Now I saw in my dream that at the end of this valley lay blood, bones, ashes, and mangled bodies of men, even of pilgrims that had gone this way formerly. and while I was musing what should be the reason, I aspired a little before me a cave, where two giants, Pope and Pagan, dwelt in old time, by whose power and tyranny the men, whose bones, blood, and ashes, and etc., lay there, were cruelly put to death. but by this place Christian went without much danger. Whereat I somewhat wondered, but I have learnt since that Pagan has been dead many a day, and as for the other, though he be yet alive, he is by reason of age, and also of the many shrewd brushes that he met with in his younger days grown so crazy and stiff in his joints, that he can now do little more than sit in his cave's mouth, grinning at pilgrims as they go by, and biting his nails because he cannot come at them. So I saw that a Christian went on his way. Yet, at the sight of the old man that sat in the mouth of the cave, he could not tell what to think, especially because he spake to him, though he could not go after him, saying, you will never mend till more of you be burnt. But he held his peace and set a good face on it, and so went by and catched no hurt. Then sang Christian, O world of wonders, I can say no less, That I should be preserved in that distress, That I have met with here, O blessed be That hands that from it hath delivered me. Dangers in darkness, devils, hell, and sin, Did compass me while I this veil was in. Yea, snares, and pits, and traps, and nets, Did lie my path about that worthless silly eye, might have been catched and tangled and cast down, but since I live, let Jesus wear the crown." Now as Christian went on his way, he came to a little ascent, which was cast up on purpose, that pilgrims might see before them. Up there, therefore, Christian went, and looking forward, he saw Faithful before him upon his journey. Then said Christian aloud, Ho, ho, so ho, stay, I will be your companion. At that Faithful looked behind him, to whom Christian cried again, Stay, stay, till I come up to you. But Faithful answered, No, I am upon my life, and the avenger of blood is behind me. At this, Christian was somewhat moved, and putting to all his strength, he quickly got up with Faithful, and did also overrun him, so the last was first. Then did Christian vaingloriously smile, because he had gotten the start of his brother, but not taking good heed to his feet, he suddenly stumbled and fell, and could not rise again until Faithful came up to help him. Then I saw in my dream they went very lovingly on together, and had sweet discourse of all things that had happened to them in their pilgrimage. And thus Christian began. My honoured and well-beloved brother Faithful, I am glad that I have overtaken you, and that God have so tempered our spirits that we can walk as companions in this so pleasant a path. I had thought, dear friend, to have had your company quite from our town, but you did get the start of me, wherefore I was forced to come thus much of the way alone. How long did you stay in the City of Destruction before you set out after me on your pilgrimage?" till I could stay no longer, for there was great talk presently after you were gone out, that our city would, in a short time with fire from heaven, be burned down to the ground. What, did your neighbours talk so? Yes, t'was for a while in everybody's mouth. What, and did no more of them but you come out to escape the danger?" No, there was, as I said, a great talk thereabout, yet I do not think they did firmly believe it, for in the heat of the discourse I heard some of them deridingly speak of you and your desperate journey, for so they called this your pilgrimage. But I did believe, and do still, that the end of our city will be with fire and brimstone from above, and therefore I have made my escape. Did you hear no talk of neighbour Pliable? Yes, Christian, I heard that he followed you till he came at the Slough of Despond, where, as some said, he fell in, but he would not be known to have so done, but I am sure he was soundly bedorbed with that kind of dirt. And what said the neighbours to him? He hath, since his going back, been had greatly in derision, and that among all sorts of people. Some do mock and despise him, and scarce will any set him on work. He is now seven times worse than if he had never gone out of the city. But why should they be so set against him, since they also despised a way that he forsook? Oh, they say hang him. He is a turncoat. He was not true to his profession. I think God has stirred up even his enemies to hiss at him and make him a proverb, because he hath forsaken the way. Had you no talk with him before you came out? I met him once in the streets, but he leered away on the other side as one ashamed of what he had done. So I spake not to him. Well, at my first setting out, I had hopes of that man. But now I will fear he will perish in the overthrow of the city, for it has happened to him according to the true proverb. The dog is turned to his vomit again, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire. They are my fears of him too, but who can hinder that which will be?" "'Well, neighbor Faithful,' said Christian, "'let us leave him and talk of things that more immediately concern ourselves. Tell me now, what you have met with in the way as you came, for I know you have met with some things, or else it may be writ for a wonder.' I escaped the slough that I perceive you fell into, and got up to the gate without that danger. Only I met with one whose name was Wanton, that had like to have done me a mischief." "'Twas well you escaped her, Nett. Joseph was hard put to it by her, and he escaped her as you did, but it had like to have cost him his life. But what did she do to you?' You cannot think, but that you know something. What a flattering tongue she had! She lay at me, hard to turn aside with her, promising me all manner of content. Nay, she