had not fully cleared himselfe.’

This letter is endorsed by Fox himself, ‘E Hookes to M F of passages consering Richard Carver, that cared the King of his backe.’

E. Hooke’s next letter, addressed to George Fox, thus continues the narrative—

‘February, 1669-70.

‘Dear G. F. As for the friend that was with the King, his love is to thee. He has been with the King lately, and Thomas Moore was with him, and the King was very loving to them. He had a fair and free opportunity to open his mind to the King, and the King has promised to do for him, but willed him to wait a month or two longer. I rest thy faithful friend to serve thee,

‘E.H.’[277]

The captain of the fisher-boat was Nicholas Tattersall, whose grave, covered with a slab of black marble, is still to be seen in Brighton church-yard, with a long poetical inscription, now scarcely legible. On the Restoration, he applied for his reward, and was made a commander in the royal navy, with an annuity to him and his heirs for ever of £100. The family have recently become extinct. His fisher-boat was moored for a considerable time in the Thames, opposite Whitehall. Years had rolled on, but the Quaker mate who had so materially assisted the flying prince—by keeping the secret—arranging the escape with the crew, and when, in fear of danger from a privateer, rowing the prince ashore, and in shoal water carrying him on his shoulders to the land, near the village of Fecamp, in Normandy, yet he had not been with the king to claim any reward. This escape took place in 1651, and nearly twenty years had elapsed, ten of which were after the Restoration; so that in all probability the king, who with all his faults was not ungrateful, was agreeably surprised with his appearance at the palace. Whatever alteration the rough life of a sailor had made on his appearance, the king at once recognized him. All the progress he had made as to worldly prosperity was from being mate of a fisher-boat, under Tattersall, to becoming mate of a West Indiaman, under Captain Grove. His Majesty, who had passed his time more with courtiers than with Quakers, was doubtless astonished that a poor man, having such a claim on his bounty, should have been so many years without seeking his recompense. On asking the reason, the Quaker nobly answered to this effect, That the performance of his duty in saving the life of the hunted prince, was only a moral obligation, for the discharge of which God had amply repaid him by peace and satisfaction in his mind and conscience. And now, Sire, I ask nothing for myself, but that your Majesty would do the same to my friends that I did for you—set the poor pious sufferers at liberty, that they may bless you, and that you may have that peace and satisfaction which always follows good and benevolent actions. The king attempted feebly to argue, that they would soon offend again, and that they were much complained of by the country gentlemen. How readily the sailor might have said to his sailor king, Alter the ship’s articles, let all the crew fare alike as to their free choice in religion, and there will be no grumbling in your noble ship; every subject will do his duty. The king offered to release any six, and we may imagine the sailor’s blunt answer, What, six poor Quakers for a king’s ransom!! His Majesty was so pleased as to invite him to come again, when he introduced another member of the Society of Friends, Thomas Moore. At this period an amazing number of Friends, men and women, were in the jails throughout the kingdom, torn from their families, and suffering most severe privations, under which great numbers had perished. The application for the release of the survivors, thus happily commenced, was followed up with zeal and energy, and crowned with great success. This narrative solves all those difficulties which rendered that remarkable event extremely mysterious. The question naturally arises why so debauched and dissolute a king should prefer such tight-laced Christians to be the peculiar objects of his mercy. The reason is perfectly obvious, he owed his life to one of their members, who, however poor as to this world, possessed those riches of piety which prevented his taking any personal reward for an act of duty. Shade of the noble sailor, thy name, Richard Carver, is worthy of all honour! And the more so, because thy gallant bearing has been studiously concealed in all the histories of these important transactions. Had he been a mischief-making Jesuit, like Father Huddleston, his noble deed would have been trumpeted forth for the admiration of the world in all ages. His name was left to perish in oblivion, because he was of a despised sect. It is an honour to Christianity that a labouring man preferred the duty of saving the life of a human being, and that of an enemy, to gaining so easily heaps of glittering gold. And when all the resources of royalty were ready munificently to reward him, he, like Moses, preferred the rescue of his suffering friends to personal honours or emoluments—even to all the riches of England!

The efforts of Carver and Moore were followed by most earnest appeals for mercy by George Whitehead, who with Moore appeared before the king in council several times, until at length the royal word sanctioned this act of mercy. The Quakers were then appealed to by sufferers of other denominations, and advised them to obtain the permission of the king in council, that their names might be inserted in the deed; rendering them all the assistance that was in their power. Great difficulties were encountered in passing the cumbrous deed through the various offices, and then in pleading it in all parts of the country. The number of Quakers thus released from imprisonment was 471, being about the same number as those who had perished in the jails. The rest of the prisoners liberated by this deed were Baptists and Independents, and among the former was JOHN BUNYAN.

