[1] In 1906 the British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams set the words to a melody taken from the traditional song "Our Captain Cried All Hands" which he collected in the hamlet of Monk's Gate in West Sussex – hence the name of "Monks Gate" by which the melody is referred to in hymn books.

[2] The hymn is also been sung to the melody "Moab" (John Roberts, 1870) and "St Dunstans" (Charles W. Douglas, 1917).

[3] For a time, Bunyan's original version was not commonly sung in churches, perhaps because of the references to "hobgoblin" and "foul fiend."

The quaint sincerity of the words stirs us out of our easygoing dull Christianity to the thrill of great adventure.

The hymn's refrain "to be a pilgrim" has entered the language and has been used in the title of a number of books dealing with pilgrimage in a literal or spiritual sense.