PRINCETON. N. J. 
 
 Division. 
 Section 
 
THE FRIENDS: 
 
 WHO THEY ARE— WHAT THEY HAVE DONE. 
 
JAN 4 
 
 Logical 
 
 THE FRIENDS: 
 
 HO THEV ARE -WHAT THEY HAVE DONE. 
 
 WILLIAM BECK. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 Friends' Book and Tract Committee, 
 45, East Tenth Street. 
 
 1897. 
 
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 This little work attempts only a general description of the rise, 
 progress, and present state of The Society of Friends as a community 
 in its Religious, Philanthropic, Social, and Industrial aspects. 
 
 Those acquainted with the subject will kindly make allowance for 
 omissions which an intentional brevity has enforced, and any who 
 may desire further details will find them in works which most Friends' 
 libraries possess. 
 
 Such as this is— it is offered as a passing tribute of regard from 
 one whose membership in the Society by circumstance of birth has 
 been confirmed by an attachment produced by a sense of *he justness 
 of its views on Christian Faith and Practice 
 
 William Beck. 
 
 Stoke Nevvixgton, Lonugn, 
 l:ith August, 1892. 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Arcliive 
 in 2015 
 
 littps://arcliive.org/details/friendswliotlieyarOObeck 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 I. A CnosEN Generation ----- i 
 
 II. Some Details of George Fox's Early Life - 10 
 IIT. George Fox's Personal Appearance - - 17 
 
 IV. The Early Friends Travelling in the Ministry 21 
 
 V. . The Early Missionaries — Continued - - 34 
 
 VI. Persecution Under Monarchy o « , 46 
 
 VII. Origin of the Discipline . ... ^ . 55 
 
 VIII. Meeting Houses, &o. - - •• * - 69 
 
 IX. George Whitehead and his Serviok * . 63 
 
 X. Scotch Friends 72 
 
 XI. Irish Friends - - - - - . - 82 
 
 XII. Friknds in Holland, Germany, and West Indies 92 
 
 XIII. „ America 100 
 
 XIV. „ Pennsylvania - - - - - 116 
 
 XV. Ministers amongst the Settlers in America- 134 
 
 XVI. George Fox's Death 140 
 
 XVII. Society Organisation - - - - 144 
 
 XVIII. Yearly Meeting Premises . . . . 154 
 
 XIX. Christian Doctrine and Counsel, Issued by 
 
 the Yearly Meeting - - - - 159 
 
 XX. Education - ■ - 169 
 
 XXI. Disruption and Secession - - - - 175 
 
 XXII. Friends as Pioneers in Philanthropic Efforts 187 
 
 XXIII. Slavery 196 
 
 XXIV. Treatment of the Insane . . . . 207 
 
 XXV. Testimony against all War - - - - 211 
 
 XXVI. Industrial, Commercial and Social Influenck 221 
 
 XXVII. Missions 238 
 
 XXVIII. Friends as at present in Europe and 
 
 Australasia 248 
 
 XXIX. Friends of England, Ireland, Noirni America, 
 
 and Canada, in Conference assembled - 257 
 
 XXX. Conclusion 264 
 
THE FRIENDS, 
 
 WHO THEY ARE — WHAT THEY HAVE DONE, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 A CHOSEN GENERATION. 
 
 Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation- 
 —d. peculiar people that ye should show forth the praises of Iliiu 
 s-ho hath called you out of darkness into His marvellous light. — 
 / Peter ii. 9. 
 
 QOME two liundred and forty years ago, or to be 
 more exact, in 1652, might have been seen one fina 
 spring morning a tall young man of athletic build 
 climbing the steep slopes of Pendle Hill, in Lancashire. 
 It is a height remarkable for its extensive prospect. 
 In one direction can be seen the waters of the Irish 
 Channel, and in another, far off eastward, the towers 
 of York Minster. Its wild rugged summit, held in awn 
 by country folk as the nightly haunt of witches, is now 
 associated with an important event in the gospel labours 
 of this youthful traveller, George Fox. 
 
 He has left on record the feelings awakened in his 
 mind as he gazed in that fine spring morning upon th& 
 wide prospect spread out below. 
 
2 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 " I saw the Bea bordering upon Lancashire, and 
 from the top of this hill the Lord let me see in what 
 places He had a great people to be gathered, a people 
 (he adds) in white raiment." Such became known as 
 the Society of Friends, which originated through the 
 missionary labours of that young man of eight and 
 twenty amid the houses and people of the district 
 bordering around that Lancashire hill. 
 
 This travelling evangelist in his plain farmer-like 
 appearance — though ungifted with the eloquence of a 
 Whitfield or the scholarly training of a Wesley — had 
 come like a David of old from the sheepfolds to be an 
 instrument in the hand of the Great Shepherd of souls 
 to bring off many from the hills of a barren profession 
 into the conscious possession of gospel truth and power. 
 
 It was his assurance " that if but one man or woman 
 were raised up by the Lord's power to stand and live in 
 the same spirit that the apostles and prophets were in 
 who gave forth the Scriptures — that man or woman 
 should shake all the country in their profession for ten 
 miles rcu id," and certainly George Fox himself became 
 a witness to the truth of these words by a ministry that 
 shook men's hearts exceedingly both in acceptance and 
 in opposition to his doctrine. 
 
 Encouraged with the prospect opened before him 
 -on Pendic Hill, the missionary traveller descended and 
 having refreshed himself by a draught of water from 
 a spring by the wayside, entered with holy ardour on 
 the coming service. Undoubtedly George Fox possessed 
 Juodily and mental as well as spiritual endowments for 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 3 
 
 Buccess as a missionary preacher, being able at this time 
 of his life to endure great bodily exertion and hardship. 
 He could travel for days together without food or any- 
 Avhere to rest at night, seeming to live independent of 
 appetite and work without sense of fatigue. Earnest 
 yet courteous in manner, plain yet powerful in ministry 
 and doctrine, skilful in debate, he would harangue 
 crowds for hours together, or conduct successfully 
 arguments with professors and learned opponents. 
 
 By the time he had reached this particular district 
 of England he had been engaged for about five years 
 travelling in the midland parts of England in the spirit 
 of a John the Baptist, calling upon men everywhere to 
 repent for that the Day of the Lord was at hand. 
 
 He believed himself a divinely appointed herald 
 to call men off from a formal worship to one in Spirit 
 and in Truth, and from dependence on the teaching of 
 man to know the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ for 
 themselves, that they might not rest satisfied with 
 reading or hearing of the experiences of Prophet or 
 Apostle of old, but seek for the same divine influence 
 in their own hearts, and thus enter into conscious pos- 
 eession of that Holy Power the Scriptures spake of as 
 the blessing of true believers. They were to realize 
 not only the saving virtue of our Lord's sacrifice on 
 Calvary, but His spiritual presence in the heart, as the 
 glorious result of His resurrection power, and thereby 
 know a being brought off from the World's ways and 
 Teachers, to be instructed of the Lord, who had bought 
 them and was Himself the Teacher as well as the 
 
THK FRIENDS. 
 
 Saviour according to the promise, "All thy children 
 shall be taught of the Lord, and great shall be their 
 Peace." 
 
 Such views in themselves led rather to greater 
 <lepth or fulness than to any new form of belief or 
 < hange in mode of worship, and during his five years 
 of missionary labour in the Midland districts of England 
 !io fresh Society bad arisen, although his ministry had 
 aroused opposition in some quarters and met with 
 much acceptance in others. 
 
 But now as he descended that Lancashire Hill a 
 decided change was at hand and his followers were to 
 group themselves into a definite Community, realising 
 what he had seen in vision as of " a Great People in 
 white raiment by a riverside coming to the Lord." 
 
 With his accustomed diligence George Fox went 
 from house to house and from town to tow^n in this 
 district of Lancashire, proceeding thence to the York- 
 sliire and Westmoreland Dales, where he preached to 
 the people in their markets, visited them at their farms 
 and went to the mansions of the country gentry, every- 
 where and on all possible occasions, proclaiming his 
 message even in the Churches. These he called Houses 
 with a Steeple, for to him nothing deserved the name 
 •of a Church, but a membership of souls knit together 
 in the faith and love of the Lord Jesus Christ their 
 Saviour. 
 
 His Journal notes also preaching at Fairs, and adds, 
 " so dreadful was the power of God that was upon mc, 
 that people flew like chaff before me into their houses. 
 
TIllO FKIEXDS. 
 
 5 
 
 I warned them of the mighty day of the Lord, and ex- 
 horted them to hearken to the voice of God in their 
 own hearts." 
 
 Proceeding thus, amid much opposition but en- 
 couraged by the many who embraced his views of 
 Christian Truth, he came into the Furness district and 
 to the town of Ulverston, near which dwelt Judge Fell 
 and Dame Margaret his wife, persons of quality and 
 great influence in that locality. 
 
 Swarthmore Hall, their residence, is a substantial 
 mansion of Elizabethan date, and its then hospitable 
 owners kept open house to entertain visitors (especially 
 ministers or those on Gospel errands), and hither George 
 Fox was brought by one of his friends. 
 
 The minister of the parish was a fellow guest, 
 and an argument begun with him on religious subjects 
 was resumed a few days later in the church, where, 
 after the minister had finished his lecture, George Fox 
 obtained permission to give his views on the nature of 
 Christian experience and worship. These seemed so 
 novel and out of accord with what the congregation 
 , had just heard from the pulpit, that a Justice who was 
 present, ordered him to be stopped. But Margaret Fell, 
 struck with the depth and power of the message, called 
 out to let him alone, and her influence prevailed for 
 George Fox to proceed without further interruption. 
 When he had finished with the people inside the church, 
 he preached to a crowd outside in the churchyard, the 
 people being much excited at this novel scene of the 
 man in "leathern breeches" confronting their Minister. 
 
6 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 It Jiiust be remembered this was in Oliver Cromwell's 
 time, when the Church of England was dis-established, 
 the parish clergj^man dis-possessed, and sermons and 
 lectures by Presbyterian or Independent ministers 
 took the place of Church services, or use of the Prayer 
 book. Remarks from those present were permitted 
 after sermon or lecture was over, but if not approved 
 it went ill with those who had ventured to differ, for 
 these were rough times, when England had neither 
 King nor Church, and scarce a Government to hold the 
 people in order. 
 
 Margaret Fell was a lady in her own rank, and 
 had married Thomas Fell, a gentleman learned in the 
 law and Judge of assize for the principality of Wales. 
 They had a family of seven daughters and a son, all 
 by this time come to years of maturity. The mother 
 was a descendant of the Anne Askew who suffered 
 martyrdom in the Catholic days, and possessed a similar 
 decision of character and firmness of purpose whicli 
 carried convictions, when formed, into practice, and 
 she soon became an earnest adherent to George Fox's 
 views. Her daughters and other members of the 
 Swarthmore household followed her example. They 
 left off their gay attire, adopted plain modes of speech, 
 avoided unmeaning compliments, and began henceforth 
 to sit down together in their parlour to wait upon the 
 great Teacher Himself, instead of depending any longer 
 upon the national teachers in the churches, and it may 
 almost be said that the Friends, as a Society, originateil 
 in these meetings at Swarthmore Hall. 
 
THE FRIEJfDS 
 
 7 
 
 The •withdrawal of a lady of bo much local in- 
 flr.ence from the public worship, and the number 
 who followed her example, occasioned much com- 
 motion in the district, and the Judge who was away 
 on his duties in the Welsh courts when all this 
 happened, became much distressed at reports brought 
 to him of his family having been bewitched into a 
 religious melancholy by a travelling stranger. 
 
 Margaret Fell, aware of these slanders, awaited 
 her husband's return with some anxiety, but when the 
 Judge found that the alteration in his family's dress 
 and manners had increased rather than lessened their 
 affectionate attentions to all his wants, he settled in 
 with a satisfaction little expected from what had been 
 told him of the change, and George Fox coming to 
 Swarthmore Hall that evening was permitted an in- 
 terview for further explanations. 
 
 So after supper, when the family had gathered for 
 evening worship, the visitor entered, and soon became 
 engaged in a ministry, plain yet powerful, as to the 
 true nature of Christian worship, and the high privi- 
 leges open to the believer in a risen, glorified, and 
 ever-present Saviour. 
 
 The Judge formed so favourable an opinion of 
 George Fox and his doctrine, as to permit the con- 
 tinuance of meetings on his premises, and though he 
 never joined the Society, would, when at home, leave 
 his study door open to share in the meetings, and he 
 used his influence to shield the Friends as much as he 
 could when they became subject to persecution. 
 
8 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 The ministers and their followers having failed to 
 gain the Judge to their side, and unable to silence 
 George Fox by argument, roused the town rabble upon 
 him, which resulted in scenes of gross violence in this 
 district, one of which occurred at Ulverston, during 
 Judge Fell's absence, and maybe taken as an example 
 of how a missionary preacher was treated in those long 
 past days. He was brutally dragged out of church and 
 through the town, full of wounds from blows, and lay 
 on a watery common, as if dead, from which swoon, 
 suddenly reviving, he started up crying " Strike if you 
 wish ; here are my arms, my head, and my cheeks," 
 whereat a brutal fellow fetched him a blow with a 
 heavy staff, so violent that the hand and arm were bo- 
 numbed, and the people shouted it was done for for 
 ever ; but " I looked at it (adds George Fox) in the 
 love of God, for I was in the love of God to them all," 
 and presentlj-, as in a moment, strength returned to 
 hand and arm, amid the rabble's amazement, who, 
 instead of beating him again afresh, stood to hear the 
 intrepid preacher. When he had finished addressing 
 them, he went back into the town and harangued the 
 people in the market-place on the contrast their con- 
 duct presented between true and false Christianity. 
 After which, covered with bruises, body and limbs 
 black, yellow, and blue, he took his way to Swarth- 
 more Hall, where Dame Margaret and her daughters 
 were busily engaged attending with lint and plaistei 
 to the wounds and bruises of many other sufferers in 
 that day's tumult. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 9 
 
 Here a few days of much, needed rest followed, 
 and the break it makes in his missionary career affords 
 an opportunity to introduce some particulars of the 
 parentage and previous history of this guest of Margaret 
 Fell's, who had had such an influence on the religious 
 life of herself and her household, and who had so nnr- 
 rowly escaped being beaten to death by an Ulverstou 
 mob. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 SOME DETAILS OF GEORGE FOX S EARLY LIFE. 
 
 ;/ There is in broad Europe one free man— George Fox the 
 //greatest of the moderns— he looks heavenward from his earth 
 /'and dwells in an element of mercy and worship 
 
 Carlvle. 
 
 TT has already been mentioned that George Fox \^&s 
 at the time of the incidents narrated in the pre- 
 vious chapter about eight and twenty years of age. 
 His birth, was in the year 1624, and in the county of 
 Leicester, where his father, Christopher Fox, a small 
 woollen manufacturer, lived in such esteem with his 
 neighbours as to pass amongst them by the name of 
 " righteous Christer," and of his mother George Fox 
 has pithily made record " she was an upright woman 
 of the stock of the martyrs." 
 
 Under home influence for good he had grown up 
 sn unusually grave, conscientious lad, avoiding all kinds 
 of foolish sports, and so truthful and also so determined 
 that it was a saying among his associates " if George 
 mjB ' verily ' there's no altering him." 
 
 Notwithstanding the reputation thus early gained 
 for excellence of character in innocency and honesty, 
 he felt himself a stranger to the heartfelt truths of 
 religion, and was willing in search of this knowledge 
 ^ relinquish worldly prospects that opened before 
 
THE FIUKNDS. 
 
 him, and even to leave his home and relations if hu 
 could but lind the way of peace. 
 
 He consulted many occupying stations affording 
 reasonable expectations of their proving his instructors, 
 but gained from them nothing serviceable to his state, ' 
 and although he associated for a time in different placet- 
 Avith earnest and good people of various religious per- 
 suasions, he left them after trial of their ways with the 
 mournful experience that not even these had been able 
 to comfort him in his distress. 
 
 In this failure to arrive at true peace from the 
 counsels of others, he adopted solitary meditations, , 
 and would spend days in some hollow tree in a deep 1 
 study of Holy Scripture, and pass nights walking over ' 
 commons and desert places in these lonely musings. 
 
 The mental strain became so excessive as to lead 
 him to the verge of despair, for no more relief followed 
 from solitude than from the instructions or companion- 
 ship of religious professors. 
 
 It was the turning point in his spiritual life, for 
 so soon as he had despaired of self-righteousness, and 
 could adopt the language of the patriarch of Uz, " I 
 abhor myself," he heard a voice, " 0 then (he says) I 
 heard a voice which said there is ONE, even Christ 
 Jesus, that can speak to thy condition, and when I ' 
 heard it my heart did leap for joy." 
 
 Many pages of his printed journal are filled with 
 a record of feelings and experiences at the opening of 
 divine mysteries and revelations of gospel truth that 
 attended this great change ; let it suffice here to say 
 
12 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 thnt he was now become a new man in Christ Jesns 
 with whom it was his blessing to live in close spiritual 
 communion throughout a long life of apostolic service 
 that was the means of bringing many thousands to 
 rejoice in a similar blessing. 
 
 Having alluded to his utterances in times of deep 
 despair, a few expressions may be added as to his sense 
 of relief that had come after several years of mental 
 conflict and distress : — " I could not believe that I 
 should ever overcome — but when Christ opened to me 
 how he was tempted of the same devil, and had over- 
 come him and bruised his head, and that through Him, 
 and His Power, Light, Grace and Spirit I should over- 
 come also, I had confidence in Him — He gave me His 
 Spirit, and gave me His Grace which I found sufficient 
 in the deeps and in weakness — and I saw professors, 
 priests, and people were whole and at ease in that con- 
 dition which was my misery, and they loved that 
 which I would have been rid of ; but the Lord did 
 stay my desires upon Himself from whom my help 
 came, and my care was cast upon Him alone." 
 
 George Fox was about three and twenty when he 
 felt the Divine commission to speak of that which he 
 had learned and to testify of that which he had 
 spiritually seen of the Grace of God to all men in 
 Christ Jesus. He had been brought through an 
 " ocean of darkness " into the peace and power of his 
 risen and glorified Saviour. Many came to consult 
 him both from far and near, esteeming him to be a 
 young man with a discerning spirit. To such he spake 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 13 
 
 of the things of God, and was heard with an attention 
 that led many to seek through silent waiting and 
 wrestling of spirit for the same Peace themselves. 
 He saw the Harvest white, and himself as its reaper, ./ 
 with a sense of coming opposition of which his more ! 
 public ministry soon brought him an ample experience. 
 
 In this age of toleration for all religious opinions 
 it may be difficult to understand how it came to pass 
 that a young man, who would now have been termed 
 a preacher of the higher Christian life, was denounced 
 as a blasphemer or imprisoned as a dangerous character 
 by the magistrates. It must be remembered that 
 England was at this time in great commotion, political, 
 social and religious ; there was neither King nor 
 Church, and the Magistrates' power was uncertain. 
 The authorities dreaded meetings as sources of plots 
 and factions, and the preachers who occupied the 
 parish pulpits were too many of them learned pro- 
 fessors, rather than actual possessors of the Truth on 
 which they discoursed. It angered them to be lectured 
 by a youth who had never been to College, as if he 
 could unfold a more excellent way, and when he 
 claimed (as he did) to be in possession of a measure of i 
 that Spirit in which the Scriptures were written, this ' 
 was denounced as despising the Bible, and again, when 
 he pleaded for a knowledge of sin being overcome and 
 a state of perfectness attained, he was charged with 
 saying he was a Christ himself, and as a consequence 
 imprisoned for Blaspliemy , whilst what he really pro- 
 claimed was Purity, Righteousness and Perfection 
 
14 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 throngli belief in and by the power of Christ. 
 
 Religious controversy and political strife went 
 hand in hand, and as the rival parties had spent years 
 in fighting on battle-fields it is no surprise to find that 
 whichever one was in power persecuted the other, and 
 George Fox and his Friends (who were conscientiously 
 of no political party whatever) became dreaded by 
 each in turn. At this time the Puritans were upper- 
 most, who had brought their King to the scaffold, and 
 their preachers said George Fox was a man not fit to 
 be at large, so for more than a year he was their 
 prisoner in Derby jail on account of his theological 
 convictions and firm announcement of a possible free- 
 dom from Sin through the indwelling power of the 
 Lord. This his opponents had distorted into a claim 
 to be Divine, heedless of his emphatic declaration, 
 j " Nay ! We ivere nothing, Christ is all." He bid the 
 Justices tremble at the Word of the Lord, and for this, 
 one of them called him a Quaker, an opprobrious title 
 neither he nor his successors have ever lost. 
 
 It illustrates the strange temper of these zealous 
 Puritans to find that their prisoner was, after some long 
 weary months of jail life, offered his freedom, if be 
 would but officer a troop of soldiers that was being 
 raised in Derby to fight Prince Charles, then with an 
 army at Worcester seeking to regain his father's throne. 
 The soldiers, pleased at the prospect, cried out to have 
 this stalwart youth placed over them, for he looked like 
 one born to command. He declined the tempting 
 offer, saying he was "in love with all men and could | 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 15 
 
 not fight against any," which religious conviction 
 against the unlawfulness of all wars and fightings 
 being construed as a disloyalty to the government, he 
 was in rage thrust back amongst the lowest, rogues, and 
 kept near six months, as if he were the vilest of 
 criminals, in a nasty stinking place with not even a 
 bed to lie upon. At length, no real cause of offence 
 being found against him, and some trouble that fell 
 on the town being thought a judgment on their con- 
 duct, the authorities dismissed him as having proved 
 himself " an honest and virtuous man." It set him 
 1'ree for that missionary journey among the fields 
 white unto harvest," which, as already described, 
 brought him to the incidents connected with Swarth- 
 more Hall. With all the energy of youthful manhood 
 and the zeal of an inspired evangelist, George Fox prose- 
 cuted his mission in these Northern districts, now 
 preaching to throngs from a haystack or a hillock, then 
 to crowded congregations in churches for three hours 
 at a time, with ministers silenced by his arguments 
 and people amazed at his doctrine. Then came long i 
 reasonings with professors in conference or wise counsel I 
 to converts in houses. At times he is in arrest as a 
 prisoner at sessions or before justices, exposing the 
 calumnies of accusers, and clearing himself to the 
 conviction of sober-minded and learned men. In his 
 public ministry he used no flattering words or fair 
 speeches, but boldly called all to repentance. At 
 T\Iarket crosses he would publicly denounce the cozen- 
 ing and deceitful practices of traders, and sought in 
 
16 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 both high and low to awaken the voice of Conscience 
 in the heart. This he assured them was the word of 
 the Lord to the soul, which, if attended to, would lead 
 to repentance, and to a being taught of the Lord with 
 an ability to resist all evil by the Lord's own power, to 
 the end that their bodies might be pure temples for 
 Him, by His Spirit to " live in them and walk in 
 them," according to His gracious promises in Christ 
 Jesus. A great " convincement " resulted from this 
 ministry in the six counties of Durham, Northumber- 
 land, Westmoreland, Lancashire, Cumberland and 
 Yorkshire where, George Fox writes, " the plants of 
 •■ God so grew and flourished that many mouths were 
 • opened by the Lord to His praise, yea, to babes and 
 ' sucklings He ordained strength." 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 GEORGE FOX'S PERSONAL APPEARANCE. 
 S curiosity may have been awakened respecting ilio 
 
 personal appearance of one so dreaded by some, 
 and so beloved by others, it may be mentioned that in 
 the absence of any contemporary likeness,* our infor- 
 mation rests on allusions contained in his Journal, and 
 observations made by some of his intimate friends. 
 From these we may gather that he was of a tall build, 
 and in after life bulky in form, his eyes bright and 
 piercing, {'■'■Take thine eyes off said one with 
 
 whom he was arguing, "they inerce me so''') His voice 
 powerful and strong, he could address large crrwilsfor 
 hours at a time in the open air, and make himself so 
 heard above the din of an excited court, that a judge 
 called out, " Thou hast good lungs, George, it needs four | 
 or five town criers to stop thee." In all matters of 
 dress he was plain rather than peculiar, avoided finery 
 in silks and velvets, and bright colours, which the 
 gentlemen of the age wore, but always had his linen 
 clean and good, and the " leathern breeches" were but 
 what are still thought suitable for those so often, as 
 
 * One attributed to the pencil of Lely is now claimed as such, 
 hut some critics see in tlie regularity of tlie features more of the 
 quietude of a Penington than the generalship of a George Fox. 
 
