It is an absolute relief, in some books, to turn the final page, for some stories are too long in the telling. In other books, the final page seems to arrive too early, leaving the reader slowing the pace to make the experience last. Some final pages are a sorry anticlimax, but others are just pure joy in their every sentence, like the final page, of the second book, of Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.

Bunyan is seeing off his beloved characters, one by one, across the river to heaven. And the pilgrim who occupies the privileged final paragraph is Mr Standfast. And what a hero of the Faith is he. True to his name, and courageous in the midst of a longer crossing, from where he cries: “The waters, indeed, are to the palate bitter, and to the stomach cold; yet the thoughts of what I am going to, and of the conduct that waits for me on the other side, doth lie as a glowing coal at my heart.”

The experience of death is different for all. Some pass across the river quickly, but some are called to a slower crossing; and which of the two it will be for me, is not mine to choose. But if it is to taste the bitterness for longer than I wish, and to feel the chill for longer than I want, may there yet be in my heart the glowing coal, carrying me forward to the Saviour who waits for me on the other side.