the point to perish, one in white shining raiment descended, and
plucked him out of that dreadful place; whilst the devils cried
after him, to leave him with them, to take the just punishment his
sins had deserved, yet he escaped the danger, and leaped for joy
when he awoke and found it was a dream.'

Such dreams as these fitted him in after life to be the glorious
dreamer of the Pilgrim's Progress, in which a dream is told which
doubtless embodies some of those which terrified him in the night
visions of his youth.

In the interpreter's house he is 'led into a chamber where there
was one rising out of bed, and as he put on his raiment he shook
and trembled. Then said Christian, Why doth this man thus tremble?
The Interpreter then bid him tell to Christian the reason of his
so doing. So he began and said, This night, as I was in my sleep
I dreamed, and behold the heavens grew exceeding black; also it
thundered and lightened in most fearful wise, that it put me into
an agony. So I looked up in my dream, and saw the clouds rack at
an unusual rate, upon which I heard a great sound of a trumpet,
and saw also a man sit upon a cloud, attended with the thousands of
heaven--they were all in flaming fire; also the heavens were in a
burning flame. I heard then a voice saying, "Arise, ye dead, and
come to judgment;" and with that the rocks rent, the graves opened,
and the dead that were therein came forth. Some of them were exceeding
glad, and looked upward; and some sought to hide themselves under
the mountains. Then I saw the man that sat upon the cloud open the
book, and bid the world draw near. Yet there was, by reason of a
fierce flame which issued out and came from before him, a convenient
distance betwixt him and them, as betwixt the judge and prisoners