 \ 
 
18 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 he was, in the saddle. His manners, though without 
 the compliments, then fashionable, of bows, or movinfr 
 of the hat, or use of yoiir humhle servant, and flattering 
 titles, were owned to be civil beyond all forms o£ 
 breeding. And so far from having the appearance of a 
 closely cropped Puritan, his long and luxuriant hair 
 rested on his shoulders with a graceful curl. His 
 mind had not been trained in the schools of human 
 learning, but was of such capacity for acquiring know 
 ledge that many of his associates who had had these 
 advantages were surprised at his questions and answers 
 in Natural things, for " he had in him the foundation 
 j of useful and commendable knowledge, and cherished 
 I it everywhere." He was plain and powerful, rather 
 than eloquent in speaking, would go to the marrow of 
 things, and had an extraordinary gift in opening the 
 Scriptures, and abruptly as sometimes his sentences 
 would fall from him, they often served as texts to many 
 a fairer declaration from others. He was, adds one of 
 his contemporaries, " a man that God endued with a 
 clear and wonderful depth, a discerner of others' spirits, 
 and very much a master of his own ; so meek, con- 
 tented, modest, easy, steady and tender, it was a 
 pleasure to be in his company." Whilst another who 
 knew him well, conversed with him often, observed 
 him much, and loved him dearly, says he was " Grace- 
 fal in countenance, manly in personage, grave in 
 gesture, courteous, weighty and instructive, zealous for 
 the Name of the Lord, and preferred the honour of God 
 before all things." 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 19 
 
 George Fox must have had some resources of his 
 own that gave him an independent livelihood, for he 
 ■was engaged in no business and never accepted re- 
 muneration for preaching. Instances occur of his 
 being charitable in gifts to cases of distress. Probably 
 he inherited a small patrimony sufficient for his 
 moderate wants. We read of the large black horse he 
 rode, and find if no hospitality was extended to him 
 that he went to some tavern or ale-house and paid for 
 his fare like an ordinary traveller. 
 
 When occasion required he could make great sacri- 
 fices of personal comfort, never more so than on his 
 first Northern journey, so fruitful of results. He had 
 left his horse, finding it a hindrance, and was on foot ; 
 was often refused meat or drink for days together 
 though he ofiiered to pay for it, yet travelled on un- 
 wearied and preached everywhere. So active was he, 
 people thought him a wizard, so enduring that after 
 days of continuous fasting a draught of cold water 
 would suffice for his refreshment, and a furze bush 
 or a hayrick serve him for shelter on a cold winter's 
 night. But this inhospitable treatment among the 
 northern folk soon changed as his character became 
 known and his followers increased, yet he ever re- 
 mained foremost in danger or in suffering amongst 
 them. " Much of my life," he once said, " I have spent 
 in prison." In 1649 such was his lot at Nottingham, 
 the succeeding year at Derby for eighteen months, then 
 at Carlisle in a filthy dungeon. In 1654 he was arrested 
 at Leicester and sent to Oliver Cromwell who, as we 
 
20 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 shall see, found no fault w ith him. At Laauceston, in 
 far Cornwall, they put him into Doomsdale.* At Lan- 
 caster he was twice confined in the castle, then sent to 
 Scarborough where it looked as if death would be hia 
 release, and at a time of life when a?e and infirmities 
 were upon him he was cast into jail at "Worcester and 
 released only by efforts that brought his case before the 
 Lord Chief Jutstice in London who gave him a clear 
 acquittal. 
 
 " " Tlie prisoners and sonic Avild people, t.ilkc(^ of spirits tliat 
 haunted Doomsdale. and liow many had died in it. But I lold 
 them if all the devils in hell were there, I was over tliem in tiie 
 power of God, and feared no sueh thing ; for Christ our priest 
 would sanctify the walls and tlie house to us, lie who biTiised 
 the head of the de\ i\.''—The Journ iL 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE EARLY FRIENDS TRAVELLIXG IN THE MINISTRY. 
 
 " What Chiist does for our salvation icithin us by His Holy 
 Spirit, the Early Friends sought to unfold and proclaim as a 
 mysterj' then little known to so many Christian believers, whilst 
 what the Lord had done xcitlwut us and for us, being generally 
 accepted, they insisted on the one more than the other." 
 
 A N ancient historian compared the spread of Chris- 
 
 tian doctrine throxighout the world to the swift 
 radiance of the rising sun, and it was with a some- 
 what similar rapidity that Friends' views of Christian 
 Truth became known throughout cities, town and 
 country, until Meetings were everywhere settled. 
 
 The labour of years in. other parts of England had 
 brought George Fox but few co-workers in missionary 
 enterprise, but when these Northern districts were 
 reached some sixty earnest spirits were suddenly found 
 tilled with a holy enthusiasm to spread everywhere the 
 views that had brought peace to their souls through his 
 ministry. 
 
 These threescore zealous missionaries left house 
 and home (some of them never to return), and going 
 forth two and two together, travelled mostly on foot, 
 taking little or no money with them, depending for 
 food and lodging on the kindness of those to whou) 
 their message might be acceptable. They coveted no 
 
22 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 man's silver, or gold, or apparel, nor sought for profit 
 or honour to themselves, but full of pious zeal desired 
 others might come through their ministry to participate 
 in the blessings they had themselves found by accept- 
 ing Christ Jesus as their Teacher and Guide, through 
 His Spirit in the heart. 
 
 For that glorious purpose had our Lord, they 
 declared, made of Himself not only an offering for Sin 
 (which all Christians acknowledged), but had obtained 
 for man power over sin, w^hereby the believer through 
 spiritual union with Him, might find an indwelling 
 force making him victorious in the hour of temptation 
 and proving an effective liberator from the dominion 
 of sin, as the Apostle said (Rom. vi. 14) — " Sin shall 
 not have dominion over you." 
 
 Far short of this were the views then prevailing of 
 the work of our Lord and Saviour for man. Religious 
 professors contented themselves wuth the belief that 
 justice due for sin had sheathed its avenging sword in 
 a Savioxir's breast, and that it honoured Him aright to 
 conceive of His righteousness covering as a robe all 
 /poor Man's defects. As for divine virtue eradicating 
 lain in Man, the preachers of the day declared any be- 
 ' lief in such inward work and power to be false in 
 doctrine, dishonouring to the Head of the Church and 
 detractive from the atoning virtue of the great sacrifice 
 on Calvary. 
 
 Whereas, these zealous ones ijroclaimed, it was 
 giving greater honour to the Saviour, who died for all 
 men, when the believer was Avillingly and patiently 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 23 
 
 submissive to a further worh of the Lord's spirit in his 
 heart creative of an indwelling righteousness. 
 
 They sought to lead on from the cross at Calvary I 
 to the day of Pentecost, that having died to all self-l 
 trust, a measure might be known of the same experience 
 enjoyed by apostles and prophets, who felt there was 
 that in them not of themselves, even the power of 
 Christ's own endless, boundless, victorious life. Its 
 result in those who thus felt the Spirit of Truth and 
 yielded to its guidance in life and practice was that it 
 influenced them in all things — their word became their 
 bond, all untruthful expressions used as compliments 
 were discarded, the vain fashions of the world were 
 laid aside, truth was sought in word and act ; which in 
 an age of gaiety and fashion, made them singular in 
 daily life, and led into singularity of religious practice. 
 They could not join with mere professors in the out- 
 ward worships, or use words in Psalm singings or 
 prayers not truly expressive of their feelings at the 
 time, and they preferred to sit down in a reverential j 
 silence, waiting to feel fresh arisings of the Spirit of ' 
 Life in their hearts. 
 
 One social peculiarity resulting from the desire to 
 be truthful was the saying Thoxi to all persons alike if 
 only one were addressed, whereas society favoured the 
 use of You as a compliment to those in genteel circum- 
 stances like as the term Esqxiire is now applied to some 
 and Mr. to others ; the Friend (in this respect religiously 
 republican) said Thou even in the presence of the King, 
 nor could he, when hats were worn in doors (as in the 
 
24 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 House of Commons still) and only removed as an act 
 of worship, consent to take them off as a compliment 
 iu reverence to any Law Court, notwithstanding such 
 religious scruples condemned him in the eye of captious 
 judges as one who would not reverence the Law. 
 
 His conviction also that Oaths were unlawful and 
 all Swearing forbidden to a Christian, proved especial 
 cause of trouble, for in those days such were the only 
 methods by which a person could prove his loyalty to 
 a Government that visited refusal with loss of liberty 
 and property. In the face of these penalties the Friend, 
 true to the command of his Lord, would " swear not at 
 all," letting his Yea be Yea and his Nay, Nay ; assured 
 that " whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil." 
 
 This valiant missionary band came forth in an age 
 of preaching, when learned divines unfolded the mean- 
 ing of Scripture in sermons of several hours' length, and 
 officers in the army, captains and colonels of regiments 
 were preachers as well as soldiers. Religious questions 
 pervaded the politics of the day, and Parliamentary 
 sittings would be spent in their discussion or debates 
 merge into preaching and prayer. 
 
 The Liturgy was superseded in 1G45 by another 
 form of worship, called the Directory, which continued 
 in use until the restoration of the monarchy. The 
 Directory was not an absolute form of devotion, but 
 contained only some general directions to the ministei-s 
 as to public prayer and preaching and other parts of 
 iheir functions, leaving them a discretionary power to 
 (ill up the vacant time. Whilst then; was this general 
 
THE FEIENDS, 
 
 25 
 
 regulation respecting the form of worship, the pulpits 
 were occupied variously by all kinds of professors. 
 " Independent and Presbyterian priests and some Bap- 
 tist priests (observed George Fox) had got into tha 
 steeple-houses," and now that the Episcopalians were 
 driven out, " hunted after a benefice as crows do after 
 a rotten sheep." 
 
 Amidst this prevalent Bible exposition and doc- 
 trinal discussion, while different parties were, forming 
 Confessions of faith and bases of religious agreement, 
 came this message, not only to learn from Scripture 
 what the Lord had done in days past, or draw there- 
 from a rule of conduct, but also, and more especially, 
 to partake in the same power that had made of men 
 xVpostles and Prophets, so that each one, no longer 
 dependent on his fellows, might be himself a priest, 
 taught of the Lord, joyfully to know a royal state in 
 dominion over sin through the indwelling power of 
 his risen Saviour. " The Son of God " (said one of 
 these) " is come to deface and destroy the image of the 
 Devil, and renew us up in the image of God." It 
 came as a new aspect of the Gospel to people hitherto 
 dependent on ceremonies or preachings, and they sat 
 down in silence to feel after and to know Him who 
 would not only destroy their self-confidence, but also 
 liberate them from dependence on other men, and 
 Himself heal their broken spirits and raise up in them 
 His own power. 
 
 The teachers of the day finding their congregations 
 lessened, denounced this view of Christian life as a 
 
26 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 self-dependence, and because these earnest minds sought 
 rather for that which the Scriptures bore witness of, 
 than rested in the feelings and thoughts awakened by 
 Texts, the pulpits cried out that the Holy Word was 
 being neglected, and called upon magistrates, autho- 
 rities, and justices of the peace to stamp out this 
 heresy. 
 
 England during these days of the Commonwealth, 
 being pervaded with unsettlement through factious 
 plotting for a change, it was easy to rouse the sus- 
 picions of the rulers against those whose views as they 
 spread everywhere, lessened the authority of preachers 
 and ministers, and the alarm cry was raised that if 
 unchecked, Magistracy and State authority would go 
 likewise, and all the country be thrown into confusion. 
 
 In times when the scaffold or the pillory, the 
 whipping post or the filthy jail were the modes for 
 enforcing authority, it needed much courage and holy 
 enthusiasm to brave the displeasure of the ruling 
 classes in religion, and few of these sixty missionaries 
 escaped without some share in such cruelties, un- 
 righteously administered in the name of Justice. 
 
 Truly these illuminated ones had to endure a 
 great fight of controversy and affliction, with trial of 
 cruel mockings aud scourgings." Ears were cut off', ,| 
 noses were slit, and bonds and imprisonments inflicted (' 
 for no other cause than opposition to the doctrines of 
 popular preachers or refusal under any circumstances 
 to swear or take an oath. Such brutalities, ordered 
 by justices and magistrates in the name of Justice, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 27 
 
 seem incredible to us living in this time of general 
 Toleration, especially as those who thus suffered were 
 jireachers of righteousness, who called on all men " to 
 walk wisely, gently, lovingly, meekly, and soberly, 
 redeeming the time because the days were evil," and 
 laboured that a holy generation might be raised, 
 strengthened, and increased in the earth among the 
 children of meij. 
 
 Not only are the names known of most of these 
 threescore propagators of Friends' views, but many of 
 the letters written by them to Margaret Fell during 
 their mission remain among the Society's manuscripts, 
 and of some of them Memoirs or Journals were pub- 
 lished recording their wide-spread labours, great suc- 
 cesses and grievous sufferings. 
 
 Most of them were either young in years or in 
 the prime of life; few possessed School attainments, 
 but were deep in spiritual experience, and their preach- 
 ing was not " with enticing words of man's wisdom, 
 but in demonstration of the Sjiirit and of power," and 
 their endeavoiar was to bring off from the outward to 
 the inward, and raise a " faith in the heart that should 
 stand, not in the wisdom of men, but in the power of 
 God."— (I. Cor. ii. 4.) 
 
 They entered freely into controversy, attended 
 and spoke at public Lectures, preached in Markets, held 
 great meetings, and those who accepted their message 
 were gathered by them to assemble regularly in private 
 dwellings or in some hired premises. In this way the 
 Society of Friends quickly rose all over England, and 
 
28 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 in London and Bristol increased greatly among the 
 inhabitants of these chief commercial centres at a time 
 when such places as Birmingham or Bradford, Leeds, 
 Liverpool, or Manchester, were but villages compared 
 with their present populations. 
 
 Great diversity, both of station and character com- 
 bined to give effect to this wide-spread mission. Some 
 were but domestic servants, others had independent 
 means, some had left the plough in the furrow, others 
 the pen of the scribe or lamp of the student ; some 
 were farmers, others tradesmen, several had been 
 esteemed as able preachers ; and amidst this group 
 great differences are discernible of character ; one 
 was deliberate like John Bitrnyeat, others calm and 
 sagacious like Thos. Aldam or Alexander Parker. 
 Rivliard Farnsicorth and Bohert Widders were thun- 
 derers against hypocrisy and deceit, Josm/i Cole ecstatic 
 with visions of heavenly glory, Wm. Dewshury grace- 
 ful in mind and speech, George ^V^litehcad dehorn rxxicT 
 of men. These may be taken as types of the variety 
 in this large missionary band, amongst whom none 
 shewed more zeal than the youthful Edward Burroughs 
 who made great ferment by his ardent conduct in the 
 Metropolis. 
 
 " Last First-day but one," observes E. Burrough, 
 in lG5i, "I was at a Steeple-house [in London] in the 
 forenoon, and had free liberty to speak what I was 
 free, and passed away to [our] meeting in the after- 
 noon." 
 
 About the same date Francis Howgill, his fellow 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 labourer, writes:"! went to E.B., who was pone to 
 Lombard Street to a public steeple-house, wliere most 
 of the high notionists in the City came, and so 1 came 
 to him before the priest had done, and after he ceased,. 
 Edward stood up upon a seat and spoke with a loud 
 voice and in much power, and all was still and quiet, 
 and he spoke about an hour and the people were very 
 calm, and afterward I spoke and we cleared our con- 
 sciences and passed away in peace." 
 
 As the work in London became eventually so im- 
 portant that it has been estimated the Society had there 
 some 10,000 adherents, a few more allusions may be 
 made to this work of Edward Burrough and Francis 
 llowgill, who were the first to declare Friends' views 
 publicly in the Great City. 
 
 "Great is our travail (they write) till Christ be 
 brought forth in this people, and our suffering is even 
 Avith and for the pure seeii, which lies in bondage in 
 this City . . here are the subtlest serpents to grapple 
 with . . great giants to e'ncouuier, but by the power 
 of the Lord the mouths of lions have been stopped and 
 our adversaries have been put to flight. . . All the- 
 Priests and all the gathered Congregations in the city 
 preach against us and are bent in great rage, and print 
 lies, and incense people much. We have ordinarily 
 two public disputes with the heads of them, and they 
 lose their members so fast they know not what to do,, 
 yet the City is pretty calm and quiet. . . We get 
 Friends on the First days to meet together in several 
 places out of the rude multitude " [soiuo seven or eight 
 
30 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 had opened their houses for these more private gather- 
 ings] " and -we two go to the great meeting place which 
 we have, which will hold a thousand people." And 
 here, Bible in hand, Edward Burrough would expound 
 for hours before crowds of listeners, " threshing (as he 
 called it) among the multitude." He was ready also 
 to avail himself of any occasion that might offer for a 
 public proclamation of the gospel. Once (for example) 
 he came upon a crowd of rough fellows assembled on 
 an evening in Moorfields, around some wrestlers, and 
 arrived just as one who had thrown all competitors 
 was striding in defiance round the ring challenging any 
 to try a throw with him, whereupon Edward Burrough 
 stepped out into the midst, and as the hero of muscle 
 stared at his strange antagonist, began to declare in his 
 powerful voice that he was not come to wrestle against 
 flesh and blood, but against the powers of evil and 
 darkness. The people listened to him, greatly wonder- 
 ing, and departed quietly, feeling that this ardent youth 
 of scarce eighteen was such a preacher as they had not 
 heard before. He and his companion, Francis Howgill, 
 are described as instruments in the hand of the Lord 
 " for the gathering of many, who like good old Simeon 
 were waiting for the consolation of Israel." 
 
 No central control directed the movements of those 
 composing this Friends' missionary band ; they went 
 only where they themselves felt free to go, but met 
 together when occasions served for advice and counsel, 
 and evidently kept in touch with the mistress of 
 Swarthmore Hall, from the neighbourhood of which 
 
THE FKIBNDS. 
 
 31 
 
 most of them had come, and it is very probable some 
 of the poorer ones were dependent in a measure on 
 her bounty for means of travel in this early stage when 
 no Society had as yet been formed. 
 
 Let it be afresh remembered these were times of 
 National confusion and commotion. Amidst the wreck- 
 age of the Constitution the Throne was vacant, the 
 Church dis-established ; a King, a Prime Minister and 
 an Archbishop had each died on the scaffold ; the 
 House of Lords was abolished, the Prayer-book pro- 
 scribed, and Episcopalian ministers driven from their 
 parishes, and from the Universities. Civil war between 
 King and Parliament was only just ended, and people's 
 minds were unsettled amid conflicting ideas in religious, 
 social, and political life. 
 
 The Liturgical service of the Episcopalian was 
 thrust aside and the public use of the Prayer-book for- 
 bidden. The people assembled in churches, but it was 
 to find some Presbyterian, Independent, or even Baptist 
 preacher in possession of the pulpit, who would pray 
 extemporaneously for the hour together, and preach at 
 great length, many of them in excellent discourse, 
 learned, devout, and eloquent. Their congregations 
 had in fact assembled not so much to worship as to be 
 taught by one who was minister rather than priest. 
 Lectures as a means of instruction were much in favour 
 with these Divines, when discussions would be permitted. 
 All this should be borne in mind, as we read, in Friends' 
 histories, of the three-score missionaries in their cam- 
 paign, entering churches, sometimes interrupting, but 
 
32 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 mostlj' waiting till the minister had finished, when the 
 rough handling received, came not so much as a punish- 
 ment for this conduct in a place of worship, as from 
 the objection taken hy the minister and congregation 
 to their doctrine. It is observable that after the 
 Commonwealth days, when Episcopalian ministers had 
 regained their pulpits, and Liturgical services were re- 
 established by law, no repetition of these scenes that 
 at one time were so frequent, is observable. 
 
 Cromwell's government, whilst it gave England a 
 measure of outward peace and jirosperity at home and 
 abroad, effected no settlement of her religious difficulties 
 either by establishment of any one form, or that tolera- 
 tion for all forms which he professed as his aim. The 
 various religious bodies struggled over possessions of 
 pulpits, ])arishes, and tithes, each one as it gained any 
 power oppressing the other, and all in turn and some- 
 times all at once striving to uproot and disperse the 
 Friends. 
 
 Such of these as travelled in the ministry were 
 frequently arrested as Vagrants, and as they could not 
 swear to the oath of allegiance when it was tendered 
 them were sent to prison as persons dangerous to the 
 State, often on account of their want of outward rever- 
 ence to the magistrates in keeping on their hats when 
 in court. Those who for conscientious reasons could 
 not pay Tithes suffered great loss of goods by distraints, 
 and thus for one or another cause the days of the 
 Commonwealth were hard times for tender consciences. 
 
 Their persistent practice in meeting together en- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 33 
 
 countered also the jealousy of the military governors 
 Cromwell set over the counties, lest such gatherings 
 should be nurseries of Sedition as many then were, but 
 Friends kept theirs clear of politics, and held firmly 
 to the principle of yielding obedience in all things civil 
 " to them that have the rule over you." 
 
 George Fox was, however, sent prisoner by one of 
 these military governors to Oliver Cromwell in London, 
 where he was examined personally by the great Pro- 
 tector, who, after hearing his doctrine, grasped him by 
 the hand and wished he could have more of his com- 
 pany, telling his people to see that he had some dinner 
 before he left, and when he heard that this had been 
 declined, said, " Now I see a people has arisen that I 
 cannot win, as I can all others, by gifts and honours." 
 He could not bribe the Friends, and to his discredit let 
 the ministers and magistrates persecute them, but with- 
 out eflEecting their dispersion ; such treatment only 
 consolidated them more closely into a Society, for there 
 is no human fellowship like companionship in suffer- 
 ing, and Friends grew in numbers mightily. 
 
CHAPTER y. 
 
 I'HE EARLY MISSIONARIES— Co/(//?l»e«?. 
 
 " In our days," writes Robert Barclay, " God hath raised up 
 witnesses for Himself, as he did fishermen of old, many, j-ea, 
 most of whom are labouring and mechanic men, who, altogether 
 without that learning, have by the Power and Spirit of God struck 
 at the very root . . . and by reaching their consciences, 
 gathered thousands into the same power and life who, as to tl:e 
 outward part, have been far more knowing than they, yet not able 
 to resist the virtue that proceeded from them." 
 
 ILLIAM AMES had a quick understanding and 
 
 ' agreeable manners, and held, in early life, a com- 
 mission in the Parliamentary army, where he was careful 
 to preserve strict discipline among those under his com- 
 mand, having himself forsaken the gaieties of youth 
 under strong religious convictions. He was one of the 
 early converts to Friends' views, and as a zealous 
 preacher did excellent service during many years of 
 Ills life in spreading them not only in England, but in 
 Holland and parts of Germany. His latter years were 
 spent in Amsterdam, where he settled in business as a 
 wool-comber. 
 
