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BUNYAN PLANTED BAPTIST CHURCHES.

infant baptism, and that by them brand us for Pedobaptists, must this drive you from your belief of the truth?'

It has been any thing but a pleasant task to attempt the rescue of this honored historical name from such a brand of inconsistency as the wrong use of the St. Cuthbert's Register must fix upon it, by applying to him an act which it was morally impossible for him to perpetrate without infamy to all the other acts of his religious life and being. A dozen such records, so perverted in their application, can never gainsay the universal voice of history as to the man's principles and character. And outside of these nothing is more notorious than that all his chief friendships were sought by himself amongst Baptists, as in the case of Jessey, who was more the father of open communion views in England than was Bunyan. Nothing seemed more to delight that sturdy Baptist friend and acquaintance' of his, Charles Doe, than to speak of him as 'OUR Bunyan,' which he does until the repetition wearies. Francis Smith, who published the most, if not all the works which Bunyan wrote while he was in prison, was one of the most thorough Baptists. He was a brave and true character, who set the censor of the press at defiance and was imprisoned again and again as a fanatic' because he would publish dangerous books.' He was called 'Elephant Smith,' because he did business at the Elephant and Castle, near Temple Bar, but he was better known as 'Anabaptist Smith;' and would have published Bunyan's Grace Abounding,' but he happened to be in prison when it was issued. Many of Bunyan's books were seized at his place in 1666, because he published them without a license; and the Baptist press has been loaded with his writings ever since. And, last of all, says Philip: 'He was interred at first in the back part of that ground (Bunhill Fields) now known as Baptist Corner.'

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While these considerations serve as slight collateral evidences of his denominational connections, the great proof is found in his own words and works, both of which follow him. Although his own Church has forsaken the faith and practice which he taught, there are still many Churches left which received his impress, and have retained it through two hundred years. His labors outside of Bedford, in that and other counties, were abundant; and a number of Baptist Churches therein, which still exist, were then gathered as the result. Philip says: Not a few of the Baptist Churches in the county (Bedford) trace their origin to Bishop Bunyan's itineracies, as do some also in the adjoining counties of Cambridge, Hertford, Huntingdon, Buckingham and Northampton.' Alluding to these labors, the 'Britannica' states that he had so great an authority among the Baptists that he was popularly called Bishop Bunyan.' This article, written by Macaulay, adds: 'Great as was the authority of Bunyan with the Baptists, that of William Kiffin was still greater.' The present status of these Churches show the model on which he formed them, as an open communion Baptist. Mr. Brown's Church at Northampton, the Union Chapel at Luton, and some others, can elect either a Baptist or a Pedobaptist minister for pastor, though their ministers are now and have been gen

HIS WORKS FOLLOW HIM.

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erally Baptists. The Park Street Church at Luton claims Bunyan as its founder, also that at Hitchin and Hurst-Hempstead. Rev. Mr. Watts, the present pastor of Mill Street Baptist Church, Bedford, says: Stagsden, Goldington, Elstow and Kempston are all branches of Bunyan's Meeting. Josiah Couder says in "Life and Writings of Bunyan :

Reading, in Berkshire, was another place which he frequently visited, and a tradition has been preserved by the Baptist congregation there that he sometimes went through that town dressed like a carter, with a long whip in his hand, to avoid detection. The house in which the Baptists met for worship stood in a lane, and from the back door they had a bridge over a branch of the river Kennett, whereby, in case of alarm, they might escape. In a visit to that place, prompted by his characteristic kindness of heart, he contracted the disease which brought him to his grave.'

Rev. Thomas Watts adds:

There are very few Congregational Churches in Bedfordshire, and these are mostly of modern formation. It seems certain that John Bunyan was remarkably useful throughout the county, and that his converts either became members of Baptist or Union Churches. We have several Union Churches, but, with the exception of Bunyan Meeting, the minister in every case is a Baptist. The trust-deed at Cotton-End requires the Church to choose a Baptist for their pastor.'

Clearly Bunyan was an open communion Baptist, but as to christening his child. in the parish church in 1672, we may well use the Scripture exclamation: Go to!'

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CHAPTER VIII.

BRITISH BAPTISTS.-COMMONWEALTH AND RESTORATION.

OHN MILTON, the apostle of liberty and monarch of song, demands our notice, because, whether he was a Baptist or not, he expounded and defended certain elementary Baptist principles as few others have done. Milton was born in 1608, and educated at Cambridge. He was of a serious spirit, full of purity and

JOHN MILTON.

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courage and very modest withal. This soul dwelt in a temple as fair as Apollo's, the picture of beauty and delicacy; so fine, indeed, that the coarser dents nicknamed him the lady of Christ's College.' As a literator, he did for England what He no man had yet done. lived when all religious and political traditions were called in question, and all old institutions were being remodeled. Although his early design was to enter the Episcopal ministry, and his preparation was thorough, after examining the claims of Episcopacy, he said that to take orders he 'must subscribe slave,' and this he After would do for no man.

seven years' study he took his master's degree, 1632; then retired for five years, studying the Bible, Greek and Roman writers, philosophy and literature, and laying plans for his great life-work. On the death of his mother, in 1638, he went In Paris he became to the Continent, intending to spend some years there. thoroughly acquainted with Grotius, and at Florence had much conversation with Galileo, in the Inquisition. When he heard of the disturbances in England, his patriotism was so stirred that he resolved to return, saying, 'I considered it dis

honorable to be enjoying myself at my ease in foreign lands, while my countrymen were striking a blow for freedom."

