public person, in whom all the whole body of his elect are always to
be considered and reckoned; that we fulfilled the law by him, rose
from the dead by him, got the victory over sin, death, the devil, and
hell by him; when he died, we died; and so of his resurrection. 'Thy
dead men shall live; together with my dead body shall they arise,'
saith he: and again, 'After two days he will revive us, and the
third day we shall live in his sight:' which is now fulfilled by the
sitting down of the Son of Man on the right hand of the Majesty in
the heavens, according to that to the Ephesians, 'He heath raised us
up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus.' Ah! these blessed considerations and scriptures, with many
others of like nature, were in those days made to spangle in mine
eye, so that I have cause to say, 'Praise ye the Lord God in his
sanctuary; praise him in the firmament of his power; praise him for
his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.'"

Extricated from the Slough of Despond, Bunyan went on his way
rejoicing; and though sometimes interrupted by disquieting thoughts
and strong temptations, his subsequent career was a path of growing
comfort and prevailing peace. At the age of twenty-six he was
admitted a member of that Baptist church of which Mr Gifford was the
faithful pastor,--a rare man, who, in angry times, and in a small
communion, preserved his catholicity. Holding that "union with
Christ," and not agreement concerning any ordinances or things
external, is the foundation of Christian fellowship, with his dying
hand he addressed a letter to his beloved people, in which the
following sentence occurs, the utterance of a heart enlarged by
Christian magnanimity, and bent on those objects which alone look
important when the believer is waiting on the top of Pisgah: --
"Concerning separation from the Church about baptism, laying on of