 John AudUind, born in Westmoreland, possessed 
 superior abilities, and had gained a considerable re- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 35 
 
 pntation as a preacher among the Independents, but 
 found the Friends' views led him into a deeper and 
 more spiritual experience of his Saviour's life and 
 power, of which he became a most zealous advocate, 
 finding especial acceptance with the people in Bristol, 
 who crowded to hear him in meetings that for want of 
 space were held in an orchard, and converts gathered 
 80 fast that it was said " their net was like to break 
 with fishes, they had caught so many." 
 
 John Camm, who was his companion in much of 
 this service, came also from Westmoreland. He was 
 married and possessed of an independence, but gave 
 himself to this itinerancy with great zeal, encountering 
 joyfully hardships that weakened his constitution. 
 
 Wm. Dewsburij, was a Yorkshireman, a shepherd, 
 clothier, and a soldier, endowed with great qualifica- 
 tions both natural and spiritual, fervent yet deep, calm 
 and sagacious, weighty in counsel, courageous in suf- 
 fering. To England's shame, he spent much of his 
 time in prison, which for the cause of his Saviour he 
 entered as willingly as if it were a palace, and told his 
 friends who pitied him his loss of liberty that these 
 bolts and bars were as jewels to his spirit, so greatly 
 was he upheld to triumph over all outward sufferings. 
 
 Giles Barnardiston, a Suffolk gentleman, well 
 Educated and well married, once a Colonel in the 
 A.rmy, was another of these preachers by whom great 
 Bufferings were endured (chiefly in the Eastern Coun- 
 ties), from which it might have been thought his social 
 reputation and character would have exempted him. 
 
36 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 Francis Eowgill, from "Westmoreland, travelled 
 chiefly with Edward Borrough through most parts of 
 England. His gifts in the ministry were bo extra- 
 ordinary as to render him conspicuous in the Friends' 
 annals as one of the chief founders of the Society. 
 
 William Caton and John Stuhhs were oft com- 
 panions in gospel travels and service ; both were from 
 the North. "Wm. Caton was one of Judge Fell's pupils 
 — his companion (of sterner mould) had been a soldier. 
 They had most success in Kent amidst treatment from 
 authorities such as rogues only deserve. Ashamed of 
 such conduct, Luke Howard gave them the shelter of 
 his house, and successfully challenged the constables 
 to attempt any violation of its legal sanctity. [He was 
 the ancestor of the Howard firm of Manufacturing 
 Chemists]. 
 
 Samuel Fisher, who lived in Kent as a beneficed 
 clergyman, gave up all preferment and became known 
 as an able defender of Friends' views in Conferences 
 and by his published works, which show great ability 
 and deep learning. 
 
 Josiah Coale, a gentleman of Gloucester, possessed 
 of property, lived and died a bachelor, giving all his 
 time and substance to the advancement of the Cause 
 he had embraced. He was one who travelled to 
 America, where he preached to the Indians. He i» 
 remembered as cheerful and social in temperament, 
 sharp and piercing in handling the sword of the Spirit, 
 very patient under sufferings and trials in England, in 
 America, and in Holland, ending his days at the early 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 37 
 
 age of thirty-five, but able to rejoice at the glorious 
 prospect death opened before him. " It had been his 
 life and joy," writes one who knew him, " to declare 
 the gospel and to proclaim the Word of God," and 
 adds, " with what a charming and melodious voice did 
 he sound forth the praises of the Most High in his 
 public prayers." 
 
 Thomas Loe was another gentleman. He had had 
 a university education. His truly successful labours 
 m the spreading of Friends' principles wherever ho 
 •travelled were remarkable as being the means of 
 /William Penn forsaking the prospects of a courtier 
 (and man of fashion, which life had opened to him, for 
 that of a Society in which he became so prominent a 
 member. Thomas Loe's affable manners, tender sym- 
 pathy and benevolent disposition were natural qualifi- 
 cations which greatly endeared him to his Friends, 
 whilst great Spiritual discernment enabled him to 
 expound the word aright to their comfort and advance- 
 ment in religious life. 
 
 Alexander Parker is described as one comely in 
 person with a gentleman-like carriage and deportment ; 
 he was from Bolton and well educated. After some 
 time spent in travel in the ministry he married and 
 settled in London where he was prominent among 
 those engaged in the settlement of the Society's con- 
 stitution, being a very able and dependable man. 
 
 Robert Lodge and John Burnyeat, both from the 
 North, were companions in gospel journeys, trials and 
 sufferings, the former so ready to yield to a sense of 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 iluty as to say ou his death bed " The Lord knew he 
 had never refused to go wherever a sense of it had 
 drawn him," he was of an amiable disposition, circum- 
 spect conversation, and had an excellent gift in the 
 -Xiinistry. John Burnyeat had passed through deep 
 spiritual experiences, J.V was of a deliberate and de- 
 liberative disposition, frequently waiting long in the 
 congregations before he felt any commission to speak, 
 which added much to the impressiveness of his elo- 
 quent addresses. He laboured much and long, having 
 a strong constitution and an undaunted spirit that bore 
 him up through great trials under which weaker 
 frames broke doAvn. He spent his time mostly in the 
 Lord's work and service, visiting Friends up and down 
 in England, Wales, Scotland, Barbadoes, New England, 
 Long and Rhode Islands, New York, and New Jersey, 
 and during the latter part of his life he married and 
 settled in .Ireland, where he also encountered great 
 hardships through the ardour with which he prose- 
 cuted the holy Cause he had embraced. 
 
 Thomas Aldam was a gentleman of means from 
 Doncaster and an earnest and most judicious labourer 
 in the Society to which he attached himself from its 
 earliest stages. He was at the pains by travel to collect 
 facts as to Friends' sufferings and laid these before 
 Cromwell, but seeing no hope of his interference for 
 their relief tore his own cap in the Protector's presence, 
 
 / / saying, " So shall the government be rent from Thee 
 
 ' ' and Thy house." 
 
 The two brothers Christopher and Thomas TcDjlor, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 39 
 
 of Shipton, hud great abilities and a learning that 
 qualified them to be schoolmasters, and as such they 
 were some of the earliest to undertake this office among 
 the Friends and are remembered more for such service 
 than in ministerial or evangelistic labours. 
 
 Richard Huhherthorn, a yeoman from Lancashire, 
 is a name conspicuous among the early ministers, for 
 although he had not a strong constitution, his labours 
 were extensive, and notwithstanding the natural weak- 
 ness of his voice, his ministry was of a kind that pro- 
 duced great convincement. He grieved much over the 
 suflEerings caused by persecutions, and had interviews 
 with, and received promises of relief from the king, 
 only to find how unreliable was the royal word that 
 ought to have been sacred to truth. He himself died a 
 prisoner. 
 
 I'homas Saltlwiise was a domestic in the Fell 
 family, and had much acceptance in his travels and 
 Gospel labours, for his disposition was affable and 
 pleasant, his manners pleasing, and his ministry sound 
 and powerful. 
 
 Miles Halhead travelled with Thomas Salthouse, 
 and came from the same district. Their chief work lay 
 in the far West, to the gaining of many, but to their own 
 sufferings, from ill-treatment and cruel imprisonments. 
 
 Samuel Waldenjield was from Suffolk, and possessed 
 independent means. He travelled much in the ministry, 
 both in England, Scotland, Ireland, and Germany, in all 
 about 40,000 miles, and had a great reputation in th© 
 society for his varied qualifications. 
 
40 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Christopher Story is remembered specially for liis 
 sound judgment and ability in the hearing and settle- 
 ment of differences submitted to his arbitration. 
 
 Alexander Arscott, of Bristol, the son of a clergy- 
 man, had a university education and his services were 
 much valued as a schoolmaster. 
 
 Samuel Overton, though only ? labourer's son in 
 social position, had so sound a judgment as to be help- 
 ful in the discipline. 
 
 John Gurney, of Norwich, was possessed of many 
 and excellent qualities. A gentleman and a scholar, 
 his eloquence made it a delight to sit under his ministry, 
 yet he sought not popularity. 
 
 Benjamin Bangs waa another eminent minister, 
 fervent in supplications, grave in deportment, but 
 jileasing in manners. He spent most of his life as a 
 travelling minister, 
 
 James Dickenson, of Cumberland, also travelled 
 much and far and was three times in America ; a very 
 serviceable and faithful minister, humble, circumspect, 
 and of godly conversation. 
 
 Such characters as these glisten amid the records 
 of the Society's rise and rapid increase during its earlier 
 years, and ought to remove the unfavourable impression, 
 if anywhere remaining, which the fanatical excesses of 
 a few passing under the Society's name may have 
 caused. 
 
 No movement so wide-spread as this could occur 
 in such an excited state of public feeling without in- 
 stances of imprudent or even reproachful conduct, the 
 
NAVI.ER (from an OLD PRINT. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 41 
 
 blame of which should rest with Individuals rather 
 than be associated with a Community whose leaders 
 are seen to be persons of highest principle and their 
 efforts directed to secure consolidation into settled 
 congregations where all might be done " decently and 
 in order." 
 
 Hence there is no occasion to give account of some 
 who made undressed ?ippearances in the public thorough- 
 tares or of those who carried out signs of warning or 
 prophetic denunciation much in imitation of the old 
 Hebrew prophets ; the wonder being not so much that 
 tliese scenes occasionally occurred, as that they were 
 few and that the Friends could be kept so peaceable, 
 notwithstanding the shocking cruelties inflicted upon 
 them, as to have earned the abiding reputation of being 
 a " quiet and highly respectable body." 
 
 One case, however, is too much of public notoriety 
 to be thus passed by without acknowledging that James 
 Nayler gave great cause of grief' for his reproachful 
 conduct. He had been a landed proprietor near Wake- 
 field, Yorkshire, and was engaged in ploughing his 
 fields with his own team, when he felt the summons to 
 leave his all, that he might proclaim Christ and his 
 Kingdom in the heart. Such was his unquestioning 
 obedience that, without going home to take leave of 
 wife and family, he at once set out out on this evan- 
 gelistic mission, which became marked with so much 
 spiritual fervour and success, and alas stained by a 
 reproach brought on his friends that not even his 
 repentance can wholly remove. None of the fraternity 
 
42 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 of early Friend preachers had had a larger share cf 
 popularity. E s eloquent discourses drew crowds of 
 admiring listeners, often from those moving in the 
 higher circles, as it surprised them to find one in the 
 dress and manners of a countryman possessed of such 
 oratorical powers on the loftiest themes that can engage 
 man's affections. A chief subject being the indwelling 
 of Christ by His Spirit in the heart of the believer, he 
 became, through the wicked flatteries of some fanatical 
 followers, beguiled into a conception that he was in 
 himself a manifestation of Christ, which it is said the 
 form of his visage favoured from being so like to 
 artistic presentments of that of the Saviour. He went 
 so far as to permit a few of these deluded ones to parody 
 the Triumphal entry by leading their favourite seated 
 on an ass into Bristol, whilst they shouted Hosannas 
 to him amid the excited crowd. 
 
 The result of such actions in these days would have 
 been to subject those engaged in them to medical treat- 
 ment in some pauper lunatic Asylum. But then it was 
 regarded as a criminal offence of such importance as 
 for James Nayler to be sent up to London, for a Parlia- 
 mentary Committee to inquire into and judge the case. 
 
 By them he was condemned as a blasphemer to be 
 pilloried, branded, and whipped. Public opinion evi- 
 dently considered this as cruel treatment, for a merchant 
 of the City stood by him in the pillory, and the people 
 neither jeered at nor pelted him as is usual in such 
 cases, with refuse and rotten eggs. They saw with 
 surprise how the sufferer forgivingly kissed the exe. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 43 
 
 cutioner who bored his tongue and branded his noble 
 brow. The succeeding whippings twice given — once 
 through the streets of London and again through those 
 of Bristol — almost killed him with their severity. His 
 undaunted spirit uttered neither murmur nor groan as 
 the hangman lashed and gashed his bared back and 
 sides, whilst with hands tied to the cart its horse dragged 
 him slowly along. There is however a bright sequel 
 (which those who reproach him too little remember), 
 for he was brought to deep repentance and condemna- 
 tion of his errors, which led to the entire forgiveness of 
 his friends. At his death (which occurred not very long 
 after) there was found a paper beautifully expressive of 
 his altered sentiments : 
 
 " There is a Spirit which I feel 
 
 That delights to do no evil 
 
 Nor to revenge any wrong, 
 
 But delights to endure all things, 
 
 In hope to enjoy its own in the end. 
 
 In God alone it can rejoice ; 
 
 I found it alone — being forsaken 
 
 I have fellowship therein with them 
 
 Who lived in dens and desolate places in the oarth, 
 
 "Who through Death obtained this resurrection 
 
 And Eternal Holy Life." 
 
 Another instance of one who came also from the 
 fields, but was only a lad and the son of a labourer, is 
 marked by almost equal cruelty as Nayler's, but wholly 
 undeserved, for James Parnel was a holy youth, with 
 a mind and ability above his position. Whilst but a 
 little lad, as George Fox calls him, he became a preacher 
 of great power in the Eastern Counties where he 
 
44 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 travelled. It seems scarcely credible, but after his 
 arrest, he was brought up for trial in chains like a 
 common felon, under charge of being a heretic and, 
 therefore, dangerous to the State. He was condemned 
 and fined as a Vagabond, and for non-payment of 
 this fine left to the cruelty of the keeper of Colchester 
 Castle, where the hole in the wall in which he was 
 confined is to this day an object of melancholy interest 
 to its visitors. At that time it was only reached by a 
 ladder, and this so short that he had to climb the upper 
 part by a rope, and one day. missing his hold through 
 weakness, fell to the pavement below with a broken 
 leg, that for want of proper treatment, soon ended his 
 days. He fell like Stephen an early martyr to the 
 cause he had so ardently espoused. The only offenr*> 
 Ids persecutors could find against him was the con- 
 fidence with which he had asserted the conscious 
 presence of Him in his heart, whom Stephen saw amid 
 opened heavens. 
 
 " Sublimer in this world, know I nothing " (writes 
 i Carlyle) " than a peasant saint. Such a one will take 
 ': thee back to Nazareth itself. Thou wilt see the splen- 
 ' dour of heaven spring forth from the humblest depths 
 of earth, like a light shining in great darkness." 
 
 As further illustrating the youthful age of some 
 engaged in this ministry are the instances of — 
 
 George Newland, a youth of Ireland, who entered 
 upon a gospel service in his twelfth year, to the com- 
 fort and edification of his friends, and died in his 
 nineteenth, Ellis Lewis, of Wales, was similarly engaged 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 45 
 
 at 13, William Hunt, of North Carolina, at 14, and 
 Christiana Barclay, daughter of the Apologist, when 
 about fourteen. 
 
 The Society of Friends in the counties of Norfolk, 
 Suffolk, Essex, and Cambridge was first raised and be- 
 came very numerous chiefly through the instrumentality 
 of James Parnel, William Caton, and George White- 
 head, before any of them had attained the age of 20 years. 
 
 Much wise counsel remains in Documents issued 
 by these brethren when in conference, together with 
 earnest cautions against seeking popularity or self- 
 exaltation. " Our labour and travail hath been and 
 otill is to preach Christ as servants for His sake, and 
 to gather to Him and not to ourselves." 
 
 Not a few women Friends had their part in this 
 ministry, some of whom travelled far and wide, such 
 as Ann Downer, Mary Fisher, Isabel Buttery, Ann 
 Austin, Elizabeth Hooton, with many others- 
 preachers, as well as mothers in ths So-^iety's Israel. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 PERSECUTION UKDER MONARCHY. 
 
 "There are many religions in the world and a variety of forms 
 Trhich have occasioned great persecutions and the loss of many 
 lives, each contending that they are right : but there is but one 
 true religion, arising from faith in God and in His son Jesus 
 Christ and hope in His mercy."— THOMAS GILPIN. 
 
 ITH the death of Oliver Cromwell, England, tired 
 
 of unsettlements which only a military genius 
 could control, reverted as by common consent to the 
 restoration of the monarchy by inviting Charles the 
 Second to his father's throne. 
 
 He came amid general rejoicings, for his promisee 
 gave assurance that all of various opinions in religion 
 might have liberty to worship in their own way if loyal 
 and peaceable in conduct. Such prospects vanished 
 as a dream when it was perceived he chose his coun- 
 sellors from amongst those of high views in Church 
 and State under which arrangements orders were 
 issued to re-establish the English Liturgy and Book of 
 Common Prayer in all parish churches, and to use no 
 other. This decree dispossessed 2.000 clergymen of 
 their Livings, who, with commendable exercise of their 
 conscientious scruples, preferred to give up their posi- 
 tion rather than make use in worship of a ritual and 
 ceremonies they could not approve. 
 
 This exodus from the parish pulpits carried with 
 it no prohibition to the dispossessed ministers perform- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 47 
 
 in:^ worship elsewhere, and hopes yet remained of 
 (ok- ration for Non-conformists which a sad outbreak of 
 Fifth Monarchy men in London frustrated. 
 
 These fanatical persons had associated with their 
 religious views wild political ideas, in the belief that 
 King Jesus was come to reign, that they were His 
 saints, and that he would found through them the 
 last, or fifth and all-prevailing monarchy over the 
 world. 
 
 For this purpose their meeting-houses were armories 
 for store of hostile weapons, and one Sabbath morning 
 all London was thrown into a fright by their issuing 
 out into the streets, where they attacked and routed 
 the City Militia, and killed or wounded those who 
 opposed them. 
 
 Their numbers, however, were but few, and so 
 soon as the military could be brought against them all 
 were either killed or captured to die the death of traitors 
 on the scaffold, but their wicked conduct served as a 
 pretext for those who directed the King's policy to ob- 
 tain Acts of Parliament prohibiting all meetings for 
 worship other than those in Churches as gatherings 
 dangerous to the peace of the realm. 
 
 By these Acts, Friends' meetings met with special 
 prohibition, although the Fifth Monarchy men declared 
 in their dying moments, that the Society had no con- 
 nection with their violent designs. 
 
 The authorities under the conviction that no secure 
 "government was possible without obtaining uniformity 
 in religious practice, and having settled on a church 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 aystem, invested the magistrates with powers to prohibit 
 hU other assemblies than those held in churches. In no 
 ^-rivate house were more than five beyond those of the 
 household, ever to be, on any pretext, assembled to- 
 gether, under pain of fines which rose from £5 for the 
 first offence higher and higher each time it was re- 
 peated, until the incorrigible were to undergo the 
 penalty of transportation. If these fines were not paid 
 distraints could be made on goods, or the individual be 
 subjected to imprisonment. Such powers placed in 
 the hands of justices and magistrates, caused great 
 sufferings all over the country to those, who, like the 
 Friends, could not in conscience forsake their Meetings, 
 r.or as some others did, meet in secret, bat mast attend 
 ihem openly in defiance of these unrighteous laws, and 
 the prisons, as a sad consequence, were filled w':h 
 Friends. 
 
 They of all others, cugbt to have been exempt 
 from the power of this legal machinery, since its pro- 
 ifessed object was to crush out riotous assemblies, or 
 {such as were dangerous to the peace and stability of 
 the government, which character none could ever find 
 in the quietude of a Friends' meeting. 
 
 But Friends' doctrine in dispensing with all church 
 ceremonies was obnoxious to the clergy, who inflamed 
 I lie justices and magistrates against them, lest their 
 •,'reat numbers and prevalence throughout the nation, 
 sliould make impossible that Unity in church and state, 
 without which, it was asterted, no firm Government 
 could exist. Thus aroused, the authorities (who were 
 
JijllS LILl'.UKNE (KKOM AX (;LU I'KINl.) 
 
THE FKIENDS. 
 
 49 
 
 themselves churchmen) put relentlessly in force 
 these legalised forms of oppression to crush out a 
 religious society, whose members, though loyal and 
 peaceable in conduct, would not refrain from meeting 
 together. 
 
 Even now, in England with all its freedom, a 
 social ban, indefinable, yet none the less felt, alEects 
 those who cannot conscientiously unite in the forms of 
 the state religion. But two centuries ago a legalised 
 torture was applied with the avowed object of crushing 
 out such a community as the Friends, who could not, 
 at whatever it might cost them in their property, their 
 freedom, or even their lives, give up their meetings, or 
 pay pi'iests'-dues, or take any Oaths. 
 
 How this last could affect them may now seem 
 ESrauge, but it then was the cause of their greatest 
 suffering, because anyone might in those days be called 
 :;pon by a Justice of the Peace to show his loyalty 
 by taking the Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy. Its 
 refusal involved no less a penalty than imprisonment 
 for life or at the King's pleasure, which was a fearful 
 system of tyranny in the hands of a prejudiced and 
 bigoted Magistracy, 
 
 Such formidable powers were granted in the days 
 of Gunpowder Plot to detect Catholic rebels plotting to 
 i-eetore the Pope's power in England, and having 
 never been repealed were now turned against the 
 Friends, who though neither dangerous or disloyal 
 (but much the contrary), yet because they could not 
 swear this Oath, all the penalcies of its ief').s.'ii were 
 
THR FRIENDS. 
 
 laid upon them as much as if they had made their 
 religious scruples a cloak to dangerous designs. 
 
 It seemed impossible to remove this idea from the 
 minds of prejudiced authorities. When one of these 
 asked, "How are we then to tell the difference be- 
 tween you and the Catholic, who will not swear this 
 oath because of his being against us ? " he was told, 
 "There is this difference between us and the Catholics; 
 they will swear to recover a debt or a stolen cow, but 
 we will never take an oath even to recover Avhat is due 
 to us, for our Saviour forbids swearing. Our word 
 is as good as our bond, and we are ever ready to give 
 in a declaration of our true loyalty to the King and his 
 Government." But these explanations, however clear 
 to the unprejudiced mind, were of no use with Autho- 
 rities whose set purpose was the extinguishment of all 
 religious societies other than the Episcopal. With 
 which object fresh measures were taken. " There is a 
 new Statute," said Judge Turner to Francis Howgill, 
 " that will soon make you fewer." 
 
 Knowing the wide-spread devastations such would 
 oause, some of the leading Friends used great efforts 
 with Members of Parliament to oppose this new legal 
 machinery, and four of their number obtained per- 
 mission to plead their cause at the Bar of the House of 
 Commons — which was accomplished in so able and 
 dignified a manner by these earnest youths that many 
 Members appeared inclined to favour their suit— but 
 the opposing party were too strong, and Friends were 
 left to the dire consequences attending their keeping 
 
THE DUNGEON AT vv\...vi..K v.-||i.,.i-, M..:. . 
 
 EARLY FRIENDS WERE CONFINED. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 51 
 
 up of their religious meetings in defiance of these new 
 and more oppressive laws against them. 
 
 Grievous cases of suffering ensued as the gaols 
 filled quickly with Friends. There were as many as 
 4,230 throughout the country, who were thrust — as 
 if no better than felons — into gaols and prisons, so 
 filthy and so wretched, that England's shame was roused 
 when a Howard about a century later exposed their con- 
 dition. One of these at Warwick, where the sweet spirited 
 and loving William Dewsbury was for many years con- 
 fined, is described by a prison reformer in 1815, as an 
 " offensive vault," having " only light and air from a 
 grating at top." The chief prisons in London were 
 abominable in accommodation and abominably managed 
 — their keepers were persons of a low character, only 
 required to provide free straw for sleeping on, and 
 bread and water for diet — but they might sell to each 
 prisoner whatever comforts he inclined to buy, and 
 thus made their living. The Friends regarding them- 
 selves as innocent and their imprisonment unjust, 
 scrupled to make any such terms with the jailor, who 
 consequently gave them the worst accommodation and 
 treatment, and many died in prison. 
 