At home, he was soon drawn into the front rank as a publicist, dealing with every fundamental principle of the English Constitution. Twenty-five controversial and political works were soon issued from his pen touching great practical questions of statesmanship; the rights of the people, of rulers, the freedom of the commonwealth, the relations of the Church to the State, of religious liberty, popular education, the laws of marriage and the freedom of the press. These aroused the whole nation as a giant from slumber. He spoke on all subjects with a deep conviction and an honest boldness worthy of a doctrinaire and philosophical civilian. Every point was presented with the clearness of a sunbeam; all could see that the love of liberty dominated him like an inspiration. His principles embodied a new and radical order of things, and a new set of political institutions must spring therefroin, so primal were they. In themselves they were a new creation, so to speak, which appealed to reason and conscience; in a word, the embryo of a free republic. Mark Pattison, no indulgent critic of Milton, is compelled to admit that these works were all written on the side of liberty.' He defended religious liberty against the prelates, civil liberty against the crown, the liberty of the press against the executive, liberty of conscience against the Presbyterians, and domestic liberty against the tyranny of canon law. Milton's pamphlets might have been stamped with the motto which Seldon inscribed (in Greek) in all his books: Liberty before every thing.' In the depth of his nature he reverenced God, and used that reverence to ennoble England. While the seething excitement of his times marks his style, which is often rasping, even withering, and betrays that metallic spirit which will neither brook imposition nor cant; yet there was a light and refreshing newness in his temper, which told his foes that he knew what he was talking about, whether they did or not, and which brushed away their impudent assumptions and abuses like dust. His exact calmness of thought and clearness of language made his foes resentful. He was a perfect master of stinging candor, and his nervous invective made his vehemence calm by the truth which it couched.

The second marked period of his life brought his knowledge of the learned languages into great service. He honored his mother-tongue as a language of ideas, and his prose works will ever remain a monument to its terse greatness. But he wrote Latin as fluently as English, and was chosen Latin secretary to the government soon after the death of Charles I. This was the language of diplomacy at the time, and he filled this station till the reign of Charles II. His office brought him into daily contact with the forty-one who composed the Council of State, especially with the Committee for Foreign Affairs, amongst whom were Vane and Whitelock, Lords Denbigh and Lisle. In company with Cromwell, Fairfax and others, his daily task was to frame difficult dispatches to all nations, in harmony with the new state of things in England, to which, practically, the world was a stranger. In

April, 1655, the Duke of Savoy horrified all Europe by the fiendish atrocities which made the valleys of Piedmont run with blood. When news of this savagery reached Protestant England she stood appalled, decreed it high time to stop such insane brutality, and sent Moreland to take the cut-throat of Savoy in hand. As repre senting a republic, Cromwell had omitted the title of his Royal Highness in the dispatches sent by Moreland to the duke, who proposed to return the demand of England under color of affront. The sober second thought, however, aided by a little common sense and Cardinal Mazarin, brought the butcher to his senses. France was required to stop this cowardly reign of fury, rape and murder. The correspondence which Milton conducted on this subject with the nations of Europe was so just, humane and simple, that it stands an honor to humanity. Its tone is severely moderate, becoming a Christian republic in diplomacy; firm, equitable, manly to deliciousness, and its effect is felt on the liberties of Europe to this day.

Milton's perpetual labor in the cause of humanity cost him his eye-sight. He said that his physicians predicted this when he took up his pen to write against the tyrannies of Charles, 'yet, nothing terrified by their premonition, I did not long balance whether my duty should be preferred to my eyes.' In 1650 the sight of his left eye was gone, and by 1652 the sight of his right eye was also quenched; so that at the age of forty-three he was totally blind, remaining so till his death, twenty-two years after. In another touching passage, which expresses his unyielding sense of responsibility, he says: "The choice lay before me, between dereliction of a supreme duty and loss of eye-sight. In such a case I could not listen to the physician, not if Esculapius himself had spoken from his sanctuary; I could but obey that inward monitor, I know not what, that spoke to me from heaven. I considered with myself that many had purchased less good with worse ill, as they who give their lives to reap only glory; and I thereupon concluded to employ the little remaining eyesight I was to enjoy in doing this, the greatest service to the common weal it was in my power to render.'

The third period of his life drew forth his highest and holiest genius as a bard. From 1660 to 1674 he produced his matchless 'Paradise Lost' and 'Paradise Regained,' and his 'Samson Agonistes.' He addressed himself to these as a prophet would devote himself to his holy office. Five and twenty years had been spent in the sternest self-culture and sacred purpose, so that he thought his epic ideal a schooling from God. He had conceived the first plan of his 'Paradise Lost' under the flush and daring imaginations of youth, but dared not touch the work without the chaste and ripe judgment of fifty, and then considered himself poorly equipped for its execution. He was not content to create an epic fiction, much less a romance, but would deal only in real poetic truth on foundations as firm as the eternal throne. But for all this he implored the help of heaven, as he believed that only close walk with God could give life and history to the imagery and feeling treasured in his soul. He said: This is not to be obtained but by devout prayer to that eternal Spirit that

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