1628 – 1688

John Bunyan

Worth knowing

A tinker from Bedfordshire who served in the Parliamentary army and became a preacher.
He spent twelve years in Bedford gaol, from 1660 to 1672, for preaching without a licence.
In prison he wrote Grace Abounding (1666), the story of his conversion. The Pilgrim's Progress followed in 1678.

In Scholar’s Dream, John Bunyan has one book

Grace AboundingJohn Bunyan, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners (1666)Spirituality

John Bunyan’s quotes in the game

Every quotation from John Bunyan that a player meets in Scholar’s Dream, attached to the move that says it. Or see them as a plain list →

In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other, and each thing a book can do in a debate is called a move. Every quote below is spoken by one of those moves. Open “How it works in the game” under a quote to see the move, which books learn it, and which arguments it answers best.

“…I saw with the eyes of my soul, Jesus Christ at God’s right hand: there, I say, was my righteousness.”
John Bunyan, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners (1666), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain

How it works in the game: the move There Was My Righteousness

SpiritualityArgument · power 88 · 100% accurate

In the gameBunyan, in the field, at the end of years of trying to find a righteousness he could stand on. The relief in Grace Abounding is that it was never going to be his own — it was already finished, and elsewhere, and secure.

Learned byGrace Abounding (Lv 1)

Words John Bunyan’s books borrow from others

Moves these books can learn whose quotation comes from somebody else. The citation on each one names who actually said it.

“In peace I will both lay myself down and sleep, for you, Yahweh alone, make me live in safety.”
Psalm 4:8 (WEB).

How it works in the game: the move Rest

SpiritualityRest · 100% accurate

In the gameBreak off and rest. Stamina is restored in full and any trouble is slept off, but the book is then ASLEEP for a turn (two turns, one time in five) while the other side does as it likes.

Learned byGrace Abounding (Lv 40)

“You made us for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it reposes in You.”
Augustine, Confessions 1.1 (trans. Pusey, 1838, public domain, lightly modernized).public domain

How it works in the game: the move Restless Heart

ExperienceArgument · power 75 · 100% accurate

In the gameExperience, directed toward God at last — what the Coach felt in his gut, Augustine prayed onto papyrus.

Learned byGrace Abounding (Lv 48)

Strong against

×3The Absurdan argument · why?

Augustine’s line is that the heart is restless until it rests in God. It is the collision Camus describes, said fifteen centuries earlier by the man he studied for his degree, and with an answer.

×3The Man of the Worldan argument · why?

The cheerful, occupied man is restless and does not know it. The heart is restless until it rests in God.

×2Men Before Adaman argument · why?

Every people he names as older than Adam is a people with the same ache in it. One fall reaches all of them.

×2Penséesa book · why?

Pascal said that his account of man, wretched and great together, came from Augustine.

×2The Expressive Selfan argument · why?

The Romantic looks in and expects to find home. Augustine looked in and found the ache — and said nothing finite, the self included, has ever stilled it.

×2Totem and Tabooan argument · why?

Freud traces the restlessness to a child wanting its father. Augustine agreed it starts there, and said it does not stop there, because nothing finite has ever quieted it.

×2You Are Still a Manicheean argument · why?

A good thing, made restless — which is the distinction he says cannot be drawn.

Who else was alive

John Bunyan against everyone else in the game.

A.D. 450A.D. 700A.D. 950A.D. 1200A.D. 1450A.D. 1700A.D. 1950

Boethius Boniface John of Damascus Daniel of Winchester Timothy I Alcuin of York Pope Leo III Eulogius of Córdoba Paul Alvaro of Córdoba Rimbert Humbert of Silva Candida Michael Cerularius Peter III of Antioch Anselm of Canterbury Ari Thorgilsson Ebo and Herbord Thomas Aquinas John Wyclif Lorenzo Valla Girolamo Savonarola Pope Paul III Martin Luther Miles Coverdale William Tyndale Emperor Charles V John Calvin Teresa of Ávila John Jewel The Council of Trent The English exiles at Geneva Hugo Grotius René Descartes John Owen Blaise Pascal John Bunyan Louis XIV of France Pierre Bayle Joseph Butler Jonathan Edwards Thomas Reid George Campbell William Paley John Henry Newman J. C. Ryle Friedrich Nietzsche James Orr B. B. Warfield Herman Bavinck W. R. Sorley James Denney J. Gresham Machen

Solid bar = firm dates · faded = approximate51 authors sit outside this window