 Thomas Ellwood, a gentleman of good means, who 
 for being a Friend and attending their meetings had to 
 spend some time in Newgate, has left in his published 
 journal a graphic account of the state of this prison 
 which may well account for the mortality prevailing 
 in them. In the night they were lodged in f ne room, 
 sleeping in hammocks, hung in three rows on'> over the 
 
52 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 other, '* the phice was so filled with breath and steam 
 fi-om so many bodies of different ages, conditions and 
 constitutions packed up so close together as was enough 
 to cause sickness." Its loathsomeness was such that 
 during 1662 and the two subsequent years, no less than 
 52 of these prisoners died from disease contracted 
 there. 
 
 Richard Hubberthorn, who was one of those valiant 
 four who had pleaded before the House of Commons, 
 Avas imprisoned in one of these jails, and not having a 
 strong constitution, soon fell into mortal sickness, and 
 had to be carried out for burial like so many others. 
 
 Edward Burrough, whose services in London and 
 in street preaching have been mentioned, who also was 
 one of the pleaders with Parliament, came back from 
 Ireland (whither he had gone) that he might encourage 
 his beloved London Friends in holding their meetings. 
 As a consequence he was soon one of these prisoners in 
 Newgate, where, owing to its shameful condition, he 
 fell grievously ill, and here this earnest preacher, — a 
 t^on of thunder and consolation — ended his days at the 
 early age of 28, triumphant in faith and forgiving all 
 Jiis enemies, dying a martyr to the principles of 
 Christian Truth he had so valiantly advocated. 
 
 " Your gaols we fear not, no, nor banishment ; 
 
 Terrors or threats can ne'er make us lament ; 
 
 For such we are as fear the living God, 
 
 Kot being vexed by persecution's rod. 
 
 Away, Hypocrisy ! begone false fear ! 
 
 Immortal Life's the crown which we do wear, 
 
 Which cannot be removed from us away. 
 
 That makes us scorn your threat'nings every day. 
 
 These are our prayers, and thus our souls do cry — 
 
 Let justice live, and let oppression die." 
 Lines written whilst in Newgate by Edward Bukrocch. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 George Fox's iron constitution long withstood tlio 
 rigour of an imprisonment in Scarborough's Castle 
 throughout a winter of great severitj^ in a dungeon 
 cell not fit for man's habitation, but at length he fell 
 into a state of extreme weakness, and nothing but 
 success attending earnest efforts made with the King 
 lor his release, saved him from death. The gross in- 
 justice of his confinement was shown by the governor 
 saying on his discharge that he had found him " pure 
 as a bell." 
 
 His bulky frame was now become swollen and 
 benumbed with long continued exposure to rain and 
 tempest on that bleak sea-coast ; he was helpless as 
 a child, and had to be lifted on and olE his horse ; 
 his limbs were racked with rheumatic pain, each finger 
 w-as swollen as large as three and nothing warm could 
 be taken for food. 
 
 Yet even in this state of weakness the first use he 
 made of his liberty was to travel slowly towards London 
 to attend to the welfare of his Friends. 
 
 He found the City in all the distress and desolation 
 of the last of three misfortunes that had befallen it, 
 misfortunes that to some minds were as judgments for 
 the miseries inflicted on Eeligious Dissentients. She 
 had been ravaged by a plague of such violence as still to 
 be known as the great plague of London. Her river 
 had been invaded by the Dutch fleet which had burnt 
 ^ inen-of-war at Sheerness, and now a fire of nearly a 
 week's duration had raged over two-thirds of the City, 
 and laid houses, churches, cathedral, and public build- 
 
 3 
 
54 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 ings in ashes, and the prisoner from Scarhorongh saw 
 little around him but blackened ruins. 
 
 To him these outward desolations of the citizens 
 would be scarcely less affecting than the lamentable 
 results persecution had brought among the commu. 
 nities of his Friends throughout the country, and hia 
 powerful mind became directed towaid some measnrea 
 to prevent their further dispersion. 
 
CHAPTER VIT. 
 
 ORIGIN OF THE DISCIPLINE. 
 
 TTP to this lime there had been but little of outward 
 organisation attempted except through General or 
 Quarterly Meetings, and frequent visits of travelling 
 ministers. Now that the number of these Gospel visitors 
 had been so greatly reduced by imprisonment and death, 
 and General Meetings were impracticable, symptoms 
 of disorganisation and disintegration were appearing 
 that threatened serious results. There were divisions on 
 subjects of Doctrine and Practice, a want of care in 
 having marriages properly solemnized, and feelings 
 prevailed in favour of each following what might be 
 right in his own eyes — as if that were the same thing 
 as a being guided by the '* Light within " so earnestly 
 proclaimed by the sixty preachers. 
 
 It was under these circumstan jes that George Fox 
 advised arrangements for order and method that have 
 .^ever since proved so effectual as to constitute him not 
 only the originator of the Society, but the founder of 
 its organic constitution. 
 
 These arrangements were the setting up of 
 Monthly Meetings, or (to speak more plainly) the 
 assembling together of the leading Friends in a little 
 group of meetings once a month to enquire into the' 
 
56 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 state of affairs and keep record of their proceedings ; to 
 register all births, receive notices of intended marriages, 
 Inquire into the clearness of the parties concerned, and 
 when such had been ascertained, see that the wedding 
 was religiously conducted, in the presence of at least 
 twelve persons not of the family ; to inquire into and 
 relieve the necessities of poorer members or widows, 
 and see to the proper education of their children ; and 
 further to hear and compose any differences, that 
 Friends might not go to law with one another ; also to 
 deal with disorderly walkers. Thus " all right-minded 
 ones might feel that on themselves it rested to see that 
 all who profess the truth do walk in righteousness and 
 holiness, and order their conversation aright as becometh 
 the household of God." 
 
 To bring these arrangements into general practice 
 throughout the nation involved George Fox in arduous 
 journeys over the whole country, for the unsettled state 
 of the times would not allow of any general conference, 
 and Friends' minds were so sensitive on the subject of 
 individual guidance by the light of Christ in their heart, 
 that nothing but the personal influence of this heaven- 
 ly gifted man would have induced them to a general 
 compliance with these arrangements. He was able to 
 eliow them they would prove a development rather than 
 a contradiction of the principle of this inward and in- 
 dividual guidance. Each one that felt the divine power 
 in himself would find it draw him into association with 
 those similarly influenced, giving an accumulative 
 strength for examining into and dealing with matters 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 57 
 
 that concerned the interests and welfare of the wider 
 area of a community. For this object he spared him- 
 self no exertion in giving addresses, counsel, or advice, 
 leaving himself little time for rest, and travelling 
 continuously for years together in this arduous service, 
 throughout the whole English counties. 
 
 He felt as much under divine commission to 
 secure an adoption of these arrangements as he ever 
 had for the commencement of his ministry, and the 
 settlement and good order which ensued made Friends 
 thankful " in praise and blessing that the Lord God 
 had sent him forth on such a service among them." 
 
 He afterwards introduced in a similar manner 
 monthly meetings of "Women Friends, which have 
 likewise been found of great service by enabling 
 inquiry and council concerning affairs of their own 
 sex, which could be more suitably conducted among 
 themselves. These monthly meetings did not at the 
 first possess any official connection with one another, 
 but commenced their useful service in an Independence, 
 similar to the churches of the Congregational body, 
 ;ind only in course of time has the close association 
 t hat now exists become established by grouping them 
 into Quarterly meetings, and these again into an 
 annual representative assembly. Nevertheless the 
 loonthly meeting remains the original Unit of the 
 Friends' system. It is the one that admits and dis- 
 solves membership of individuals, acknowledges 
 ministers, and appoints Elders. It nominates repre- 
 8 -ntatives to the superior meetings, and whatever such 
 
58 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 may determine comes to it as advice and not as 
 command. 
 
 Through these arrangements the Society became 
 consolidated amid sufferings without and trials within, 
 that otherwise threatened its dispersion. They have 
 proved effective through two centuries of varied 
 experience, and continue in operation the same as 
 when first established through the protracted, arduous, 
 
 iand disinterested labours of George Fox. He sought 
 no honour to himself, nor like Wesley, held any 
 authority over them, his principle being one of self- 
 < government in a Unity that was spiritual rather than 
 external. 
 
 He rejoiced to see his friends, as he said : 
 " possessors of the joyful order of the joyful Gospel — 
 the comfortable order of the comfortable Gospel — the 
 glorious order of the glorious Gospel — and the ever- 
 lasting order of the everlasting Gospel, through Him 
 who hath all power in Heaven and Earth given to 
 Him, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the 
 Ending, the Foundation of God which over all stands 
 sure. Christ Jesus, the Amen." 
 
CHAPTER VIII, 
 
 MEETING HOUSES. 
 
 /^N account of increasing congregations Friends soon 
 found it necessary to acquire meeting-houses in 
 town and country instead of assembling in a house or 
 premises belonging to some more affluent member of 
 the Society, which procedure met with great opposition 
 from the government as tending to establish what they 
 desired to uproot, and full powers were given to those 
 in authority for either closing or, if necessary, pulling 
 down these meeting-places. 
 
 As a consequence many were closed, but when 
 barred out the Friends met quietly around the doors 
 or in the street ; and when wrecked, as was not in- 
 frequently the case, they settled down calmly to their 
 worship amid its ruins, although as a consequence they 
 would be swept off to prison. Such was the holy ardour 
 then prevailing that in one case where all the parents 
 were in custody the children met and kept up the 
 meeting themselves. In one instance, in London, the 
 meeting-place was seized on behalf of the king as a 
 guard house for his soldiers. At another London 
 meeting-house the parish clergyman insisted on reading 
 the English service there, but Friends only waited till 
 he had finished to hold their meeting. 
 
60 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 The governor of the Tower of London made him- 
 self conspicuous in this treatment of such places within 
 his jurisdiction and had wrecked several before any 
 check could be obtained against his proceeding, but 
 when his men came to pull down one in Spitalfields 
 they were told it was private property of a Friend, who 
 was therefore ordered to attend at the Tower, and ex- 
 plain his conduct in having such an unlawful place. 
 Now this Friend was just then away on some religious 
 service in the far west of England, and the utmost 
 favour attainable from the Governor was a delay of a 
 fortnight in his appearance. 
 
 Gilbert Latey (the Friend concerned) had this news 
 conveyed to him, but no threatened damage to any 
 of his property would allow him unduly to hasten 
 toward a conclusion of his religious service. However, 
 it so occurred in its course as to bring him back to 
 London just before the fortnight's expiration. Now he 
 was shrewd as well as pious, and having moved in 
 upper circles through his former business of clothier 
 and outfitter at the West End, was acquainted with the 
 rights of individuals as to Property. 
 
 He at once ordered some household furniture to 
 be sent in to this threatened meeting-house, and having 
 told one of his pensioners he must go to live there, 
 had a lease of it to him legally prepared, and so soon 
 as it was signed announced his readiness to go with 
 his friends to see the governor in the Tower of London, 
 who as soon as he saw Gilbert Latey reproached him 
 violently for having broken the King's law in own- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 61 
 
 ing a meeting-house, and although told he had had it 
 before there was any such law, exclaimed such should 
 jiot save it from destruction. " But," calmly interposed 
 (filbert, " I have a tenant there in possession, and one 
 of whom I have so good an opinion that I have granted 
 him a lease." " There, now you have me," said the 
 bafifled ofBcial, "and had your friends but had half your 
 wits they would have saved their other meeting-houses." 
 The fact being that by furniture, tenant, and lease the 
 wary Gilbert had invested the meeting-house with the 
 sanctity of a dwelling, which no royal proclamation or 
 Act of Parliament has ever yet violated to deprive a 
 subject of the realm from regarding his home as a castle 
 — that not even a Governor of the Tower of London in 
 a persecuting age dared to destroy. 
 
 The plan thus initiated by Gilbert Latey, waa 
 adopted by the Society, so that all their early meeting- 
 houses were provided with sufficient household accom- 
 modation to enable them, in the eye of the law, to pass 
 as^a dwelling, and often their living rooms would be in 
 the occupation of an educational Friend, who would 
 use the premises as a school-room during the week. 
 The early chapels of Nonconformists adop ted generally 
 similar arrangements, and when one of the earliest of 
 these, in a London suburb, was pulled down some years 
 ago, there were discovered some forgotten chambers in 
 the roof that had served this purpose in days of peril to 
 such property. 
 
 A great many Friends' meeting-houses remain in 
 country districts, especially in Yorkshire, mostly in- 
 
(32 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 tended for but small congregations, with living-rooma 
 under the same roof at one end. Such is the one George 
 Fox gave to the Friends of Swarthmore, to which he 
 bequeathed his ebony bedstead, table, and chairs, desir- 
 ing that such might furnish a chamber for any travelling 
 minister on his visit. It was no doubt intended as an 
 example that was very generally followed in these 
 country meeting-houses. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 GEORGE WHITEHEAD AND HIS SERVICE.. 
 
 Loyalty to the State is impossible without conformity io 
 the State form of Religion." 
 
 npHE accession of William and Mary to the English 
 throne in l688, inaugurated an Era of Constitutional 
 Government that ensured to all loyal and peaceable 
 subjects a freedom for worship according to their own 
 conscientious beliefs, and not as the Law might direct. 
 
 It was a lesson government and statesmen had 
 been feiow to learn, that uniform loyalty could be 
 secured without unifo-mity of religious practice — but 
 the granting this liberty to Friends presented special 
 difficulties on account of their refusal of the Oaths of 
 Allegiance having raised doubts as to their loyalty. It 
 need^ much negotiation before some compromise 
 could be effected in the form of a Declaration 
 sufficiently solemn to satisfy the authorities, and also 
 sufficiently free from any approach to swearing as not 
 to ofEend the consciences of Friends. 
 
 The working of democratic bodies seems favour- 
 able to someone being found in each emergency gifted 
 to steer the course, and the Friends throughout their 
 long and chequered career have never failed in having 
 at such times an able leader or counsellor — which 
 George Whitehead so truly became in the conduct of 
 these affairs that some personal details respecting him 
 may be given. 
 
64 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 He was by birtli — like so many other of the early 
 Friends — a North countryman, and had become whilst 
 yet in his teens, one of the sixty earnest preachers. 
 He travelled at first in the Eastern counties, where his 
 ministry by its success caused great sufferings to him- 
 self and his companions in the persecution that envious 
 professors raised against them. 
 
 This was borne with unflinching courage : he sang 
 psalms whilst publicly and cruelly scourged, argued 
 ably with opposing divines, endured patiently long 
 and hard imprisonments, and in all acquitted himself 
 as a man of an upright and undaunted spirit. 
 
 After some years of these missionary experiences 
 he married and settled into a grocery business in 
 Houndsditch, where he continued so constant in attend- 
 ing Friends' meetings through the hottest seasons of 
 persecution as to be in the wont of putting his night- 
 cap in his pocket when he left his home, expecting no 
 other results than to find himself at night a prisoner in 
 some city jail. 
 
 His many imprisonments, numerous trials in law 
 courts, pleadings before judges, magistrates, and others, 
 were all experiences which, in one of his great natural 
 ability, enabled him the better to become an intercessor 
 with those in authority on behalf of others, in v/hich 
 he was of much assistance to his Friends. For this 
 purpose he had on various occasions sought the presence 
 of Charles the Second, both at the head of his council 
 and when among courtiers in the palace grounds, and 
 had been able to return the royal pleasantries without 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 65 
 
 offence to dignity or losing the serious aim in view. 
 On one such occasion the officials, affronted at their hats, 
 were for denying them admittance to the council 
 chamber, but the King called out "Let them in as they are, 
 their consciences are in their hats," intending no doubt to 
 give himself some further diverson at their expense, but 
 George Whitehead, and the two Bristol Friends who 
 were with kim, succeeded, notwithstanding interrup- 
 tions from members of the council, in pleading the 
 cause of the sufferers for nearly an hour, until the King 
 showed signs of being favourably impressed, and George 
 "Whitehead in his account of the interview, adds, "Blessed 
 be the Lord God, who gave me power and boldness, and 
 also counsel and wisdom to plead the cause of the 
 innocent sufferers for His worthy name and blessed 
 Truth's sake." 
 
 The severity and extent of their sufferings is shown 
 by the fact that during the twenty-five years of Charles 
 the Second's reign, 13,562 Friends were imprisoned in 
 various parts of England, 198 were transported as slaves 
 beyond seas, and 338 died in prison or of wounds 
 received in violent assaults on their meetings. 
 
 Some 400 of these prisoners being confined for not 
 taking the Oath of Allegiance could only be released by 
 royal interference, and towards the close of his reign 
 Charles was induced to issue an order for their release, 
 in which the reappearance of a Friend who had helped 
 him to escape when a fugitive, proved of assistance in 
 gaining this royal favour. This Friend, Richard Carver, 
 had been mate in the little fishing vessel in which 
 
€6 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Cbarles, after his many -wonderful and hairbreadth 
 escapes, sailed for France, and he and his master alone 
 knew the rank of the tall and swarthy stranger on board. 
 Having, for fear of a vessel that seemed in chase, 
 to run ashore in shallow waters, the mate took the King 
 on his shoulders and waded with the heavy burden to 
 land, receiving amid heartfelt thanks for his escape, an 
 assurance from the King that if ever he came to the 
 throne, the sailor had but to come there to receive his 
 reward. Few of those who had assisted in the fugitive's 
 escape through his many adventures, failed to do this, 
 and, to the King's credit, they never had to complain of 
 neglect. But Richard Carver's seafaring life kept him 
 away from England for many long years, nor would he 
 on his return have thought of going to "Whitehall if 
 George Whitehead had not seen in the circumstance a 
 possible assistance towards obtaining that royal pardon, 
 in which, with others, he was so deeply interested. 
 The King knew the mariner again, and asked why he 
 had not come sooner, and was told he wanted nothing 
 for himself, as any help he could have given to one in 
 distress left a peace that was its own reward, but he 
 pleaded for favour towards his suffering friends. 
 
 It doubtless helped toward the issue at length of 
 the " Order of Release," a bulky document, still to be 
 seen in the Society's Archives, written on eleven large 
 skins of vellum with the great seal of England attached, 
 and a portrait of the King at its commencement. It 
 contains the names of four hundred and ninety-one 
 prisoners, amongst whom it is interesting to observe 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 67 
 
 that of John Bunyan, who with some others, not 
 Friends, were by their assent included in this Royal 
 Pardon they had at so much labour obtained. 
 
 It had to be presented at each Jail throughout the 
 country. By having an official copy made, the labour 
 in travelling was divided amongst some others, but 
 George Whitehead took upon himself the largest share 
 in this laborious service. 
 
 The relief at best was but temporary, for the Acta 
 •under which they had been imprisoned remained in 
 force, so the Magistrates and Justices continued to 
 convict : and during the short reign of James the 
 Second neither the influence of William Penn's per- 
 sonal friendship with the King, nor George White- 
 head's sagacious assiduity were able to effect per- 
 manent relief for tender consciences, who could 
 neither conform to the State Worship nor take the 
 Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy. 
 
 Parliament opposed any exercise of a Royal Pre- 
 rogative, by which also those Catholic interests might 
 be promoted, to which it was believed Charles was 
 secretly inclined, and James known to be openly 
 pledged, so that no united action was possible for the 
 relief of Nonconformists until a staunch Protestant 
 like William the Third was King. 
 
 With him there was no difficulty in granting these 
 full legal protection to life and property, and for their 
 varied modes of worship if held with unbolted doors ; 
 but Friends had to assure Parliament of their being 
 Christians, which George Whitehead and two others. 
 
68 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 who appeared at the Bar of the House, found no 
 difficulty in effecting. Yet even then, as before 
 mentioned, negotiations were needed to convince the 
 King that Friends were really a united or corporate 
 body, or would be loyal to him if they were allowed 
 to make a Declaration instead of taking an Oath. 
 
 Here, also, as with Parliament, George Whitehead 
 was chief speaker in the Royal closet and chief agent 
 in reconciling Friends to the use of that which the 
 King had agreed to accept. But all this reviewed in so 
 few words, conveys no idea of the long, continuous, 
 and varied labour at Court and Parliament the settle- 
 ment involved. And if any are desirous to be in- 
 formed of the work effected by this Nehemiah of the 
 Friends' society in obtaining for it the v/alls of legal 
 protection, they should read his own narrative of it in 
 the work called " Christian_^rogress," where they 
 will find him acknowledging he was " daily sensible 
 the hand of the Lord our God, that was with us in our 
 industrious endeavours, made way and did work for 
 us therein. To Him be the glory of all for ever." 
 
 George Whitehead lived on through the reigns of 
 William and Queen Anne, ever working for the cause 
 he had embraced as early as his 17th year, and though 
 enfeebled with great age, was still its spokesman to 
 welcome George the First to the throne, saying in his 
 courtly tones, " Thou art welcome to us, King George. 
 We heartily wish thee health and happiness. . . We 
 desire the king may have further knowledge of us and 
 our innocency, and that to live a peaceable and quiet 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 69 
 
 life in all godliness and honesty is according to our 
 principle and practice." He again headed the Friends, 
 ■when with deputations from other religious bodies, 
 addresses of congratulation were presented on the 
 failure of the Pretender's attempt, and assured the 
 King, " His Friends were thankful at being able now 
 to say he was George, by the grace of God, King of 
 Great Britain, and that as men carried that saying 
 stamped on the money in their pockets, so it was to be 
 wished it might be imprinted in their hearts." 
 
 This was the fifth sovereign in succession he had 
 addressed on behalf of the Society in whose interests 
 he continued working till the close of his long life of 
 87 years. Content to gain his living as a tradesman, 
 whilst proving himself a true gospel minister — an able 
 disciplinarian, an astute controversialist, a skilful di- 
 plomatist and trusted councillor. The Friends of his 
 own meeting in their memorial of him recorded as 
 leading features of his character, " a gravity, wisdom, 
 and abilities, beyond many in the Church of Christ." 
 
 From what has been narrated, no inference will be 
 drawn that this accomplished administrator and di- 
 plomatist, who could interview successfully monarchs, 
 bishops, lords, and great men, had had any special 
 advantages from training or education, for he was but 
 a city tradesman, in the far from aristocratic quarter of 
 Houndsditch, and though it may seem beneath notice 
 in any historical sketch, to allude to mere traditions, 
 an exception may be made to one that still lingers in 
 the neighbourhood of his dwelling, as to his conduct 
 
70 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 towards a highwayman, who had robbed a Friend of his 
 of £30. The sufferer had just come into George White- 
 head's shop-parlonr, whose window opened on to the 
 yard of the Dolphin Inn, when he saw the man who 
 had robbed him ride into it, and exclaimed " there he 
 goes." Such seemed improbable to George Whitehead, 
 who knew him as a fellow tradesman, but the Friend 
 was so positive, that he went out, and quietly taking 
 the horseman aside, said, " I will thank thee to give me 
 the £30 thou took from my friend this morning, for he 
 is come into my shop, and says he wants it, and if thou 
 art in want of money look to me for help." Needless to 
 Bay the money was given up, with an assurance, that 
 this, his first, should be his last offence, to which only 
 extreme necessity had driven him. Such may seem 
 strange to those of the present generation, but at that 
 time it was not uncommon for persons, and even gentle- 
 men, to take to the road (as it was called), under mone- 
 tary pressure, preferring to run the slighter risk of 
 capture, to the certain loss of goods, or imprisonment 
 for debt. At all events, according to tradition, George 
 Whitehead by his tact recovered the money for his 
 friend, helped his brother tradesman through his mone- 
 tary difficulties, and saved his reputation by never 
 menlioning the circumstance till after the delinquent's 
 decease. 
 