did not promise you the content of a good conscience. You know what I mean, all carnal and fleshly content. Thank God you have escaped her. The abode of the Lord shall fall into her ditch. Nay, I know not whether I did wholly escape her or no. Why, I trow, you did not consent to her desires? No, not to defile myself, for I remembered an old writing that I had seen, which said, Her steps take hold of hell. So I shut mine eyes, because I would not be bewitched with her looks. Then she railed on me, and I went on my way. Did you meet with no other assault as you came? When I came to the foot of the hill called Difficulty, I met with a very aged man who asked me what I was and wither bound. I told him that I was a pilgrim going to the Celestial City. Then said the old man, Thou lookest like an honest fellow. Wilt thou be content to dwell with me for the wages that I shall give thee? Then I asked him his name and where he dwelt. He said his name was Adam the first. and I dwell in a town of deceit. I asked him then what was his work, and what the wages that he would give. He told me that his work was many delights, and his wages that I should be his heir at last. I further asked him what house he kept and what other servants he had. So he told me that his house was maintained with all the deities in the world, and that his servants were those of his own begetting. Then I asked how many children he had. He said that he had but three daughters, the last of the flesh, the last of the eyes, and the pride of life. and that I should marry them all if I would. Then I asked how long time he would have me live with him, and he told me as long as he lived himself." Well, and what conclusion came the old man and you to at the last? Why, at first I found myself somewhat inclinable to go with the man, for I thought he spake very fair. But looking in his forehead, as I talked with him, I saw there written, Put off the old man with his deeds. And how then? Then it came burning hot into my mind, whatever he said, and however he flattered, when he got me home to his house, he would sell me for a slave. So I bid him forbear to talk, for I would not come near the door of his house. Then he reviled me, and told me that he would send such a one after me that should make my way bitter to my soul. So I turned to go away from him, but just as I turned myself to go thence, I felt him take hold of my flesh, and give me such a deadly twitch back, that I thought he had pulled part of me after himself. This made me cry, O wretched man! So I went on my way up the hill. Now when I had got above halfway up, I looked behind me and saw one coming after me, swift as the wind, so he overtook me just about the place where the settle stands. Just there, said Christian, did I sit down to rest me, but being overcome with sleep, I there lost this roll out of my bosom. But, good brother, hear me out. So soon as the man overtook me, he was but a word and a blow, for down he knocked me, and laid me for dead. But when I was a little come to myself again, I asked him, wherefore he served me so. He said, because of my secret inclining to Adam the first. And with that he struck me another deadly blow on the breast and beat me down backward. So I lay at his foot as dead as before. So when I came to myself again, I cried him mercy. But he said, I know not how to show mercy. And with that knocked me down again. He had doubtless made an end of me, but that one came by and bid him forbear. Who was that that bid him forbear? I did not know him at first, but as he went by, I perceived the holes in his hands and in his side. Then I concluded that he was our lord, so I went up the hill. That man that overtook you was Moses. He spareth none, neither knoweth he how to show mercy to those that transgress his law. I know it very well. It was not the first time that he has met with me. It was he that came to me when I dwelt securely at home, and that told me he would burn my house over my head if I stayed there. But did you not see the house that stood there on the top of that hill, on the side of which Moses met you? Yes, and the lions too, before I came at it. But for the lions, I think they were asleep, for it was about noon, and because I had so much of the day before me, I passed by the porter and came down the hill." He told me, indeed, that he saw you go by. But I wish you had called the house, for they would have showed you so many rarities, that you would scarce have forgot them to the day of your death. But pray tell me, did you meet nobody in the Valley of Humility?" Yes, I met with one discontent, who would willingly have persuaded me to go back again with him. His reason was, for that the Valley was altogether without honour. He told me, moreover, that there to go was the way to disobey all my friends as pride, arrogance, self-conceit, worldly glory with others, who he knew, as he said, would be very much offended if I made such a fool of myself as to wade through this valley. Well, and how did you answer him? I told him that although these that he named might claim kindred of me, and that's rightly, for indeed they were my relations according to the flesh, yet since I became a pilgrim they have disowned me, as I also have rejected them, therefore they were to me now no more than if they had never been of my lineage. I told him moreover that as to this valley, he had quite misrepresented the thing, for before honour is humanity, and a haughty spirit before a fool. Therefore, said I, I had rather go through this valley, to the honour that was so accounted by the wisest, than choose that which he esteemed most worthy of affections. Met you with nothing else in that valley?" Yes, I met with shame, but of all the men that I met in my pilgrimage, he, I think, bears the wrong name." The other would be said nay after a little argumentation and somewhat else. But this bold-faced shame would never have done. Why? What did he say to you? What? Why, he objected