He wrote against the liturgy of the Church of England. No two things,
according to him, had less affinity than the form of prayer and the
spirit of prayer. Those, he said with much point, who have most of the
spirit of prayer are all to be found in jail; and those who have most
zeal for the form of prayer are all to be found at the ale-house. The
doctrinal articles, on the other hand, he warmly praised, and defended
against some Arminian clergymen who had signed them. The most
acrimonious of all his works is his answer to Edward Fowler, afterward
bishop of Gloucester, an excellent man, but not free from the taint of
Pelagianism.
Bunyan had also a dispute with some of the chiefs of the sect to which
he belonged. He doubtless held with perfect sincerity the distinguishing
tenet of that sect, but he did not consider that tenet as one of high
importance, and willingly joined in communion with pious Presbyterians
and Independents. The sterner Baptists, therefore, loudly pronounced him
a false brother. A controversy arose which long survived the original
combatants. In our own time the cause which Bunyan had defended with
rude logic and rhetoric against Kiffin and Danvers was pleaded by Robert
Hall with an ingenuity and eloquence such as no polemical writer has
ever surpassed.
During the years which immediately followed the Restoration Bunyan's
confinement seems to have been strict; but as the passions of 1660
cooled, as the hatred with which the Puritans had been regarded while
their reign was recent gave place to pity, he was less and less harshly
treated.
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