 In closing this allusion to times of severe and long- 
 continued trials through misgovernment and persecu- 
 tions it may be observed that whilst many of the disaf- 
 fected engaged in plots and insurrections, and adherents 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 71 
 
 of other Nonconformists were either dispersed or had 
 gatherings but in secret, the Friends had kept themselves 
 60 clear from any political complications, and had 
 always been so open in their meetings for worship that 
 Robert Barclay was able on their behalf thus to aadress 
 King Charles as to their loyalty and openness : "For 
 that among' all the plots contrived by others against thee 
 since thy return into Britain there was never any owned 
 of by any of our people, as we contend not for the 
 kingdoms of this world, but are subject to every ordi- 
 nance of man for conscience' sake ; and also that in 
 the hottest time of persecution against meetings we 
 have boldly stood to our testimony for God instead of 
 creeping into holes or corners or once hiding ourselves 
 as other dissenters have done, but met according to 
 custom in the public places appointed for that end, so 
 that none of thy officers can say they have surprised ua 
 in a corner, but were sure to find us in our open 
 assemblies testifying for God and His truth." 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 SCOTCH FRIENDS. 
 
 " In the mighty power of God go oa preaching the Gospel to 
 every creature and^isciglin|f them in the name of the Father, 
 Son, and Holy Spirit. . . . Sound, sound the trumpet abroad 
 ye valiant Soldiers of Christ's Kingdom, of which there is no end." 
 
 G. FOX (Epistles). 
 
 TTITHERTO our attention in this rapid survey of the 
 Friends' history has been confined to the rise and 
 progress of the Society in England alone, but noAv 
 reference should be made to its spread in Scotland and 
 Ireland, some parts of the Continent of Europe, the 
 West Indies, and America. 
 
 In Scotland Friends have never been numerona, 
 yet some amongst them have proved of such service to 
 the Society at large, as seemingly to justify on these 
 grounds — rather than on any numerical importance — 
 the observation made by George Fox that he felt " the 
 Seed of God to sparkle around him as his horse's feet 
 struck Scottish soil.** 
 
 These individuals were for the most part citizens 
 of Aberdeen, and some of them in high official positions 
 at the time of the change in their religious convictions. 
 
 Alexander Jaffray was its chief magistrate, iu 
 Buch esteem as to have been chosen one of the Com- 
 mis:5iouers to arrange with Charles the Second, in" 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 73 
 
 Holland, on behalf of the Scotch Parliament, the terms 
 on which he should return to his father's throne. By 
 uniting with Friends, Alexander JaflCray lost all his 
 magisterial and civic appointments, and experienced a 
 full share in the bitter persecutions raised by the Pres- 
 byterian ministers, who denounced them from their 
 pulpits as a people "demented, distracted, and devil 
 possessed," fit only to be rooted out as " blasphemous 
 deniers of the true Christ, of Heaven, Hell, Angels, the 
 Resurrection of the body, and Day of Judgment," a sect, 
 who by their practice of declining to give hat honour to 
 the magistrates, or to take oaths, were, in the opinion 
 of these divines, " destructive of all good government." 
 
 Strange language and conduct towards those who 
 could number amongst them characters with a piety 
 so pure and fervent as was shown by Alexander Jaffray, 
 who in his enforced retirement from all public honours, 
 suffered in much patience this persecution for righteous- 
 ness sake, and came to his life's close in great peace, 
 lirm in his religious principles to the last. 
 
 Conspicuous also amongst these Aberdeen Friends 
 is the grand personality of old David Barclay, the 
 Laird of Ury — one of a thousand for height of stature, 
 bodily strength, courage, and manly beauty, renowned 
 as a soldier and commander, in warlike conflicts, at 
 home and abroad, chiefly in the cause of the Stuart 
 kings, to whom he was related through his marriage 
 with one of the Gordons. 
 
 Experiences such as these, of worldly success, had 
 brought so little of peace to his soul that he had left all 
 
74 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 and retired to his estates, there to study for himself 
 the New Testament, which made him in reality a 
 Friend, before he had met with any prejudiced state- 
 ment of their principles. On becoming acquainted with 
 these he embraced their cause in all the nobleness and 
 firmness of his character, and bore his full share in the 
 obloquy and persecution which the change had brought 
 upon him. It is said that at the first meeting of Friends 
 attended by him, he was much impressed by these few 
 words spoken by one present, " In stillness there is 
 
 If ulness, in fulness there is nothingness, in nothingness 
 there is all things." This grand old warrior, whose 
 sword 'twas said " few other men could wield," 
 although unable now to ride through the streets of 
 Aberdeen without scorn and insult, would regard such 
 reproach, for Christ's sake, as greater honour than all 
 the banquetings and processions with which the citizens 
 had formerly been used to greet his official visits to 
 their city. 
 
 Up the streets of Aberdeen, 
 By the kirk and college green, 
 
 Rode the Laird of Ury ; 
 Close behind him, close beside, 
 Foul of mouth and evil eyed, 
 
 Pressed the mob in fury. 
 
 Yet with calm and stately raie;i, 
 Up the streets of Aberdeen, 
 
 Came he slowly riding ; 
 And to all he saw and heard, 
 Answering not a bitter word, 
 
 Tm-ning not for chiding. 
 
 WlIITTIER. 
 
THE FRIENDS 
 
 75 
 
 Undaunted in suffering as he had been valorous 
 in martial strife, he held meetings in his own Castle, 
 and attended those of his friends in the City, took 
 quietly the spoilings of his goods and cattle for fines, 
 and allowed neither rank nor age to spare him from 
 some share in their grievous imprisonments, until his 
 long and eventful life closed in peace, at the age of 77 
 years. A grandson has told how impressive was his 
 reverent attitude in prayer, when contrary to the Pres- 
 byterian mode of standing, it was his practice to kneel 
 down, and removing his hat with one hand, and his 
 black cap with the other, present himself with bare 
 head and bowed form, in earnest pleadings at the 
 Throne of Grace. 
 
 His son, Robert Barclay, who joined the society at 
 the early age of nineteen, possessed great mental 
 power, heightened by an excellent education, and be- 
 came a chief exponent of Friends' views, in his well- 
 known Apology, addressed to King Charles, showing 
 how consonant their doctrines were, both to Scripture 
 and right reason. 
 
 It originated in some theological propositions, pro- (Di/C^v^^o^ 
 pounded by him when student at a Scotch university, /j^^^^^jf^'^ C^:,,;^ 
 to serve as the basis of a debate, in which he sought to — ' 
 clear Friends' views from false representations of them, 
 made by ^.rofessors and priests. Success in the contro- 
 versy encouraged him to expand his argument into this 
 treatise, which, though at first written and published in 
 Latin, soon took its English form, in which it has passed 
 through very many editions, and become a standard 
 
76 
 
 THE FBIEJfDS. 
 
 ■v^ork amongst Friends, as a calm, clear, and logical 
 exposition of their views of Christian doctrine, 
 
 Robert Barclay is personally remembered as one 
 of a sweet, pleasant, and cheerful temper, combined 
 with much public spirit. Quick was he of understand- 
 ing ; sound, solid, and comprehensive in his writings ; 
 beloved also by all who knew him, great and small, for 
 whilst mixing on terms of easy familiarity with persons 
 in the highest walks of life, or discoursing on deep 
 subjects with others of the most learned sort, he was 
 ever ready to make plain the truths he loved, to any in 
 humbler circumstances, or to those but little acquainted 
 with school learning. 
 
 His greatly lamented death from a fever, when 
 only in his forty-second jear,_ left seven children 
 fatherless ; and from these are descended the various 
 lines of Barclays that became, and yet remain, so in- 
 fluential in social and commercial life. 
 
 Patrick Livingston is a name that should not be 
 passed over without mention of his having been a min- 
 i.ster umongst the Scotch Friends, who so truly waited 
 before the Lord, for authority to speak, that when the 
 spring of life opened, his discourses would strike 
 hie hearers with awe, at their divine unction and 
 power. It was very much his commission "to call 
 people to repentance, and to bring them out of their 
 lifeless, hypocritical profession, and dead formalities, 
 wherein they were settled in the ignorance of the true 
 and living God." 
 
 Whilst the Aberdeen Friends had amongst them 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 77 
 
 those high in social rank and scholastic attainments, 
 such as the Barclays, the JaJEErays, George Keith, 
 Alexander Skene, and others, their membership in- 
 cluded many of the humbler sort, amongst whom George 
 Gray is remembered as a weaver, who, though he had 
 had no educational advantages, was a minister amongst 
 them, with so excellent a gift, and with such a know- 
 ledge of Gospel Truths as contained in Holy Scripture,! 
 that it is said his most critical opponent in any doctrin-/ 
 al controversy could never find him wrong even in ^ 
 word. He worked diligently at his trade, yet found 
 time for much public service in the Gospel, and endur- 
 ed with great patience and cheerfulness, a long im- 
 prisonment for the part he had taken in attending 
 meetings, being one whom no persecution nor spoiling 
 of his goods could deter from following out his religious 
 convictions. 
 
 George Keith, another member of this Aberdeen 
 group, was a strong contrast to George Gray, as he had 
 had a distinguished university career, where he was a 
 fellow student with Robert Barclay, and united with 
 him in a debate on Friends' principles whilst at the 
 university. 
 
 His scholastic attainments, which obtained lor 
 him a degree as Master of Arts, enabled him to acquire 
 some reputation as a schoolmaster, which profession he 
 followed with similar success on emigrating to America, 
 where however he became dissatisfied with Friends, 
 and changed from having been an earnest and able 
 advocate of their principles, into a bitter controversialist 
 
78 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 against them, and after doing all he conld to oppose 
 the Society, both in America and England, ended his 
 days as the clergyman of an English country parish, 
 where, it is said, he was also unable to live on good 
 terms, even with his own parishioners. 
 
 Andrew Jaffray (son of Alexander), like his 
 father, attached himself to the little company of Friends 
 at Aberdeen, amongst whom he became greatly esteem- 
 ed for his ministry, which they record as having been 
 " sound, bold, and perspicuous in doctrine and argu- 
 ment, delivered with a clear, full, and penetrating 
 utterance." Himself a gentleman by birth, and a scholar 
 by education, he worshipped in loving fellowship with 
 the group of mechanics and little tradesmen, animated 
 by the same convictions, and freely shared with them 
 long and cruelly severe imjirisonments, which were in- 
 flicted for no other cause than the holding these religious 
 meetings and absenting themselves from the public 
 worship. "The magistrates (writes Robert Barclay), 
 stirred up by the malice and envy of our opposers, 
 have used all means possible (and yet in vain) to deter 
 us from meeting together, and that openly and publicly 
 in our own hired houses. For that purpose both death, 
 banishments, imprisonments, finings, beatings, whip- 
 pings, and other such devilish inventions, have proved 
 ineffectual to terrify us from our holy assemblies, and 
 we having thus oftentimes purchased our liberty to 
 meet by deep sufllerings, our opposers have taken 
 another way, by turning in upon us the worst and 
 wickedest people, yea, the very offscourings of men 
 
JOURNAL 
 
 O R 
 
 Hiftorical Account 
 
 Life,Travds, Sufferings, Christian Experiences 
 and Labour of Love in the 
 
 SSork of i\t Ifinigtrj 
 
 OF THAT 
 
 Ancient, Eminent, and Faithful Servant of 
 Jesus Christ, 
 
 George Fox; 
 
 Who departed this Life in ereat Peace vnth 
 
 the Lord, the i^i/i of the iiM Month, 1690. 
 
 Dan. 12.3. And they tlial turn many to Righteoufnt/s, //tali 
 
 fhine as llie Stars Jor ever and ever. 
 Verfe4. Many JJiall run to ujul fro ; and Knowledge /kali be 
 Encrea/ed. 
 
 2 Tun. 2 12. ff we/uffer, -we /hall also reign with kim ; (i.e. 
 with Ckri/t.) 
 
 LONDON, 
 Ptinted for CitWIIUlB ^IttltOtt, in George- Yard, in 
 Lombards irut. M D C X C I V . 
 
 THE TITLE I'AOE OF THE FIRST EDITION OF THE 
 JOURNAL O;' GEORGE FOX (NOW EXCEEDINGLY SCARCE.) 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 7'.) 
 
 who by all rnaniier o*^' inhuman, beastly, and brutal be- 
 haviour, have sought to provoke us, weary us, and 
 molest us, but in vain. It would be almost incredible 
 to declare, and indeed a shame, that among men pre- 
 tending to be Christians, it should be mentioned what 
 things of this kind eyes have seen, and I myself, with 
 others, have shared of in sufferings. There they have.i 
 often beaten, cast water and dung, danced, leaped, sang,;! 
 and spoken all manner of profane and ungodly words, * 
 jeered, mocked, and scoffed, asking us if the Spirit was ' 
 not yet come, while we have been seriously and silently ■ 
 sitting together and waiting upon the Lord." 
 
 Subjected to these indignities, it does not cause 
 surprise to find that two such gentlemanly and refined 
 natures as Andrew Jaffray and Robert Barclay, were 
 each at different times led to make of themselves a i 
 spectacle to the persecuting Citizens, by walking stripped | 
 to the waist through the streets, the one with sackcloth 
 and ashes on his head, and the other holding of the filth 
 that had thus been cast upon them, in his hands, each 
 uttering woes and judgments on the City if such course 
 of insult and oppression were persisted in. 
 
 These personal appearances, by way of a sign like 
 the prophets of old, are not forgotten to be brought 
 forward by those who reproach the early Friends with 
 fanatical practices ; but they never ought to be mention- 
 ed, as they mostly are, by such, without due remem- 
 brance of the state of public feeling at the time, and the 
 shocking indignities and brutalities an excited populace 
 had inflicted on these peaceable citizens. The appear- 
 
80 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 auces of high bred gentlemen in such a condition might 
 be expected to have had more effect of shaming them 
 into propriety, than of offering any shock to those un- 
 acquainted with our modern ideas of social proprieties. 
 
 It seems that amid their trials and long confine- 
 ments in loathsome prisons, all were favoured with 
 remarkable health, and Andrew Jaffray would tell how 
 on one occasion, when thus shut up in dark cellars 
 under the Court House, such a pentecostal time of 
 prayer and praise fell upon them, that those of the 
 Town Council above said one to another, " 0 how 
 astonishing it is that our Ministers should eay, the 
 Quakers have no Psalms in their Meetings, for such 
 an heavenly sound we never heard in either old or new 
 Church." 
 
 Nowhere more than among Scotch Presbyterians 
 was religious doctrine reduced to rigid forms of belief, 
 so that it is easier among these Highland controver- 
 sialists to discern the chief points at issue between 
 them and Friends. One of these to which Friends 
 made objection was the Presbyterian statement, "That 
 God from before the foundation of the World predes- 
 tinated some men and angels to destruction, and 
 others to life everlasting, and that the numbers are so 
 fixed or definite that none can be added to the one nor 
 diminished from the other," contrary (as Friends said) 
 to the Apostolic declaration, " God willeth all men to be 
 saved and come to the knowledge of the Truth." 
 Then again these Presbyterians held " that no mere man, 
 ntiither of himself nor by any grace given, is able to 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 81 
 
 keep the commands of God, but doth daily break them 
 in thought, word, and deed," in opposition to which 
 the Friend believed true faith and trust in the Saviour 
 made him partaker in His divine grace, whereby 
 successful resistance could be given to the enemy in 
 all temptations. 
 
 He arrived at this through a deep baptism of spirit, 
 and felt a judgment against all sin to the loss of self- 
 trust or any sense of imputable righteousness, which as 
 patiently endured, had been succeeded by the dawning 
 in his soul of true life and power over the evil ten- 
 dencies and weaknesses of human nature. A.11 this 
 rested on Christ and His work in the soui ; with whom 
 was neither restriction of time or place, nation, rank, 
 sex, or age — " Ye are all one " in this Grace — waa 
 Friends' assured conviction — in opposition to the 
 bounds set by the theological propositions of Presby- 
 terian Divines. The Friends felt Judgment within 
 instead of looking for it without, and gazed not so 
 much on an outward and imputable righteousness 
 as witnessed its operation in themselves. 
 
 Seeing the remarkable instances Scotland thus 
 presents of their fervour and firmness, it may seem 
 strange that as a permanent Society the Meetings have 
 never been many nor their congregations numerous. 
 This may receive some explanation in the large share 
 Scotch Friends have taken in the emigration to the 
 North of Ireland, and especially to the Settlements of 
 Pennsylvania and the Jerseys in North America. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 IRISH FRIENDS. 
 
 "The Lord hath a seed in Ireland — Keep yonr Meetings in the 
 
 fear of the Lord, and you will see the Lord amongst you and His 
 
 rpO this country some of the sixty early preachers 
 
 went, finding much acceptance, especially in the 
 Northern Districts inhabited by Presbyterians and 
 Baptists of English and Scotch extraction, of whom 
 many became adherents to the Society, and as the 
 settling of these into an organized community resulted 
 largely from the gospel labours of William Edmundson, 
 some particulars of his life and ministry may be here 
 given. 
 
 He was by birth a native of Westmorland, and 
 served for a while in the Parliamentary Forces, but 
 becoming deeply affected with the truths of religion, 
 quitted the Army, that he might engage in some 
 industrial occupation more congenial to such con- 
 victions. He now married and removed into Ireland, 
 •where hie business quickly prospered, and in the 
 course of it, having to come to England, he there met 
 with some of the Early Friends, whose views of gospel 
 truth he found so accordant with his own convictions 
 
 presence refreshing your hearts." 
 
 Edward Burrocgh. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 83 
 
 that he returned to Ireland and at once put them into 
 practice. He declined all oaths, though it interfered with 
 his trade,as such were then needed to pass goods through 
 the Customs. Nor could he give what he considered 
 vain compliments, though it occasioned misunderstand- 
 ings with relatives and acquaintances. He also com- 
 menced holding meetings at first in his own house, 
 which were mostly but small and times of awful 
 silence, yet . they were comforted in a sense of the 
 Divine Presence, and found their numbers increase by 
 the accession of earnest seekers after truth. Amongst 
 these William Edmundson was led out in the ministry, 
 which beginning but in few words uttered in fear and 
 trembling, developed in the course of his long and 
 active life into a large and powerful gift. 
 
 This little meeting had not long existed before 
 Ireland was visited by several of the early preachers 
 whose travels and ministry met with such great results 
 in the number of adherents gained as to raise violent 
 oppositions against them, and Edward Burrough and 
 Francis Howgill, who had spent six months of inces- 
 sant gospel labour in the country, were ignominiously 
 expelled as " vagrants. " In vain was it that they asked 
 of the Authorities — " who is it of whom we have begged? 
 To whom have we been burdensome .'' or whose bread 
 have we eaten for naught ? or what evil have we done ?" 
 These earnest labourers in the Gospel Harvest Field 
 received from the harshness of the rulers a treatment 
 given only to vagabonds, though they had travelled at 
 their own expense and could challenge their bitterest 
 
84 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 enemies to prove any act or deed contrary to an in- 
 offensive and peaceable behaviour. 
 
 " "We came," writes Edward Burrough to these 
 Dublin OflBcials, " into this land of Ireland by virtue of 
 command given unto us by the Eternal Spirit of the 
 Lord, contrary to the will of man, not to prejudice your 
 Government, but with the message of the Gospel of 
 Christ Jesus. We came to turn from darkness to light, 
 and from the power of Satan to the power of God, and 
 to minister the word of reconciliation and salvation 
 freely (without gift or reward) unto lost souls, and this 
 we are ready to seal with our blood." They were 
 nevertheless put out of the places of worship and 
 banished from the towns, but this intrepid Evangelist 
 with stentorian lungs preached through the streets of 
 Limerick on horse-back, as they led him along. Being 
 thus put out of the country, he addressed his dear 
 Friends in communications so loving and judicious, 
 as show by their perusal, how one, who for his bold 
 utterances, was known as a " Son of thunder," could 
 be also to the tender-hearted a " Son of consolation." 
 " Every one of you," he writes, " having a measiare of light 
 f rom Christ the Saviour, unto this you are to take heed 
 only, and it leads to Christ to receive Him and be 
 joined to Him," with the result, as he proceeds to show, 
 of triumphing through His power over sin in this 
 present life by a growing " unto perfection and com- 
 pleteness in Jesus Christ." 
 
 Although the Authorities might succeed in banish- 
 ing these, others came, and a succession of earnest 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 85 
 
 Missionaries followed one after another in travelling 
 throughout Ireland, many of them women Friends, 
 not to be deterred by reproach or suffering, but much 
 cheered through large accessions to their views, and at 
 times gaining favour even with the Authorities, for 
 their word was with power, and its effects seen in a 
 consistent and peaceable life in those who accepted 
 their teaching. 
 
 As some indication of the sufferings involved, it 
 may be noted that for speating Truth in Steeple- 
 houses, Markets, and other places, 
 
 Ninety-four Friends endured whippings, stocks, 
 imprisonment and loss of goods. 
 
 Nineteen were imprisoned for meeting to worsliip 
 God in their own houses. 
 
 Twelve we.re stopped in streets and on highways 
 while about their lawful occasions, and committed to 
 prison. 
 
 William Edmundson was one who gave up much 
 time to travel with these Friends, and the settlement 
 of meetings after their departure rested so much upon 
 him that his name is closely associated with the rise 
 and progress and consolidation of the Society in 
 Ireland, of which a full account may be found in his 
 published Journal. He there mentions his first meet- 
 ing with George Fox during one of his visits to 
 England, whom he found at a largely attended con- 
 ference of Friends in Leicestershire. George Fox, 
 hearing who he was, and that he was desirous of some 
 consultation on the state of Friends in Ireland, went 
 
86 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 aside with him into an orchard, where their converse 
 concluded by kneeling down together in earnest prayer 
 under one of its fruit trees. It was by such men and 
 in such dependence on Divine guidance and power 
 that the Society rooted itself in the British Isles. Each 
 section of it in England and Ireland adopted its own 
 organization, but these have ever worked in as much 
 fraternal harmony as when the two respective leaders 
 knelt in prayer under the apple trees of that Leicester 
 orchard more than two centuries ago. 
 
 William Edmundson has been described as possess- 
 ing great share of natural parts, though but of a mean 
 education, plain in his style of preaching but greatly 
 gifted in unfolding the mysteries of the Kingdom of 
 Christ, and somewhat austere in manner, but loving 
 withal. His service in the Gospel led him into most ex- 
 tensive travels, in the course of which he made three 
 voyages to America, where his hardy constitution bore 
 him through severe trials in exposure to dangers, hunger 
 and cold by sea and land. Very careful was he to avoid 
 being burdensome to his Friends by making arrange- 
 ments for his family and outward affairs during these 
 long absences. In all things watchful to give none 
 cause of offence, and even to old age laborious for their 
 spiritual welfare, he came to his close in his 85th year, 
 with a thankful sense of " peace with God, unity with 
 his brethren, and good-will to all mankind." 
 