against religion itself, he said. Twas a pitiful, low, sneaking business for a man to mind religion. he said that a tender conscience was an unmanly thing, and that for a man to watch over his words and ways, so as to tie up himself from the hectoring liberty that the brave spirits of the times accustomed themselves unto, would make him the ridicule of the times. He objected also, that but a few of the mighty, rich or wise, were ever of my opinion, nor any of them neither, before they were persuaded to be fools, and to be of a voluntary fondness to venture the loss of all, for nobody else knows what. He moreover objected, the base and low estate and condition of those, that were chiefly the pilgrims of the times in which they lived, also their ignorance and want of understanding in all natural signs. Yea, he did hold me to it, at that rate also, about a great many more things than I here relate, as that it was a shame to sit whining and mourning under a sermon, and a shame to come sighing and groaning home. but it was a shame to ask my neighbor forgiveness for petty faults, or to make restitution where I have taken from any. He said also that religion made a man grow strange to the great because of a few vices, which he called by finer names, and made him own and respect the base because of the same religious fraternity. And is not this, said he, a shame? And what did you say to him? Say, I could not tell what to say at first. Yea, he put me so to it that my blood came up in my face. Even this shame fetched it up, and had almost beat me quite off. But at last I began to consider, that that which is highly esteemed among men is had in abomination with God. And I thought again, this shame tells me what men are, but it tells me nothing what God or the Word of God is. And I thought, moreover, that at the day of doom we shall not be doomed to death or life according to the hectoring spirits of the world, but according to the wisdom and law of the Highest. Therefore, thought I, what God says is best, though all the men in the world are against it, seeing then that God prefers His religion. seeing God prefers a tender conscience, seeing they that make themselves fools for the kingdom of heaven are wisest, and that the poor man that loveth Christ is richer than the greatest man in the world that hates him. Shame! Depart thou an enemy to my salvation! Shall I entertain thee against my sovereign Lord? How then should I look him in the face at his coming? Should I now be ashamed of his ways and servants? How can I expect the blessing? But indeed his shame was a bold villain. I could scarce shake him out of my company. Yea, he would be haunting of me, and continually whispering me in the ear, with some one or other of the infirmities that attend religion. But at last I told him it was but in vain to attempt further in this business. For those things he disdained, in those did I see most glory. And so at last I got past this importunate one, and when I had shaken him off, then I began to sing. The trials that those men do meet withal, that are obedient to the heavenly call, are manifold and suited to the flesh, And come, and come, and come again afresh. That now, or some time else, we by them may Be taken, overcome, and cast away. O let the pilgrims, let the pilgrims then Be vigilant, and quit themselves like men. Throughout Pilgrim's Progress, it is clear that, as well as illustrating the gospel and the Christian life, that John Bunyan inserts snippets of his own life into his writing. As Christian makes his way to the end of the valley, he sees blood, bones, ashes, and the bodies of pilgrims who had gone this way. Though it is a brief reference, it is clear that we are to think of the lives of those who have gone before and suffered for the faith of Christ. Hebrews 11 exhorts us to remember such as a great cloud of witnesses of whom the world is not worthy. Bunyan himself had been imprisoned for the faith and always England as his country was very much on his heart. In the two giants, Pope and pagan, we are reminded of what England used to be, that is pagan. And in the weak picture of the Pope, how England since the Protestant Reformation was no longer in the vice grip of the papacy. However, for the most part of this passage, we have the happy experience of Christian finally catching up with Faithful. Before the two converse, we see a glimpse of how it is very easy to allow pride to overtake us. When Christian catches up with Faithful, there is a moment in which he smiles in pride because he had gotten ahead of him, but soon he stumbles and falls. The Bible is always reminding us, believer, to take heed to ourselves. Naturally, both Christian and faithful recount their experiences. They share the same common faith and speak fondly and lovingly of their master, the Lord of the Hill. While they have both walked the same way in the main, yet their experiences differ. So too for all Christians, what one person experiences by way of trial or temptation may not always be the same for another Christian. Faithful was a fellow citizen of the city of destruction and a Christian is intrigued to hear about how and why he left. Sharing our conversion experience and our testimony with each other is a sure way to encourage other believers in the faith. Faithful seems to have been most troubled by one called Shame, a name Faithful feels which doesn't suit him. His intention is to disgrace others who put their hope in God. It seems like this is the voice of the God-rejecter, possibly the atheist, one who thinks religion is pointless, and that having a tender conscience to God is not a noble or fitting thing. We are reminded in his speech that what the world despises or calls foolish, that God is pleased to use to display his power. Not many mighty, not many noble are called. Although faithful is at first taken back by this person's shame, yet he considers and remembers that God's word matters most. It is God who will judge this world.