A very circumstantial narrative of these proceedings, copies of the minutes of the privy council, and other documents, will be found in the introduction to The Pilgrim’s Progress.[278] One of these official papers affords an interesting subject of study to an occasional conformist. It is the return of the sheriff of Bedfordshire, stating that ALL the sufferings of Bunyan—his privation of liberty, sacrifice of wife, children, and temporal comforts, with the fear of an ignominious death—were for refusing to attend his parish church and hear the Common Prayer service.

When it is considered that Bunyan was very severe in his remarks upon the Quakers, the event reflects no ordinary degree of honour upon the Society of Friends, at whose sole charge, and entirely by their own exertions, this great deed of benevolence was begun, carried on, and completed. It is difficult to ascertain the exact duration of this sad imprisonment, because we cannot discover any record of the day of his release. His imprisonment commenced November 13, 1660, and his pardon under the great seal is dated September 13, 1672. As the pardon included nearly 500 sufferers, it occupied some time to obtain official duplicates to be exhibited at the assizes and sessions for the various counties. A letter from E. Hooks to Mrs. Fox intimates that none were released on the 1st November 1672. Another letter shows that the Bedfordshire prisoners were discharged before January 10, 1673;[279] confirming Bunyan’s own account, published by him in the Grace Abounding, 1680, that his imprisonment lasted complete twelve years.[280]

During the latter period of his imprisonment, probably from the time of his receiving the royal license to preach, May 15, 1672, he enjoyed extraordinary liberty—visiting those who had been kind to his family, and preaching in the surrounding counties. An entry in the records of the city of Leicester proves that he was there, and claimed the liberty of preaching—‘John Bunyan’s license bears date the 15th of May 1672, to teach as a Congregational person, being of that persuasion, in the house of Josias Roughed, Bedford, or in any other place, room, or house, licensed by his Majestie’s memorand. The said Bunyan shewed his license to Mr. Mayor, Mr. Overinge, Mr. Freeman, and Mr. Browne, being then present, the 6th day of October, 1672, that being about two months before his final release from jail.’[281]

His first object, upon recovering his liberty, appears to have been the proper arrangement of his worldly business, that he might provide for the wants of his family, a matter of little difficulty with their frugal habits. He, at the same time, entered with all his soul into his beloved work of preaching and writing, to set forth the glories of Immanuel. The testimony of one who was his ‘true friend and long acquaintance,’ is, that one of the first fruits of his liberation was to visit those who had assisted him and comforted his family during his incarceration, encouraging those who were in fear of a prison, and collecting means of assistance to those who still remained prisoners; traveling even to remote counties to effect these merciful objects.[282]

While the premises occupied by Mr. Roughed were being converted into a capacious meeting-house, the pastor was indefatigable in visiting the sick, and preaching from house to house, settling churches in the villages, reconciling differences, and extending the sacred influences of the gospel, so that in a very short time he attained the appellation of Bishop Bunyan—a title much better merited by him than by the downy prelates who sent him to jail for preaching that which they ought to have preached.

He formed branch churches at Gamlingay, Hawnes, Cotton-end, and Kempston, in connection with that at Bedford. When he opened the new meeting-house, it was so thronged that many were constrained to stay without, though it was very spacious, every one striving to partake of his instructions. Here he lived, in much peace and quiet of mind, contenting himself with that little God had bestowed upon him, and sequestering himself from all secular employments to follow that of his call to the ministry.[283] The word ‘sequestering’ would lead us to conclude, that his business was continued by his family, under his care, but so as to allow him much time for his Christian duties, and his benevolent pursuits. His peaceful course was interrupted by a severe controversy with the Christian world upon the subject of communion at the Lord’s Table, which had commenced while he was in prison. He would admit none but those who, by a godly conversation, brought forth fruits meet for repentance, nor dared he to refuse any who were admitted to spiritual communion with the Redeemer. Every sect which celebrated the Lord’s Supper, fenced the table round with ritual observances, except the Baptist church at Bedford, which stood preeminent for non-sectarianism. A singular proof of this is, that the catechism called Instruction of the Ignorant, written and published by Bunyan, is admirably adapted for the use, not only of his own church, but of Christians of all denominations.

His spirit was greatly refreshed by finding that his precept and example had been blessed to his son Thomas. On the 6th of the 11th month, 1673, he passed the lions, and was welcomed into the house called Beautiful, uniting in full communion with his father’s church. There doubtless was, as Mercy expresses it, ‘music in the house, music in the heart, and music also in heaven, for joy that he was here.’[284] He afterwards became a village preacher.