 Living in a country like Ireland where political 
 and religious parties are ever at strife, and the nation 
 often the scene of long continued and sanguinary wars. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 87 
 
 it has beon the lot of Irish Friends to exemplify in a 
 very practical manner the Society's testimony, that all 
 war is unlawful to a Christian. It has been upheld by 
 them faithfully and fearlessly amid the shock of con- 
 tending forces, and also in the midst of the horrible 
 disorders occasioned by ruffianly bands that took ad- 
 vantage of the unsettled state of the country, to roam 
 about, marking their track with pillage and murder and 
 grievous desolations of property and homes. 
 
 Dwelling thus as in a furnace of affliction, amid rago 
 of battle and storm of lust and rapine, the Friends, faith- 
 ful to their principles, found a preservation for their 
 lives, like the three brethren of old in the king's burn- 
 ing fiery furnace, for He Who walked with those therein 
 so ordered it amid these perils, that they could look 
 back, when all was over, in thankful admiration of 
 the marvellous deliverances of life they had known, 
 when certain destruction seemed to have threatened 
 them. The case of John Clibborn may be quoted as an 
 example. He had kept open house to all, and was a 
 succourer to many, both Friends and others, and in 
 times of great skirmishes and slaughter he did not flee. 
 At length, plundered and quite spoiled in his outward 
 substance by the Eapparees, he was dragged out by the 
 hair of his head, his tormentors threatening to kill him, 
 but though theyburnt his house,even here no life was lost ; 
 property and substance were wasted, but their " lives 
 were given them for a prey." In reference to which 
 trials, Gough, in his history, records as "remarkable that 
 through the whole of this season of danger and tumult 
 
88 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 they kept up their meetings for worehip and dis- 
 cipline in their accustomed manner, without much 
 interruption or disturbance from either party, although 
 they often went to distant meetings through great 
 perils, by reason of the Rapparees, who in many places 
 beset the roads in ambush to rob and murder the pass- 
 engers on their way ; but they, resorting to their meet- 
 ings in faith, and under persuasion of duty, were 
 mercifully preserved and their fidelity rewarded with 
 inward consolation, peace of mind, and an increase of 
 spiritual strength ; and they gained ground in religious 
 experience, in the number of their members, and in the 
 public esteem, through their innocent, stedfast, and 
 sober deportment in the Fear of God." 
 
 Irish Friends generally are descendants of settlers 
 in that country from England and Scotland, during 
 the days of the Commonwealth, when colonists went 
 over to re-people the districts desolated by the wars ; 
 most of them had previously been in membership with 
 other non-conforming communities, for neither had the 
 early preachers much acceptance with the Catholic in- 
 habitants, nor has the Society acquired any increase in 
 after years from that source. It seems to need the 
 passing through various stages of non-conformity, be- 
 fore a Catholic can appreciate the doctrinal views of 
 Friends. 
 
 An instance of how a member of the Church of 
 England joined them is that of Thomas Braddock, who 
 deterred for a while from going to their meetings by 
 thinking Friends mistaken in " denying the two great 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 89 
 
 seals of the Covenant of Grace," was surprised on his 
 going there, to be seized, during a time of silence, with 
 such power from the Lord, as to fetch forth many deep 
 sighs and groans with tears, and a trembling so that he 
 was forced to take hold of the seat to keep himself from 
 falling ; but as he resigned himself to the Will of the 
 Lord the shaking and trouble abated, and he sat pretty 
 quiet until the meeting ended. When his wife asked 
 him, on his coming home, if he had heard any preach- 
 ing whilst there, " Yes," he said, " and the best of 
 preachers, even the Holy Jesus Himself." Needless to 
 say his prejudices vanished, and in a membership with 
 Friends he felt true Christian fellowship and a com- 
 munion of his soul with his Saviour to the end of his days. 
 
 John Dobhs was another instance, and the change 
 in his religious convictions was further attended with 
 the loss of all prospects of advancement in worldly 
 honour, and also of an inheritance in his father's pro- 
 perty that would have enabled him to live at his ease, 
 but he " studied medicine and sustained himself by a 
 successful practice, avoided popularity, and cared not 
 how little noise the world made about him, so that lie 
 enjoyed peace with God ; and as he lived, so he died, 
 in strict unity with Friends." 
 
 As an interesting pooof of how much of zeal and 
 disinterested labour can be shown by ministers in a 
 society that ofEers no pecuniary recompense for gospel 
 service, it may be mentioned that during the first hun- 
 dred years of Irish Friends' history, they received visits 
 from some 550 men and women Friends, ministers 
 
90 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 from England. James Dickenson was twelve times 
 travelling amongst them, Benjamin Holme six times, 
 and John Fothergil four. 
 
 These Irish communities had, like the English 
 much cause to be thankful for the consistent work and 
 effective ministry of many of the women amongst 
 themselves, such for example as Elizabeth Jacob, who 
 was widely known in this service, which was attended 
 with great reverence and tenderness to the reaching the 
 hearts of her hearers. She was of a sweet and cheerful 
 spirit, a good example to all in life and conversation, 
 and her case is illustrative of many more. 
 
 Preserved amidst peril of life, and faithful to their 
 principles throughout grievous and lawless times, to the 
 endurance of great spoilings of outward substance, 
 Irish Friends were also found anxious so soon as pros- 
 perity succeeded to scarcity, lest the pursuit of wealth 
 should endanger in a rising generation the maintenance 
 of that simplicity formerly professed. Their zeal 
 against a spirit of eovetousness and indifferency in 
 Truth's service, not only received commendation from 
 some who visited them, but was shewn in the establish- 
 ment of disciplinary regulations, in rules and queries 
 fully as complete and much the same as those of 
 English Friends, which have been enforced by them 
 with like care for impartiality and perseverance. 
 
 The Friends in Ireland are at this time distributed 
 in 37 congregations, with a total of nearly 2,700 mem- 
 bers. These send representatives once every four weeks 
 to twelve monthly meetings, which again are represent- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 91 
 
 ed at three quarterly meetings, and the whole Irish 
 society, like the English, meets once a year in Dublin, 
 in a General Representative Gathering, which they used 
 to call a National Assembly. It is independent of the 
 one in London held shortly after, to which however it 
 sends a Deputation of fraternal greeting ; and harmon- 
 ious action has ever been observed between what are 
 now both called " Yearly Meetings." 
 
CHAPTER Xn. 
 
 FRIENDS IN HOLLAND, GERMANY, AND THE 
 WEST INDIES. 
 
 " Having heard of great things done by the mighty power of 
 God in many Nations beyond the seas, whither He hath called 
 forth many of our dear brethren and sisters to preach the ever- 
 lasting Gospel . . our hearts are filled with tender love to 
 these precious ones of God, who have so freely given up . . 
 their friends, their near rulations, their Country and Worldly 
 Estates, yea, and their own lives also." — A General Epistle of 
 
 "HAT is on record of the early Christians going 
 
 " everywhere preaching the word," may be taken 
 as descriptive of the zeal with which the Friends' Mis- 
 sionary Band dispersed themselves in all directions, 
 not only over the British Isles but to far-off countries, 
 whither their journeyings must in those days of 
 difficult travel have been attended with great privations 
 and many perils by land ana sea. 
 
 So early as 1660 — within ten years of the rise of 
 the Society — there is mention made in a General 
 Epistle of that year " of the great work and service of 
 the Lord beyond the seas in several parts and regions 
 as Germany, America, Virginia and many other places, 
 as Florence, Mantua, Palatine, Tuscany, Italy, Rome, 
 Turkey, Jerusalem, France, Geneva, Norway, Bar- 
 badoes, Bermuda, Antigua, Jamaica, Surinam, and 
 Newfoundland," through all which this early docu- 
 ment further observes, "Friends have passed in the 
 
 1658. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 93 
 
 service of the Lord " probably in no great number, but 
 singly, or a few at a time, and of their gospel labours 
 in most of these places, little or no record now re- 
 mains, but as a list of the cost for Outfit and Travelling 
 expenses has been preserved, its amount of £490 (a 
 large sum according to the value of money in those 
 days) shows the extensiveness of a service, in which it 
 is to be remembered there was no personal remunera- 
 tion connected with its performance. 
 
 The men and women Friends thus journeying afar 
 •would find fellow countrymen in most of these 
 countries living there in exile, or as prisoners of war, 
 or taken captive by the piratical cruisers that in those 
 days infested the seas. They would also have access 
 through interpreters to the natives and their rulers ; 
 some of them had conference with a Doge in Venice, 
 and Cardinals in Rome. One of them under arrest for 
 speaking his message in public died in the dungeons 
 of the Roman Inquisition. The Great Turk was more 
 noble, having graciously received to public audience a 
 woman Friend, at whose boldness in coming so far 
 alone he much marvelled, and of whose message he 
 owned to have felt it was the Truth, and acceptable as 
 given her to speak from " the Lord God." Two other 
 women Friends found the Catholics of Malta more 
 bigoted than the Mahometans of Turkey, and suffered 
 four years of grievous imprisonment at the hands of the 
 Inquisition in Malta, from which they could get no 
 release, until the sympathies of a Cardinal, then resi- 
 dent in England (and well acquainted with some of 
 
94 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 the London Friends), were gained to intercede with the 
 ecclesiastical authorities on their behalf. 
 
 Much of this service in foreign lands was attended 
 with a distribution of Pamphlets and Books, some 
 written in Latin as a means then generally in use for 
 communication with the learned, others in the current 
 languages of the time ; for the Friends' zeal made large 
 use of the facilities printing gave for the dissemina- 
 tion of their principles, and for answering controver- 
 sialists that opposed them. These general observations 
 as to the Society's Foreign Service may serve to 
 introduce more special mention of their proceedings in 
 Holland, Germany, the West Indies, and especially in 
 North America. 
 
 HOLLAND AND GERMANY. 
 
 In the times of the Tudor and Stuart dynasties 
 much sympathy existed between the Reformers in 
 England and their brethren like-minded on the Conti- 
 nent of Europe, especially in Holland and parts of 
 Germany, which countries had become asylums for 
 those oppressed by the Catholics, as also for Puritans 
 and other Dissenters, when the Anglican Clergy dealt 
 hardly with them. Amongst a few of these still 
 remaining at the rise of the Friends' Society, their 
 earnest-minded ministers in travelling thither found 
 acceptance, as also amongst the Continental Baptists, 
 which success is especially observable in the case of 
 William Ames, who, knowing the German language. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 95 
 
 could appeal in a direct manner to the hearts of his 
 hearers. He had himself come out from being a 
 Baptist preacher through meeting with Edward 
 Burrough whilst serving as an officer in the Parlia- 
 ment Forces in Ireland, and forsaking a military life 
 had entered with all the intrepidity of his nature on a 
 gospel warfare, to which he brought natural abilities 
 and spiritual attainments of no common order. His 
 nealous labours in Holland brought on him persecution, 
 in the course of which he suffered confinement for 
 some time in the Bedlam of Rotterdam under a 
 charge of being beside himself, and although he 
 succeeded in convincing its magistrates of his own 
 sanity and conscientiousness, it must be confessed 
 some rash spirits who passed as his disciples could 
 not be equally justified in their extravagances com- 
 mitted under the saying, " my Spirit testifieth." In 
 Corisheim (a town not far from the City of Worms, in 
 Germany), "William Ames, by his ministry, gathered a 
 notable community that unanimously migrated not 
 long after to Pennsylvania, where they have formed a 
 valuable element in its Friends' population, and were 
 happily gone thither just before the French armies of 
 Louis XIV. desolated their native land with fire and 
 Bword. 
 
 " Hail to posterity ! 
 tiail future men of Germanopolis, 
 
 Let the young generations yet to be. 
 
 Look kindly upon this ; 
 Think how your fathers left their native land, 
 Dear German-land ! 0 sacred hearths and homes I 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 And where the wihl beast roams, 
 In patience planned ; 
 ^! ew forest homes beyond the mighty sea, 
 Tliere undisturbed and free, 
 To live as brothers of one family." 
 
 (From the Latin of Francis Daniel Pastorius, by J. G. 
 Whittier.) 
 
 Pastorius acquired a great reputation for learning, 
 and before his emigration, belonged to an intelligent 
 and highly cultivated community of Pietists, but soon 
 after his arrival in America joined the Society of 
 Friends, and became one of its rrv^st able and devoted 
 members. "We shall meet with him again further on 
 in connection with Slavery, against the iniquity of 
 which he was one of the earliest to make a protest. 
 
 Before this exodus various other ministers from 
 England had visited them, amongst whom were George 
 Fox, William Penn, and Robert Barclay, who in the 
 course of their journeys held debate with some of the 
 learned professors on theological subjects, and found 
 in Elizabeth, grand-daughter of James the First and 
 daughter of the ex-Queen of Bohemia, and some of her 
 near relatives, those who favom-ed their company and 
 cordially accepted their spiritual counsel. It was sel- 
 ilomany opportunity could be found for a more public 
 promulgation of their views, as the right of meeting for 
 worship in most of these Foreign States was so strictly 
 reserved to the Form that had received its legislative 
 sanction, but by enquiring in the places thus visited 
 for any who had withdrawn from the public forms 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 97 
 
 and were seeking a better way for themselves, many 
 deeply interesting gatherings, of the two or three or 
 more in private dwellings, cheered the hearts of the 
 visitors, and those that had thus at so much labour been 
 sought out by them. 
 
 In Holland a Friends* meeting was settled at 
 Amsterdam, that continued into the present century, 
 and Sewel, one of its members, has the reputation of 
 having written the first, and to this day, most complete 
 History of the Society during its earlier periods. 
 
 WEST INDIES. 
 The possession of the Islands of the "West Indies, 
 has been a source of much warlike contest between the 
 European Powers, and our country had then acquired 
 less territory there than now, at the time of Friends' first 
 visit to them. In consequence, their labours were 
 chiefly directed to Barbadoes, which ic a small but 
 fertile island, that has always been in possession of the 
 English, who settled there in 1625, and made it not only 
 open to free colonisation, but a strong military station, 
 and a place whither its criminals were sent to share in 
 plantation labour with negroes imported as slaves from 
 Africa. 
 
 Much interest speedily attended their ministry 
 amidst this miscellaneous population, and many of the 
 chief persons in the island were to be seen amongst 
 those gathered at the numerous and large meetings, held 
 with the general inhabitants, and also amongst the 
 black population. 
 
9S 
 
 THE FRIEN'DS. 
 
 This interest, however, developed into opposition, 
 when it was found that adherents to Friends' views 
 declined any share in military service, or rendering 
 contributions in aid of warlike preparations, and fears 
 also arose lest their efforts to religiously enlighten the 
 slaves, might cause them to rise for freedom against 
 the white population. 
 
 As usual in these cases, the chief instigators to the 
 troubles that ensued, were to be found amongst the 
 clericals of the island, whose own social habits appear 
 to have been of a character in little accordance with 
 their sacred calling, but having the ear of the Governor, 
 it was easy for them to raise an alarm amongst the 
 authorities, lest peace and safety should be endangered 
 by these new doctrines, which they denounced as sub- 
 versive of the fundamental truths of Christianity, and 
 also of the principles of all good government. 
 
 Grievous as these charges undoubtedly were, and 
 great as was the commotion they at first occasioned, 
 such turned ultimately to an advantage, by giving 
 Friends an opportunity of clearing away many misap- 
 prehensions, through being called upon by the Governor 
 (a man like Sergius Paulus, of a prudent mind) to state 
 distinctly their views, before he would take any official 
 action for their suppression. 
 
 In consequence, George Fox (who was then in the 
 island), with others, drew up a document, which is so 
 able and comprehensive a statement of Friends' belief 
 in the cardinal truths of the gospel, and full acceptance 
 of Holy Scripture, as to have been referred to ever since 
 
t 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 99 
 
 whenever their soundness in the Christian Faith may 
 have been called in question. 
 
 It is too long to give here, and is the less needed, as 
 our subject is rather with their points of diversity, than 
 agreement with their fellow believers. It will be found 
 in George Fox's Journal (a new edition of which in two 
 volumes at 5s. is just issued), and also in the Society's 
 Book of Christian Discipline. 
 
 By this and other means open persecution was held 
 in check, and those who joined Friends settled into 
 regular congregations, not only in Barbadoes but in the 
 much larger island of Jamaica ; so that to this day 
 may be seen Meeting Houses or Burial Grounds in 
 various parts of the West Indies, some in ruins, others 
 converted into dwellings, whilst the descendants of 
 Buch as once worshipped in them must be sought 
 for amongst the populations of America. Thither so 
 general an emigration set in, that it stripped these parts 
 of Friends, who left on account of their conscientious 
 objection to support war, and their conviction of the 
 iniquity of obtaining a livelihood by means of slave 
 labour. 
 
 Note. — In connection with Dutch Friends it should not be 
 forgotten how much they benefited by Steven Crisp's, of 
 Colchester, frequent visits, for he was one of the clearest and 
 most effective exponents of Friends' Doctrinals, and had learnt 
 to speak German. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 FRIEXDS LS" AMERICA. 
 
 " The Seed in America shall be as tlie sand of the sea." — An 
 utterance by Humphrey Xort<jn. one of the first Friends who 
 visited that great Continent. 
 
 rpHE Society of Friends has largely developed in the 
 United States, where it became divided, about sixty 
 years ago, into two nearly equal communities, in con- 
 sequence of diverse theological views, through the one 
 having adopted an Unitarian basis, whilst the other 
 retains the original views of the Society, and is the body 
 with which English Friends have continued to be in 
 correspondence. 
 
 This orthodox section consists at the present time 
 of twelve Yearly Meetings, with a total of 84,000 
 members, increasing latterly at the rate of about 2,000 
 a year. Each of these Yearly Meetings, though inde- 
 pendent in itself, maintains with the other a friendly 
 correspondence, and most of them are marked by an 
 active and influential zeal in various kinds of mission 
 and philanthropic work. 
 
 Looking backwards, Friends' history in America 
 presents itself under a two-fold aspect, each of which 
 requires notice, being in one caise the spread of 
 Friends' principles amongst colonists of various relig- 
 ious persuasions already settled there, and in the other 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 101 
 
 a founding of an entirely new State by William Penn, 
 under the name of Pennsylvania. 
 
 These English settlements along the Eastern coast 
 of America were founded at various periods by 
 associations for the ostensible purpose of trade and 
 commerce, under charters obtained from successive 
 sovereigns, ranging in date from James the First to 
 George the Second. Such royal grants gave powers 
 of self-government subject to the British Crown, and 
 throughout the great political and religious disturb- 
 ances of those reigns, these colonies became a general 
 refuge for the defeated or persecuted of all kinds — 
 English, Scotch, and Irish, with Huguenots from 
 France, Waldenses, Swedes and Danes, Moravians and 
 others. 
 
 With all this mixed character in the emigrants, 
 each province acquired a character of its own, those in 
 the South favouring Episcopalian and Royalist princi- 
 ples, whilst the Northern ones were Nonconformist as to 
 religion, and Republican or Democratic in their politics. 
 
 Between these lay the territories granted to Lord 
 Baltimore, who, though a Roman Catholic himself, 
 declared "that he would not directly or indirectly 
 molest any settler, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, 
 for or in respect of his religion," and next to him were 
 territories then in the hands of the Dutch, whose 
 charter for what they called the New Netherlands, con- 
 tained those principles of toleration for all forms ol 
 religion, that had contributed to Holland's greatness. 
 It caused their city of i'^ ew Amsterdam to acquire that 
 
.102 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 cosmopolitan character which, under its present name 
 of New York, has been so enormously developed. 
 
 Between these Dutch possessions and the Northerii 
 or New England States, was another haven of refuge li- 
 the province of Rhode Island, whither Roger Williams, 
 a Baptist minister, led off those who could not accom- 
 modate their religious convictions to the rigid Calvinism 
 of the Presbyterians and Independents of New England 
 and Massachussets. All these Settlements were more 
 or less in a growing and prosperous condition at the 
 time when Friends from England travelled to make 
 known their principles among them, and encountered 
 Hardships and sufferings which will have to be des- 
 cribed with such brevity as the nature of the case 
 will permit. 
 
 Interest naturally settles around parts where thy 
 struggle has been the keenest, and nowhere else 
 did the Missionary Friends from England meet with, 
 greater opposition, or become subjected to grosser 
 ill treatment than among the Presbyterians of Massa- 
 chussets, even to the loss of the lives of some of them 
 at the hands of the public executioner. 
 
 The first arrivals were two women Friends, who 
 came from Barbadoes to Boston, where its authorities 
 promptly subjected them to examination, and on dis- 
 covering the nature of their principles, condemned the 
 books thev had brought with them to be burnt by the 
 common iiaugman, and subjected their persons to brutal 
 tests, in search of some evidence as to their being devil- 
 wosse-ssed or witches in disguise, of which failing to 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 103 
 
 discover any signs, they were sent ignominiously away. 
 Some more Friends arriving soon after, had to sufiEer 
 close imprisonment without pen, ink, or paper, until 
 the ship that brought them could be ready for its return, 
 when they also were sent away. And to guard against 
 further intrusions, it was proclaimed at beat of drum 
 through Boston streets, that the heaviest penalties would 
 be inflicted on all who should harbour in their homes 
 any who promulgated these — to them — horrible doc- 
 trines. "God forbid," said one of the preachers, "that we 
 should tolerate errors. To say that men ought to have 
 liberty of conscience is impious ignorance ; religion 
 admits of no eccentric notions." By these methods had 
 the Presbyterian settlers in New England succeeded in 
 driving out Antinomians, Baptists, and all others who 
 had opposed or failed in conformity to their own Church- 
 order and doctrine, but they were now confronted, in 
 these Missionary Friends, with a dauntless spirit of en- 
 durance under all they could inflict in grievous scourg- 
 ings and cruel imprisonments. When banished under 
 pain of death they returned, and were willing to suffer, 
 and did, to the laying down of their lives, rather than 
 desert the holy cause in which they were engaged. 
 
 Although the magistrates were able by these pro- 
 ceedings to deter captains of ships from bringing any 
 Friends among their passengers to Boston, another 
 missionary band were about to make a fresh entrance 
 on American soil in a vessel of their own. There was 
 a ship master in the North of England who, whilst 
 building a small craft for himself, became a Friend, 
 
THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 anrl felt a divine intimation that the first venture, in 
 which his vessel was to be engaged, would be one con- 
 nected with the interests of the Society he had joined, 
 and although he knew nothing of any particular line 
 of service that would be called for at his hand, he brought 
 his little ship up to the port of London, to communi- 
 cate with the Friends there on the subject. He now 
 found that at that time, five of those who had been ex- 
 pelled from Boston, were feeling they must at all 
 hazards return thither, and that six others from different 
 parts of the country were come to town, seeking some 
 way of joining in this perilous service. The London 
 friends thought the arrival of this brother captain with 
 liis vessel, was a divinely ordered means at their dis- 
 [iosal, and although the little "Woodhouse" seemed 
 I'ar too small for crossing a wide and stormy ocean 
 with safety, they engaged it for this purpose. But the 
 captain's heart greatly failed him as the time of depar- 
 ture drew near, and he would have forfeited the charter 
 rather than set sail, if George Fox had not encouraged 
 liim to persevere, and so he says (in an account which 
 this ship owner wrote of the voyage) : " I received the 
 Lord's servants on board, who came with them with 
 a mighty hand and an outstretched arm," and truly, as 
 will be seen, there was the germ of the American 
 Friends' Society enshrined in that little craft. The 
 voyage took two months, and was conducted in an extra- 
 ordinary manner. Throughout all the time it lasted they 
 made none of the usual observations for latitude or longi- 
 tiide, but instead waited daily before the Lord, " Whose 
 
THE FRIENDS. 105 
 
 power they felt leading the little vessel, even as 
 it were leading a horse by the head," and they fared 
 better than some much larger ships, from which they 
 had parted company, and found themselves guided to 
 friendly shores, for the land they first sighted proved 
 to be New York, then in the possession of the Dutch, 
 who unlike the Calvinists of Boston, welcomed all 
 strangers. After leaving some of the Friends there, the 
 little "Woodhouse" went onto Rhode Island, where, as 
 one of the passengers wrote, " we were received with 
 much joy of heart." His letter shows the spirit that 
 animated these evangelists, for he adds : " The Lord God 
 of Hosts is with us — the shout of a King is amongst us 
 — the people fear our God, for His goodness is large 
 and great, and reaches to the ends of the earth . . . 
 take no thought for me . . . man I do not fear, 
 for my trust is in the Lord . . . the seed in 
 America shall be as the sand of the sea," a confidence 
 justified by events in the numerical status 'attained by 
 the Society there, and the influence American Friends 
 have exerted on their Brethren in older Lands. 
 
