Inimitable Bunyan Stands his Ground

• Published in: Bunyan studies Vol. 2; no. 1; p. 26
• Main Author: Phillips, Marion J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Bunyan Studies 01.04.1990; Northumbria University, Department of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, Design and Social Sciences
• Subjects: British & Irish literature; Bunyan, John (1628-1688); Bunyan, John (1628-88); English literature
• ISSN: 0954-0970

[...]in 1853, The English Churchman, a typical nineteenth-century publication in that it was part newspaper, part literary periodical, with an Anglo-Catholic readership, reviewed yet another version in the following careful, almost legalistic, words: we confess that we are inclined to hold that if members of the Church of England will read certain unsound popular works, and give them to children, it is much better that their errors should be removed, or modified, and their defects supplied, provided it can be done without substantial injury to the work, and provided also that due notice be given that such alteration or 'adaptation' has been made. [...]was announced and recommended The Pilgrim's Progress of John Bunyan, for the Use of Children in the English Church.1 The Rev. John Mason Neale (1818-1866) who had edited this version was a high-church Anglican who spent most of his life as warden of Sackville College, East Grinstead.2 His well-known Puseyite sympathies brought him into frequent controversy. [...]in the description of the Slough of Despond, Bunyan's general word 'sinner' is amended to 'the unregenerate man'.9 Integral to Neale's concern for doctrine is his concern over any possible denigration of the sacraments. [...]the parlour that must be sprinkled with water to be cleansed is identified by Bunyan as 'the heart of a man that was never sanctified by the sweet grace of the Gospel',10 whereas Neale takes care to have Interpreter explain that it represents 'the heart of a man that was never regenerated by Baptism'.11 Neale takes express care to have Christian very correctly and ritualistically christened early in the narrative; a mark is set upon his forehead and a sealed roll placed in his hand. [...]Neale is anxious to preserve his readers from the pernicious influence of two systems. [...]abhorred 'Pope and Pagan' becomes 'Mahometan and Pagan'.'3 Puritan teachings concentrating upon homely wisdom and practical Christianity, broken down into numbered heads fox ready recall, are largely cut out.