The Pilgrim’s Progress
John Bunyan’s much-loved allegory, telling the story of Christian and his journey to the Celestial City.THE PILGRIM’S PROGRESS, John Bunyan’s masterful religious allegory, narrates the journey of an everyman hero, Christian, as he attempts to navigate the trials and tribulations of this world, the City of Destruction, on the path towards paradise, the Celestial City. Though weighed down by the burden of original sin, Christian overcomes the distractions of the world, moving past the Slough of Despond, the Hill of Difficulty and the Valley of the Shadow of Death, while simultaneously resisting the temptations of the Worldy Wise, the Vain and the Ignorant. The product of a lifetime of religious work and thought, Bunyan’s virtuosic narrative fundamentally altered Protestant belief, and remains one of the most important and influential works in the English language.
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THE PILGRIMâS PROGRESS
John Bunyan
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Courteous Companions,â
Chapter 3: The Interpreterâs House
Chapter 4: The Cross and the Consequences
Chapter 5: The Palace Beautiful
Chapter 6: The Valley of Humiliation
Chapter 7: Entertained by Gaius
Chapter 8: The Delectable Mountains and the Shepherds
Chapter 9: The Enchanted Ground
Chapter 10: The Pilgrims at Home
The Little Pilgrim: The Story of a Little Girl Who Tried to Go on Pilgrimage
Classic Literature: Words and Phrases adapted from the Collins English Dictionary
In 1819, millworker William Collins from Glasgow, Scotland, set up a company for printing and publishing pamphlets, sermons, hymn books and prayer books. That company was Collins and was to mark the birth of HarperCollins Publishers as we know it today. The long tradition of Collins dictionary publishing can be traced back to the ï¬rst dictionary William published in 1824, Greek and English Lexicon. Indeed, from 1840 onwards, he began to produce illustrated dictionaries and even obtained a licence to print and publish the Bible.
Soon after, William published the ï¬rst Collins novel, Ready Reckoner, however it was the time of the Long Depression, where harvests were poor, prices were high, potato crops had failed and violence was erupting in Europe. As a result, many factories across the country were forced to close down and William chose to retire in 1846, partly due to the hardships he was facing.
Aged 30, Williamâs son, William II took over the business. A keen humanitarian with a warm heart and a generous spirit, William II was truly âVictorianâ in his outlook. He introduced new, up-to-date steam presses and published affordable editions of Shakespeareâs works and The Pilgrimâs Progress, making them available to the masses for the ï¬rst time. A new demand for educational books meant that success came with the publication of travel books, scientiï¬c books, encyclopaedias and dictionaries. This demand to be educated led to the later publication of atlases and Collins also held the monopoly on scripture writing at the time.
In the 1860s Collins began to expand and diversify and the idea of âbooks for the millionsâ was developed. Affordable editions of classical literature were published and in 1903 Collins introduced 10 titles in their Collins Handy Illustrated Pocket Novels. These proved so popular that a few years later this had increased to an output of 50 volumes, selling nearly half a million in their year of publication. In the same year, The Everymanâs Library was also instituted, with the idea of publishing an affordable library of the most important classical works, biographies, religious and philosophical treatments, plays, poems, travel and adventure. This series eclipsed all competition at the time and the introduction of paperback books in the 1950s helped to open that market and marked a high point in the industry.
HarperCollins is and has always been a champion of the classics and the current Collins Classics series follows in this tradition â publishing classical literature that is affordable and available to all. Beautifully packaged, highly collectible and intended to be reread and enjoyed at every opportunity.
This is one of those works where it is essential to understand the historical context to gain insight into the authorâs motivation. The Pilgrimâs Progress, by John Bunyan, was written in two parts â the first in 1678, the second in 1684. Bunyan was born in 1628, so he was already 50 years old when the first part was published. Those 50 years had seen a great deal of history played out in Britain, which goes a long way to explaining Bunyanâs intent.
He was born a couple of years into the reign of King Charles I, which proved to be the beginning of a period of great turmoil. Due to the Kingâs ill-judged actions, the English Civil War broke out in 1642 and would last until 1651, during which time hundreds of thousands died, either in the name of the monarchy or parliament. Charles was executed in 1649 and Oliver Cromwell took the role of Lord Protector from 1653 until his death in 1658. England then decided a monarchy was better than a republic and instated Charles II as the new king. The authorities even tried to erase the Protectorate from history by recording the start of Charles IIâs reign from 1649. To this day, England is the only nation to have rid itself of monarchy and then brought it back again.
By the time Bunyan was 30 years old he had witnessed the horrors of warfare, which had only served to exchange the selfishness of Charles I for the piousness of Cromwell. He was now witnessing the frivolity and excesses of Charles II. Understandably, he felt that English society had become so confused that it was slipping into moral and ethical bankruptcy. People wanted to put the past behind them at the expense of their religious fortitude. They had the Christian Bible for guidance, but they appeared no longer to heed its message. Bunyan set about putting things right by means of an allegorical tale that would make the reader think about the consequences of their behaviour. It would be a kind of practical guide or companion to the Bible, so that the layperson had a straightforward point of reference, instead of having to read and interpret the metaphorical words of the good book. In effect,