 The eleven who had come in the " Woodhou se " were 
 joined by four who had arrived from Barbadoes, and 
 this missionary band dispersed themselves through- 
 out the American Colonies, quickly gaining converts 
 to their religious principles, and settling meetings in 
 various places, especially in Rhode Island, where the 
 governor and most of the authorities became Friends. 
 Even New England, with all its care over the sea-board, 
 could not prevent an entrance of these earnest spirits 
 
106 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 across the land frontiers, and the magistrates of Boston 
 learnt that, notwithstanding their threateuings, Friends' 
 principles were largely spreading in some of their 
 towns, causing those who held them to withdraw from 
 the public worship, and sit down in small companies 
 or in one another's dwellings for silent waiting before 
 the Lord. The ministers inflamed the authorities 
 against them, and violent measures l>y fines, whippings, 
 and imprisonments ensued, for the purpose of break- 
 ing up and dispersing these little communities. Laws 
 also were passed for confiscation of property and 
 banishment upon all who would not conform to the 
 Presbyterian system ; such methods had been success- 
 ful with Antinomians and Baptists, and it looked as if the 
 Friends might also become shattered and scattered 
 by these severities. In this emergency the little 
 missionary band freely exposed themselves to endure, for 
 the cause's sake, all that the authorities could inflict, 
 and four of them lost their lives in the result. When ex- 
 pelled, as they often were, they returned. When 
 whipped till people cried out for shame, they bore it in 
 patience declaring "their cords were no more to them 
 than spiders' webs." When pilloried and branded, all 
 was borne in patience, when ears were cut off the 
 sufferers prayed forgiveness for their persecutors, and 
 at last, when led to the gallows, these dauntless ones 
 saug hymns in the fervour and spirit of the martyrs of 
 old. 
 
 It is a long, very long and sad story, and more than 
 the four would have lost their lives if news of these 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 107 
 
 barbarous executions of pious individuals had not 
 reached Friends in England, who gained access to the 
 King, and so roused his indignation that he commission- 
 ed one of them, who had been himself expelled, to return 
 as his messenger with royal commands to stop "this 
 vein of innocent blood." 
 
 Swiftly sped the vessel that carried this royally 
 commissioned Friend, who arrived in Boston just as 
 another one was about to' be led to the gallows-tree. 
 
 On first confronting the Boston governor he was 
 assailed with violent abuse for daring to return, and for 
 entering into his presence with his hat on ; but so soon 
 as the official learnt his commission, he bared his own 
 head to listen to the King's commands, and (after re- 
 tiring awhile to consult with a colleague) announced that 
 they should be obeyed ; and thus no more Friends than 
 these four were ever hung on Boston Common ; yet were 
 the scourgings continued on their bared backs through 
 the towns, and heavy fines and imprisonments inflicted 
 until the authorities seemed all aweary of such scenes. 
 
 Probably they became assured that those they 
 treated with barbarities worse than if they had been 
 felons were not after all the " dangerous heretics " their 
 ministers accounted them ; nor were their principles to 
 be feared as subversive of government, but on the con- 
 trary could be regarded as productive of good, loyal, 
 and peaceable folk, whose industry would be helpful 
 to the country's advancement. 
 
 An American historian thus reviews these events : 
 — " We contemplate with horror the fires of Smithfield, 
 
106 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 across the land frontiers, and the magistrates of Boston 
 learnt that, notwithstanding their threatenings, Friends' 
 principles were largely spreading in some of their 
 towns, causing those who held them to withdraw from 
 the public worship, and sit down in small companies 
 or in one another's dwellings for silent waiting before 
 the Lord. The ministers inflamed the authorities 
 against them, and violent measures ny fines, whippings, 
 and imprisonments ensued, for the purpose of break- 
 ing up and dispersing these little communities. Laws 
 also were passed for confiscation of property and 
 banishment upon all who would not conform to the 
 Presbyterian system ; such methods had been success- 
 ful with Antinomians and Baptists, and it looked as if the 
 Friends might also become shattered and scattered 
 by these severities. In this emergency the little 
 missionary band freely exposed themselves to endure, for 
 the cause's sake, all that the authorities could inflict, 
 and four of them lost their lives in the result. When ex- 
 pelled, as they often were, they returned. When 
 whipped till people cried out for shame, they bore it in 
 patience declaring "their cords were no more to them 
 than spiders' webs." When pilloried and branded, all 
 was borne in patience, when ears were cut off the 
 sufferers prayed forgiveness for their persecutors, and 
 at last, when led to the gallows, these dauntless ones 
 sang hymns in the fervour and spirit of the martyrs of 
 old. 
 
 It is a long, very long and sad story, and more than 
 the four would have lost their lives if news of these 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 107 
 
 barbarous executions of pious individuals had not 
 reached Friends in Enghmd, who gained access to the 
 King, and so roused his indignation that he commission- 
 ed one of them, who had been himself expelled, to return 
 as his messenger with royal commands to stop " this 
 vein of innocent blood." 
 
 Swiftly sped the vessel that carried this royally 
 commissioned Friend, who arrived in Boston just as 
 another one was about to' be led to the gallows-tree. 
 
 On first confronting the Boston governor he was 
 assailed with violent abuse for daring to return, and for 
 entering into his presence with his hat on ; but so soon 
 as the official learnt his commission, he bared his own 
 head to listen to the King's commands, and (after re- 
 tiring awhile to consult with a colleague) announced that 
 they should be obeyed ; and thus no more Friends than 
 these four were ever hung on Boston Common ; yet were 
 the scourgings continued on their bared backs through 
 the towns, and heavy fines and imprisonments inflicted 
 until the authorities seemed all aweary of such scenes. 
 
 Probably they became assured that those they 
 treated with barbarities worse than if they had been 
 felons were not after all the " dangerous heretics " their 
 ministers accounted them ; nor were their principles to 
 be feared as subversive of government, but on the con- 
 trary could be regarded as productive of good, loyal, 
 and peaceable folk, whose industry would be helpful 
 to the country's advancement. 
 
 An American historian thus reviews these events : 
 — " We contemplate with horror the fires of Smithfield, 
 
108 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 the dungeons and auto-da-fees of the Inquisition, the 
 massacre of St. Bartholomew, and the penalties of the 
 Star Chamber, but the unpitying and remorseless sen- 
 tence of Endicott the Boston Governor, who on one 
 occasion told his prisoner, ' Renounce your religion or 
 die,' and the sanguinary denunciations of the General 
 Court, fill us with equal dismay. That they who had 
 preached such purity of life and conduct to mankind, 
 that they who had been exposed to the terrors of perse- 
 cution, and fled from it, that they, forgetful of their 
 own precepts and the lessons of their own sad ex- 
 perience, should pursue to banishment and death almost 
 every species of nonconformity, displays to us recesses 
 in the human mind which point to a dark and unex- 
 plored labyrinth in its devious and impenetrable 
 depths." The Boston rulers considered Friends as 
 suicides because they rushed on the sword themselves ; 
 "but," continues Bancroft, " if so, those who held the 
 sword were accessories." 
 
 The subjects of this ignominious and cruel treat- 
 ment were persons of high character, and some of them 
 in a good position of life. 
 
 John Rous, who, after being several times whipped 
 in public, suffered the loss of one of his ears, was a 
 young gentleman, the son of a London merchant ; he 
 was afterwards married to one of Margaret Fell's 
 daughters. Mary Fisher, who underwent grievous 
 Bcourgings and indignities, was a person in good cir- 
 cumstances, as well as of an undaunted spirit. She was 
 the one whom the Sultan of Turkey had received with 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 109 
 
 such respect. Mary Clark, who was the first to suffer 
 these public scourgings, was the wife of a London trades- 
 man. Humphrey Norton had come from the North of 
 England. As a reward for his gospel labours he had 
 his hand branded with an H, as being a heretic in the 
 estimation of these rigid Presbyterians. But the list 
 of sufferers and nature of sufferings, which extended 
 over more than thirty years, is far too long for citation 
 in this brief survey. Of those who lost their lives, 
 William Robinson was well educated and a London 
 merchant. Marmaduke Stevenson, his companion, 
 was a Yorkshire husbandman, who had left a wife and 
 family in obedience to a Divine call. Mary Dyer, 
 who went with them to the gallows, was a matron of 
 unusual abilities and force of character. The suffererg 
 liad spent their last hours exhorting the crowds 
 that gathered round their dungeons, and walked with 
 radiant countenances to the scene of execution, but 
 were prevented by beat of drum from further address- 
 ing those who accompanied them thither. On arrival 
 there, Mary Dyer was at the last moment reprieved, 
 through, it was said, a successful intercession of her 
 son, but the other two died with words of joy and 
 forgiveness on their lips. As a last indignity the 
 bodies were denied to their friends for burial, being 
 cast into a deep and watery pit by the gallows' side. 
 Mary Dyer returned to her home in the neighbouring 
 Province, but finding that these persecuting laws still 
 remained in force, resolved to protest against them 
 with her life, and this time the hangman's function 
 
110 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 had its cruel course. William Leddra, another sufferer 
 of the death penalty, bore an unexceptional character. 
 Wenlock Ghristison, who, to encourage his Friends in 
 suffering, had freely exposed himself to these savage 
 laws, received likewise a sentence of death, and only 
 by that timely arrival of the royal veto were the 
 Boston magistrates saved from sacrificing this further 
 victim to their religious zeal. Of Mary Dyer, it must 
 further be remarked that she possessed a dauntless 
 spirit which had been manifested on former occasions 
 during her life, as she had been a prominent member 
 in a community expelled from New England for their 
 Antinomian views before she became a Friend. 
 She is described as " a person of no mean extract and 
 parentage, of an estate pretty plentiful, of a comely 
 Btature and countenance, of a piercing knowledge in 
 many things, and pleasant discourse. So fit for great 
 affairs that she wanted nothing that was manly, except 
 only the name and sex." 
 
 " I passed," are the words of Joseph Nicholson, 
 another member of this intrepid band, " through most 
 parts of the English inhabitants and sounded the 
 mighty day of the Lord which is coming upon them 
 through most towns, and was at many of their public 
 worship houses. I have received eighty stripes at 
 Boston and some other of the towns. Their cruelty 
 was very great towards me and others, but over all we 
 were carried with courage and boldness, thanks be to 
 God. We gave our backs to the smiters, and walked after 
 the cart with boldness, and were glad in our hearts in their 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 greatest rage." These were the sort John Wesley wanted 
 when he declared " Give me one hundred preachers 
 who fear nothing but Sin, and desire nothing but God, 
 and I care not a straw whether they be clergymen or 
 laymen, such alone will shake the gates of Hell and set 
 up the kingdom of Heaven upon earth ! " Certainly a 
 measure of the same power that animated and sustained 
 prophets and martyrs of old must be attributed to these 
 earnest men and women who despised shame, endured 
 great afflictions and suffered even unto death lest 
 the cause they loved should be uprooted and lost. 
 Puritan historians have sought to excuse their people's 
 conduct, but all impartial minds will find it difficult 
 to avoid condemning, as harsh and unchristian, the 
 ti'eatment of the early Friends by New England 
 Presbyterians. 
 
 If in a few instances there were one or two of the 
 women Friends who acted strangely and went undressed 
 through the streets or into assemblies, let It be taken 
 as their form of protest against barbarities inflicted on 
 themselves and their sisters by the authorities, whose 
 common form of treatment, even for women Friends, 
 was to have them stripped and flogged at the cart tail 
 by the hangman through the streets of their towns. 
 And whenever the zealous preachers seem harsh in the 
 judgments they pronounced on their persecutors, let 
 such be taken as given in the sense of solemn warnings 
 from those whose last words were of forgiveness and 
 prayers for their persecutors. If an apostle's spirit 
 waxed warm when smitten, contrary to the law, what 
 
112 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 surprise can be felt at strong words from the accused 
 when savagely interrupted in their defence as these 
 often were by a handkerchief or key thrust, at the 
 judge's order, into their mouths. 
 
 Nor must it be forgotten that it was through these 
 devoted men and women Friends freely exposing 
 themselves to such indignities and deadly perils, by 
 returning again and again after expulsion and banish- 
 ment that the Society became rooted in New Eng- 
 land soil. Their holy ardour diffused itself through- 
 out the little communities which else would have 
 become scattered under fierce persecution, if these had 
 not rallied them to endure all that opposers could inflict, 
 and would not be cast out. When the two who having 
 been banished knew it was death to have returned 
 •were arrested at Boston, they said they had come to 
 look " their bloody laws in the face," and to shame the 
 magistrates into their repeal. Seventeen friends — seven 
 of whom were women — accompanied them to the last 
 scene, and one of these brought with her linen 
 wrappings should the laws be enforced upon them — 
 but even such attentions were denied to the dead, as 
 before shewn, by the cruelty of the Boston officials, 
 whose hearts were steeled by the harangues of their 
 popular ministers to inflict for imputed heresy a death 
 for which otherwise they could see no cause. 
 
 Although the King's interference checked further 
 use of the hangman's halter, it did not prevent his 
 services being in frequent requisition for publicly 
 flogging any who returned after banishment, nor had 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 115 
 
 it the effect of preventing grievous sufferings inflicted 
 by fines and seizures of goods, until a similar treatment 
 was attempted towards some of the royalist settlers, 
 when such a remonstrance came from the English 
 Court as to put an end for ever to these Presbyterian 
 methods of enforcing their Church-order and Discipline 
 in the State under their control. 
 
 English Friends watched this struggle of their 
 American brethren with feelings deepened by their 
 own experiences, and not a few were led from time to 
 time to go and share these trials with them. In 1671 
 George Fox with thirteen other Friends crossed the 
 Atlantic for this purpose. He landed first at Barbadoes,. 
 and after good service there proceeded to America, where 
 he attended a Yearly Meeting held at Rhode Island, to 
 which great numbers came, and felt much profited by 
 his wise and fatherly counsel. He found so much 
 openness for Friends in this liberal-minded province,, 
 as to stay some time longer there "confirming the 
 churches." Many of the wealthier sort joined the 
 Society, even to the Governor and members of hi& 
 council, for it proved to be a time of large convincement, 
 and many Friends' meetings became settled throughout 
 the various American colonies as a result of the zealous 
 activity with which he and so many others travelled to 
 and fro from one Colony to another for this purpose. 
 Such labour of love cannot be sufficiently appreciated 
 unless it is remembered how far distant these Colonies 
 were from each other, being then separated either by 
 vast extent of almost trackless forests, or only reached 
 
 & 
 
114 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 through coasting voyages of an adventurous character. 
 
 It was whilst riding through these forests one of 
 their party was thrown so violently from his horse as to 
 be given over for dead by his companions, who thought 
 the neck was broken, but George Fox coming up, set 
 himself to work and succeeded, by ways he had possibly 
 learnt as a herdsman, in wrenching the neck-bones into 
 position so that the Friend was soon himself again, an 
 incident that may serve to illustrate William Penn's re- 
 mark, " I never saw him not a match for every service 
 or occasion." 
 
 "William Edmundson was one who had a full share 
 in these travelling experiences. His high mental endow- 
 ments and spiritual gifts, which we have noted in our 
 account of the Irish Friends, marked him out for great 
 influence with the higher class professors and those in 
 authority, whose minds became by his statements of 
 doctrine often cleared from previous prejudice, as for 
 example, when, after having shewn Friends' belief in 
 the Atonement and the Scriptures, he was asked "Where 
 then is it that you ditf er from the ministers " : he replied, 
 " They are satisfied with talk of Christ and the Scriptures, 
 but we could not be satisfied without the sure inward 
 divine knowledge of God and Christ, and the enjoyment 
 of those comforts the Scriptures declared, and which 
 true believers enjoyed in the primitive times." 
 
 As our further tracing of Friends' affairs on the 
 continent of America will lead us away from these older 
 settlements to one founded by themselves, it may be 
 remarked, without indulging any vindictive spirit, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 115 
 
 that in these New England settlements, where they were 
 80 barbarously treated for many years, most who had 
 had a chief hand in the sufferings inflicted came to 
 their end, either through some loathsome disease, distress 
 ot: mind, or grievous or sudden disaster that called to re- 
 irembrance the judgments of which the Friends who 
 uied at their hands had so earnestly warned them. The 
 Colony itself also suffered more than any other when the 
 French and Indian wars soon after occurred, so much 
 60 that it has been estimated New England lost before 
 the victory had been obtained one in every twenty of 
 her able-bodied population. " Never," remarks Cave 
 in his Church History, " was any wicked attempt made 
 against Christians but a divine vengeance was seen at 
 the heels of it." 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 FRIENDS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 
 
 " Within the Land of Penn, the Sectary yielded to the 
 Citizen, and peaceful dwelt the many creeded men." — Whittier. 
 
 " Without any Carnal weapon we entered the Land and in- 
 habited there as safe as if there had been thousands of garrisons, 
 for the Most High preserved us from harm, both of man and 
 beast." — (Letter of an early settler.) 
 
 rpHIS Friends' Colony owes its origin to the settle- 
 ment of a debt due by the Crown of England to 
 William Penn, the son of the famous Admiral of that 
 name, who for his valour and success in Naval affairs 
 had been rewarded by lucrative offices and estates, 
 and yet at his death left his son and heir a claimant 
 on the Crown for £15,000, which in some way Charles 
 the Second had become indebted to him. 
 
 It has ever been customary with Kings to discharge 
 their sense of obligation to those who might have done 
 them service, by grants of dignities or lands, and iu 
 this instance Charles found the son of his famous 
 Admiral willing, and indeed solicitous, to acquire ;i 
 Province in the Western World as a full discharge of his 
 pecuniary claim. If extent of country were any indi- 
 cation of value, the King would in this instance appear 
 to have greatly exceeded his indebtedness, by giving a 
 territory as large as all England in settlement of a claim 
 for fifteen thousand pounds. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 117 
 
 It was, however, at this time in an unreclaimed 
 condition, covered with forests ; the hunting ground 
 of roving Indians, except a few settlements of Dutch 
 and Swedes, on the river Delaware that formed its 
 eastern boundary. 
 
 It had formed part of an extensive territory, inclu- 
 sive of the East and West Jerseys and New York, that 
 had hitherto been known as the New Netherlands, but 
 through the fortune of war, becoming transferred from 
 the Dutch to the British crown, it enabled the king to 
 make this grant to William Penn, which he desired 
 should by its name retain a remembrance, both of its 
 forests and its Founder, from which royal christening 
 resulted that of Pennsylvania. 
 
 It could only be reached across more than 2,000 miles 
 of stormy ocean, traversed at that time by vessels of but 
 small capacity, which were often many months on the 
 voyage. But William Penn's philanthropic mind em- 
 braced the opportunity it afforded, of exhibiting to the 
 world a colony modelled on perfect freedom, both as to 
 religion and government. " I eyed the Lord," he wrote, 
 " in obtaining it, and desire to keep it, that I may not be 
 unworthy of His love, but do that which may answer 
 His kind providence and serve His truth and people, 
 that an example may be set to the nations. There may 
 be room there, though not here, for such an Holy 
 Exjjerimenty 
 
 In the progress of negotiations connected with this 
 provincial investiture, William Penn had besides other 
 helpers, a very good friend in James, Duke of York, 
 
118 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 between whom and the admiral, his father, a close 
 intimacy had existed, that was continued to the son, 
 even after James had become king. But the course 
 of events should not be further pursued, without 
 some retrospect over William Penn's previous history, 
 for he was a middle-aged man at this time, and had 
 experienced many vicissitudes in the course of his 
 life. 
 
 His father, Sir William Penn, was an admiral of 
 high renown, his mother the daughter of an Amsterdam 
 merchant, and their son William was born at their 
 residence on Tower Hill, London, in 1644. He gave 
 early promise by manly qualities and mental endow- 
 ments, of more than sustaining the honours his father 
 had achieved, and no efforts were spared to perfect him 
 by education at school and university, together 
 with training in camp and court at home and abroad. 
 Through all was there a religious zeal which thwarted 
 parental expectations of worldly honour. When 
 sent to college he was expelled, on account of resist- 
 ance to some new Ceremonials being required from 
 the undergraduates ; and when he was in London 
 his father found him more often amongst the 
 religious people than frequenting camp or court, and 
 idthough by foreign travel and residence at ioreigu 
 courts, he seemed for a few years to have become some- 
 what of a fine gentleman, it soon disappeared, to his 
 lather's disappointment, on meeting again with religious 
 associates. Having estates in Ireland he sent William 
 thither to manage them, and gave him such introduc- 
 
THE FKIENDS. 
 
 119 
 
 tions to its rulers as would, he thought, ensure for his 
 son an atmosphere of military and viceregal life, well 
 calculated to promote his worldly advancement ; but 
 here the youth met again, in an unexpected manner, 
 the same friend who had first roused his religious 
 enthusiasm at Oxford. This was Thomas Loe, a gentle- 
 man of good birth and university education, one of the 
 few of that class who had joined the ranks of Friends, 
 and become a powerful minister amongst them, not only 
 in public discourse, but through the personal influence 
 of a superior and cultivated mind. 
 
 William Penn had not seen him since his university 
 days, but hearing ho was travelling in Ireland and had 
 appointed a meeting in Cork, near which city he 
 was managing his father's estates, he went to it. It 
 gathered in silence, but soon Thomas Loe arose with 
 the words " There is a faith that overcometh the world, 
 and there is a faith that is overcome of the world ;" on 
 which he enlarged in so impressive a manner, that 
 William Penn resolved to forsake all worldly ambition 
 and unite himself with the Friends, to seek for that wis- 
 dom and peace no earthly honours could bestow. Heroic 
 in religious controversy, as the admiral was in naval en- 
 gagements, he was soon unaer arrest for propagating 
 his new views, and when released and recalled home, 
 bore himself most bravely and in great patience under a 
 father's anger, carried to the extreme of being forbidden 
 the house and cut off from his inheritance. 
 
 This left him dependent on the kindness of his 
 new associates, and such little support as a fond mother 
 
120 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 could secretly give, without awakeuing a jealous father's 
 suspicions. 
 
 Such a man could not fail to become conspicuous 
 in whatever circumstances he might be found. His 
 first essay at authorship, was a treatise against what he 
 thought were carnal views (too prevalent) of the Trinity, 
 and called it "The sandy foundation shaken," for which, 
 on the accusation of its being an heretical work, the Bishop 
 of London had him confined for nine months in the 
 Tower ; but here he composed one of the most eflfective 
 of his many publications, No Gross, no Croivn,'^ and 
 when remonstrated with by warm-hearted friends for 
 following courses that only brought him trouble, replied 
 he " scorned that religion which was not worth suffer- 
 ing for." 
 
