The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan

interrogated them asked them from whence they came, and where they
were going, and why they were dressed in such an unusual garb?
The two men explained that they were Pilgrims and strangers in the
world, and that they were going to their own country, which was the
heavenly Jerusalem. They stated that they had given no reason to the
men of the town, nor to the peddlers, thus to abuse them, or hinder
them in their journey — unless it was, when one asked them what they
would buy — and they said that they would buy the truth.
But those who were appointed to examine the Pilgrims did not believe
them to be anything other than deranged and mad — or else that they
had only come to cause trouble at the fair.
Therefore they took them and beat them, and besmeared them with
dirt, and then put them into a cage — that they might be made a
spectacle to all the men of the fair. Therefore, the Pilgrims lay in the
cage for some time, and were made the objects of every man's ridicule
or malice — the lord of the fair laughing at all that befell them.
But the Pilgrims, being patient, and not answering insult for insult —
but rather a blessing; and returning good words for reproaches, and
kindness for injuries done — some men in the fair who were more
discerning, and less prejudiced than the rest — began to restrain and
blame the examiners for their continual abuses to the Pilgrims.
They, therefore, in angry manner, railed at those who defended the
Pilgrims, counting them as bad as the men in the cage. They accused
them of being traitors, and said that they should be made partakers of
the Pilgrim's punishments.
Page
134 of 253