 Released from this imprisonment, scarcely a year 
 had passed before he was again under arrest, owing to 
 his resolute conduct in attending Friends' meetings, 
 which in those days of persecution were regarded as 
 unlawful assemblies, and subjected whoever frequented 
 them to fines and imprisonment. On this occasion, 
 William Penn had formed part of the little company 
 gathered in Gracechurch Street in front of their Meeting 
 House premises, out of whi(^h they were kept by the city 
 authorities, being determined no powers on earth should 
 prevent their meeting for divine worship. They met in 
 Bllence, but William Penn rising to address them was ar- 
 rested witli William Mead, who had also spoken there. 
 Both stood their trial at the London Sessions. William 
 Peim boldly demanded on what law the indictment 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 121 
 
 had been framed against them. On the Common Law," 
 answered the Recorder. " Where is that Law ? " He 
 was denied its production, on which he replied " The 
 Law which is not at hand to be shewn, is far from being 
 common Law." Amidst exclamations and menaces from 
 the bench, this intrepid young man of five and twenty 
 proceeded with skill and learning, to plead for the 
 liberty of the subject under the fundamental Laws of 
 England, and when ordered out of Court by the irritated 
 Judge, reminded the Jury that his case rested with 
 them, they being his judges. Dissatisfied with their 
 first verdict, "Guilty of speaking in Gracious Street," 
 tlie Recorder heaped upon them a torrent of abuse. 
 " We will have a verdict, by the help of God, or you shall 
 starve for it." " You are Englishmen," said William 
 Ponn, who had been brought again to the Bar, " mind 
 your privilege, give not away your birthright." " It will 
 never be well with us," said the Recorder, " till some- 
 thing like the Spanish Inquisition be in England." 
 At last the Jury, who had been kept without food or 
 firing for two days and two nights, gave their verdict 
 " Not Guilty." The Recorder fined them forty marks 
 (shillings) apiece for their independence, and sent 
 William Penn back to prison, for contempt of Court in 
 not removing his hat. He has earned from historians 
 great praise for this noble stand made by him for 
 British freedom of justice. 
 
 His father, who was now very ill and wishful for 
 a reconciliation, paid the fines inflicted on the Jury, and 
 obtained his son's release, whom, on his dying bed, he 
 
122 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 exhorted to persevere in his conscientious convic- 
 tions, and left him his heir to a fortune of about £1,500 
 a year. 
 
 William Penn in joining with Friends came into close 
 association with some of his own social rank, especially 
 a family of Peuingtons at Chalfont in Bucks — where 
 he met with the accomplished and pious lady who be- 
 came his wife. She was the step-daughter of Isaac 
 Peuington, a son of a Lord Mayor of London, who 
 had married her mother, the widow of Sir William 
 Springett, and as she was heiress to her father's estates, 
 the newly wedded pair were able to settle in circum- 
 stances of much financial prosperity. In this domestic 
 comfort William Penn passed many years of his life as a 
 country gentleman, with a young family happily grow- 
 ing up around him, so that other than mere worldly 
 motives must have influenced him to undertake the 
 settlement of a province in the Western world, when 
 he was become some forty years of age. He believed 
 he should be gaining for his friends, still under harass 
 in the old lands, a New Habitation with good prospects 
 of prosperity, freedom and peace, in which he proposed 
 that all of any nation, race, or colour should equally 
 unite on the broad basis of civil and religious liberty. 
 
 He was already acquainted with these parts of North 
 America through having become a Trustee, in connec- 
 tion with the purchase and settlement of the adjoining 
 districts of East and West Jersey, and on gaining 
 Pennsylvania as its sole proprietor, could with the more 
 confidence issue proposals for emigration thither, which 
 
PENN'S GREAT SEAL. 
 
i 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 123 
 
 met with such cordial response that ship masters be- 
 came busy, at many an English and foreign port, in 
 fitting out vessels for this purpose. These went, it is 
 said, at the rate of one a week for years together, so that 
 in seven years time William Penn's colony had become 
 more populous than others of forty years' planting. 
 
 It was foimded on the broad basis that the people 
 themselves were to be the authors of their own laws, in 
 a regularly constituted Assembly, that they might be 
 free from the abuse of power, for " Liberty without 
 obedience is Confusion — and Obedience without 
 Liberty is Slavery." Associated with these admirable 
 views of the Founder, it is interesting to find colonists 
 \vriting that " our business in this land is not so much 
 to build houses, and establish factories, and promote 
 trade and manufactures that may enrich ourselves, 
 (though all these things in their due place) as to erect 
 temples of holiness and righteousness which God may 
 delight in — to lay such lasting frames and foundations 
 of temperance and virtue, as may support the super- 
 structures of our future happiness both in this and the 
 other world." And another Colonist wrote, " here we 
 may worship God according to the dictates of the 
 divine principle, free from the mouldy errors of tradi- 
 tion. Here we may thrive in Peace and Retirement in 
 the lap of unadulterated Nature. Here we may im- 
 prove our innocent course of life, on a virgin Elysian 
 shore." 
 
 The colonists on arrival lost no time in agreeing 
 on a form of government, by a representative Assembly 
 
124 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 whicli, during a session that lasted three days, passed a 
 (Series of laws in full accord with the liberal sentiments 
 of their founder. All that held themselves in conscience 
 bound to live peaceably in civil society, were to be left 
 free as to religious faith and practice, so that they ac- 
 knowledged one Almighty and Eternal God as the 
 Creator, Upholder, and Ruler of the World ; and 
 amongst other and many good and sensible enactments, 
 was a special provision for elementary education, which 
 very shortly became both compulsory and free for every 
 child in this prosperous colony. 
 
 During the first few years William Penn was content 
 to be represented in its affairs by a Deputy of his ap- 
 pointment, but in 1682 he sailed in the ship "Welcome," 
 to enter personally on his position of proprietor and 
 governor. His arrival caused much enthusiasm, and 
 among his first engagements was the selection of a site 
 for the capital of his province. He found this on a 
 level tract of land near the junction of the rivers 
 Delaware and Schuylkill, which, though at the time 
 covered with forest, he perceived had a good soil, ex- 
 cellent air, with abundant springs of fresh water, whilst 
 the river banks would ensure ample scope for wharves 
 and merchandise. Here on a scale, rivalling in extent 
 and resembling in arrangement Babylon of old, were 
 his surveyors directed to lay out street and square for 
 a new Metropolis of Brotherly Love, which in the 
 names given to its rectangular streets of oak and walnut, 
 beech and locust, chestnut, larch, or pine, conserves to 
 this day a remembrance of its varied woodland condi- 
 
STATUE OF WILLIAM PENN WHICH IS NOW ERECTED ON THF 
 CITY HALL PHILADELPHIA. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 125 
 
 tion, when first chosen by Penn for the now great 
 city of Philadelphia. 
 
 No city in all America is so large as this in 
 extent or population except New York, and with 
 all its present commercial prosperity and historic 
 associations connected with American Independence 
 it fails not to cherish the memory of its Founder. 
 In its State Museum is stored every relic or 
 record it can obtain of him, and the superb edifice 
 now approaching completion, for the use of its 
 State Legislature is to have a statue of William Penn 
 on the summit of its central tower, which is so 
 l.jfty that his iron effigy will soar higher than the 
 pyramids of Egypt, or the cross on the dome of St. 
 Peter's. 
 
 Thus is the memory publicly exalted of one wlio 
 at the time seemed to worldly-minded men unpractical 
 and enthusiastic in his methods of settling Pennsylva- 
 nia, especially when they learnt his resolution to 
 build no forts, nor put trust in musketeers or cannon. 
 'You will soon," said the merry Monarch, "be in 
 the Indian's war kettle." " What are we to expect," 
 exclaimed the agent of the Duke of York, " from such 
 noddies that will have nothing to do with gin and 
 gunpowder, and say that guns were invented, not to 
 kill men, but hawks and wolves. Are they likely to 
 extend our Conquests, to spread our Commerce, to exalt 
 the Glory of the British name, and above all to propa- 
 gate our most holy Religion. . . What can they 
 promise themselves in settling among the fierce and 
 
126 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 blood-thirsty savages of North America, but to be 
 tomahawked and scalped, every man, woman, and 
 child of them." 
 
 This naturally introduces an account of how William 
 Penn behaved towards these natives, of whose blood- 
 thirstiness both King and ducal agent had so un- 
 favourable an opinion. It was one of his earliest 
 efforts on landing, to seek an interview with them, and 
 rowing up the river to the place appointed, he found 
 large numbers of Indians, with their chiefs fully 
 armed, waiting for him. These, on perceiving that 
 neither he nor his friends had any weapons or military 
 escort, laid aside their own bows and arrows, and 
 gathered quietly in a wide semi-circle around this 
 apostle of good-will and peace. Their king now put 
 on a chaplet, that made sacred, in Indian minds, not 
 only all persons present, but whatever might be agreed 
 npon between them, and then requested the interpre- 
 ter to advance and assure Penn they were now 
 prepared to hear what he might have to say to them. 
 It may be summed up in the words : — Equal rights 
 and equal justice for both Indian and Colonist, all 
 mutual wrongs to be settled by juries equally com- 
 posed of Whites and Indians, and a free interchange 
 of hospitality. " Good," said the Indian, as they 
 grasped Penn's proffered hand, " let that be so between 
 lis as long as the Sun shall shine and the Rivers flow." 
 From this memorable Conference, (the only Treaty it 
 has been said made without an Oath and never broken), 
 it has resulted that Friends and Indians have always 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 127 
 
 kept on good terms with one another, for when 
 differences arose, care was taken speedily to end 
 them in the manner thus described. 
 
 William Penn made them substantial presents on 
 this occasion, and was careful, both as to himself and his 
 friends, that in acquiring lands it should be by means 
 of fair purchase, and a great many deeds of land-sales 
 by Indians are still in existence ; but on this occasion 
 his object was a treaty of goodwill, which both by him- 
 self and subsequent governors was renewed from time 
 to time, and although at first not reduced to writing, 
 (for the Indians said their memories were their records), 
 yet in after generations parchment scrolls were intro- 
 duced, which remain to this day subscribed with the 
 dusky warriors' names, or their quaint symbolic mark- 
 ings, together with oificial signatures of Governors or 
 Council. 
 
 "Our worthy proprietor," wrote a colonist, "treated 
 the Indians with extraordinary humanity, they became 
 very civil and loving to us, and brought abundance of 
 venison, &c.," and another settler, on looking back in 
 his old age on these early times testified, " that as in 
 other countries the Indians were exasperated by hard 
 treatment, which hath been the foundation of much 
 bloodshed, so contrary treatment hath produced their 
 love and affection." Bancroft the historian writes, 
 New England sought safety by wars of extermination 
 — the Dutch could never keep peace with them, nor 
 were the adjoining colonies free from Indian hostilities 
 and massacres, whilst the unarmed Friends breathing 
 
128 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 peace and goodwill, knew not a drop of their blood to 
 have been shed by an Indian. Other people rode to their 
 worship armed, Friends "went to their roeetings without 
 either sword or gun. having their trust and confidence 
 in God." 
 
 Safe that quiet Eden lay, 
 
 When tlio war-whoop stirred the land, 
 
 Thence the Indian turned awaj', 
 From their homes his bloody hand. 
 
 Whittier. 
 
 A stately elm tree, under the shadow of which 
 Wi 1 liam Penn stood, long remained a treasured memorial 
 of the site of this Treaty, and when at length it yielded to 
 age, and the once woodland locality became busy with 
 ■wharfage and shipping, a pillar of stone was erected by 
 an historical society anxious to keep in remembrance 
 the site of this memorable scene, which the picture by 
 West has made so familiar to us by its engravings. Thif^ 
 may be taken as a fair representation, for the artist was 
 born near the place, and knew Indians from his child- 
 hood. One of his own ancestors, indeed, had accom- 
 panied William Penn on this memorable occasion, and is 
 represented as with him in the picture. 
 
 This treatment of Indians as fellow men instead of 
 savages, and with justice instead of "gin and gunpow- 
 der," accorded with the whole of William Penn's arrange- 
 ments connected with the settlement of Pennsylvania. 
 "The Nations (he observes) want a precedent, and 
 because I have been somewhat exercised about the 
 nature and end of government among men, it is reason- 
 able to expect that I should endeavour to establish a 
 
THE FKIENDS. 
 
 129 
 
 just and righteous one in this province, that others may 
 take example by it." And in doing this he gave free 
 welcome to settlers of all religious persuasions, and 
 refugees from all countries whatsoever, but always 
 intended Friends should retain a leading power in the 
 government, observing " I went thither to lay the 
 foundation of a free colony for all mankind, more 
 especially those of my own persuasion, not that I would 
 lessen the civil liberties of others because of their 
 persuasion, but screen and defend our own from any 
 infringement on that account." 
 
 During seventy years the followers of William 
 Penn commanded this majority in the Legislative 
 Assembly of the Province. And of that time it has been 
 said "no spot on the globe could be found where number 
 for number, there was so much virtue and so much 
 happiness as among the inhabitants of Pennsylvania." 
 
 Of all the American Slates none was founded on a 
 more philanthropic basis, nor had any other so rapid 
 an increase in population and prosperity. It was also, 
 during this time of Friends' control over the govern- 
 ment, kept free from any embroilment in the surround- 
 ing wars, either with French Colonists or Indians. 
 There was little of internal dissension to disturb its 
 harmony, until the British Crown began to make 
 demands on its legislature for war subsidies, in aid of 
 expeditions against the adjoining French settlements, 
 on which the Friends, finding themselves in a minority, 
 withdrew from further management of State Affairs, 
 and the History of Pennsylvania gradually merges in 
 
130 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 that of the United States. Congress eventually bought 
 out the proprietary interests of William Penn's descend- 
 ants for £115,000. In the War of Independence, 
 Friends conscientiously took no share, but suffered 
 much obloquy, and some were banished or suffered im- 
 prisonment and other kinds of persecution, from 
 assumed want of patriotism in not rising with others 
 against the British Crown. 
 
 William Penn would like to have made a permanent 
 residence in his Colonial possession, where he built 
 himself a fine mansion, surrounded with ornamental 
 grounds overlooking the river, but at the time of the 
 Revolution, when the British Crown passed from 
 James II. to William III., his chartered interests 
 derived from the deposed monarch, were so seriously 
 threatened as to oblige a return to England, and the 
 new King being acquainted with the life-long friend- 
 ship William Penn had had with James, was long 
 before he could entertain a sufficient sense of his 
 loyalty to confirm him in these Pennsylvanian pos- 
 sessions. Being at length re-assured as to them he 
 again went thither, taking his wife and family, with 
 full intention of a permanent residence among his 
 friends and Colonists, who welcomed him back with 
 every demonstration of joy. 
 
 But fresh difficulties arose, through the Home 
 Government showing a disposition to merge all the 
 proprietary settlements into possessions of the Crown, 
 under an Act of Parliament, which necessitated William 
 Penn's presence in England, for which he left, with 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 131 
 
 his wife and family, hoping for but a brief absence 
 from his miich-loved colony, yet he never returned 
 there, for although successful in retaining his charter 
 rights on account of his wise and liberal mode of 
 government, he found himself beset with so many 
 difficulties, and involved in such pecuniary responsi- 
 bilities as to place him for awhile in embarrassed 
 circumstances. No admiration for his general high 
 and noble character can be truthful, without admitting 
 he was too confiding in the honour of some who proved 
 unworthy of his trust, and with all his talents and 
 virtues, he had not that application to financial details, 
 which might have saved his public spirited nature 
 from the monetary troubles that impoverished his own 
 estate, and left him, during the closing years of his 
 life, dependent on his wife's jointure for support. " 0 
 Philadelphia," he wrote, " what hast thou not cost me 
 in mental worries and pecuniary losses.. I cannot but 
 think it hard measure in that while that has proved a 
 land of freedom and flourishing, it should become to 
 me — by whose means it was principally made a 
 Country — the cause of grief, trouble and poverty." 
 
 William Penn was twice married. His dear Guli, 
 the wife of his youth, died in 1693, in her fiftieth year, 
 and her eldest son, Springett Penn, a youth of much 
 promise, died not long after. She was a lady of high 
 birth and great virtues, and, as her afflicted husband 
 said, "a public as well as a private loss." He married, 
 for his second wife, Hannah Callowhill, of Bristol, in 
 1696, who also became the mother of a family, and 
 
132 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 proved in all respects a true helpmeet to her husband, 
 whom she accompanied on his second visit to America. 
 On their return she was of much assistance in helping 
 him through financial trials, and during his latter 
 years, when greatly enfeebled with age, cared for 
 him and his affairs with devoted affection and great 
 administrative skill. She survived his death in 1718 
 by eight years, and lies buried in the same grave 
 as her husband, in the rural burial ground of 
 Jordans, where rest so many other of the worthies 
 who used to gather for worship in its ancient Meet- 
 ing House. 
 
 William Penn's mental powers, which had been so 
 remarkable, greatly failed him during his latter years, 
 and incapacitated him from attending to his own affairs, 
 but to the surprise of his friends he could still take part 
 in ministry at meetings, and never lost his cheerfulness 
 of spirit or sweetness of disposition. In the memorial 
 notice they wrote concerning him, he is described as 
 " a man of great abilities, of an excellent sweetness of 
 disposition . . . learned without vanity, apt with- 
 out forwardness, facetious in conversation, yet weighty 
 and serious, of an extraordinary greatness of mind, yet 
 void of the stain of ambition, as free from rigid gravity 
 as he was clear of unseemly levity, a man, a scholar, a 
 friend . . . whose memorial will be valued by the 
 wise and blessed by the just." He was of a tall and 
 portly frame, inclined in later years to corpulency, 
 which he kept under by exercise ; very neat in all his 
 personal habits and dress ; the gentleman being well 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 133 
 
 preserved in the Friend, "nor need it (he used to say) 
 be lost in becoming one." 
 
 At the time of his death, Pennsylvania was become 
 peopled by 40,000, half of these Friends, the others 
 Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Episcopaliane, between 
 w hom concord prevailed and a high tone of moral feel- 
 ing. Theatres, horse races, and vain sports were not 
 allowed. The first day of the week was well observed. 
 Lotteries, pawnbrokers, and beggars were unknown. 
 Swearing and drunkenness were punished by law, and 
 during William Penn's life-time not a duel in that 
 duelling age had disgraced the community. The only 
 instrument of authority was the constable's staff, yet 
 never was there a government with less internal dis- 
 turbance or more outward decorum. 
 
 Philadelphia is now, like Nineveh of old, become 
 a million peopled City, of which the Friends form still 
 a large and influential portion, especially when the two 
 nearly equal sections of Unitarian and Orthodox are 
 considered together. Their somewhat numerous meet- 
 ing-houses attract attention by their size and plain 
 substantiality. Some sections of these Congregations 
 show much earnestness in social reform and missionary 
 efforts, but as a whole may be considered more remark- 
 able for strict propriety of life, and care in training the 
 young, for whom they maintain most excellent Schools 
 and some large and well appointed Colleges. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 MINISTERS AMOKGST THE SETTLERS IN AMERICA. 
 
 Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the 
 oversight thereof — not by constraint, but willingly ; nor for 
 filthy lucre, but of a ready mind. — I Pet. v. 2. 
 
 HATEVER of surprise it might cause the worldly- 
 
 wise for Friends to settle in Pennsylvania amongst 
 savages, without the bribe of gin or the defence of gun- 
 powder, must have been equally felt by those accustomed 
 to Ecclesiastical arrangements, for such an undertaking to 
 be made without any provision of appointed Chaplains 
 or salaried Ministers of religion. Yet as their peace- 
 able methods were successful in securing safety and 
 prosperity, so their reliance on one another's spiritual 
 gifts was met by an unfailing supply of gospel ministry. 
 It shows their religious zeal to find, that the first 
 structure erected by them in Philadelphia was a log- 
 framed Meeting-house, whilst still living themselves in 
 tents or caves, and that this soon became replaced by 
 one more spacious, of solid brickwork, where they 
 could meet to wait, in dependence on the Lord, that 
 He would Himself minister direct to the heart, or by 
 one or another of those assembled in His name, and 
 the waj' in which such Meeting-houses multiplied, is 
 an indication that this zeal in public worship kept 
 pace with the rapidly increasing population. 
 
 Here may be introduced some few words of com- 
 ment on the ministering Friends that either visited 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 135 
 
 them or were settled amongst them, drawn chiefly 
 from brief notices at the time of their living and labours. 
 None, as before said, received any out ward remuneration. 
 Even those travelling were only repaid their expenses 
 and cost of living, and many of them who could afford 
 it travelled at their own charges. Great diversity 
 obtained both in rank, age, and education ; some were 
 husbandmen, others persons of literary acquirements, 
 a few were well advanced in years, but the majox-ity 
 were young and full of enterprise, none more so than 
 many of the women amongst them. 
 
 James Martin^ from London, weakly, but devoted 
 to the work and service of the gospel. 
 
 Roger Langworth, from Lancashire, a great 
 traveller in the British Isles and Europe, settled meet- 
 ings, gave great comfort, got a name among the 
 ancients, and is recorded among the worthies of the 
 Lord. 
 
 Robert Barrow, eminently gifted in the ministry. 
 
 Ralph Warden, an ancient Friend, with extra- 
 ordinary talent for the discipline. 
 
 Jonathan Tyler, a noble instrument in the hand 
 of God. 
 
 William Ellis and Aaron Atkinson, whereof 
 William was an authoritative minister of the Gospel, 
 and Aaron a mighty tender man. 
 
 Roger Gill — the power of the Lord was with him, 
 so that his testimony was with authority, and the truth 
 was raised by it in others. 
 
 Thomas TJiumpson and Josiah Langdale — Thomas 
 
136 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 informed us that when he was binding sheaves in his 
 native land, he became impressed with a duty to visit 
 us ; he was a sound preacher ; his companion Josiah 
 was also a fine tender man, earnestly pressing people to 
 fear the Lord, saying if he could gain but one soul, or 
 turn but one to Truth in all his travels he should be 
 well satisfied. 
 
 John Salkeld, a notable man to proclaim thegospeL 
 
 Tiiomas Turner, an ancient Friend, whose testi- 
 mony was that the enemies should be scattered and the 
 Truth come into dominion. He had meetings with the 
 Indians in their places of abode, and was very loving, 
 and the Indians had great regard and kindness for him. 
 
 John Richardson, the bent of whose testimony 
 was much to press people to honesty and uprightness. 
 
 John Estaugh, a mild man, desiring people to be 
 true to what was made known to them. 
 
 Mary Ellerton and Mary Banister, both valiant 
 faithful women. 
 
 John Fothergill and William Armistead, who were 
 also very tender honest Friends. Oh, the good frame 
 of spirit, and how the power of the trutli was with 
 John Fothergill ! 
 
 Samuel Bownas,a. mighty valiant minister to open 
 the mystery of Babylon. He was imprisoned while 
 in America, and not to be chargeable to any, learnt 
 ehoemaking and supported himself until his release. 
 
 Samuel Wilkinson and Patrick Hendei'son, where- 
 of Samuel was a plain man, had a fine testimony for 
 truth, and his companion was a wise man, large in his 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 137 
 
 testimony, and of singular parts. May he keep to the 
 Root that bore him. James Logan writing to William 
 Penn of these two young Scotchmen, describes them 
 "as some of the most extraordinary that ever visited 
 those parts ; of such as these the more always the better." 
 
 John Turner, a good and sound old man, much 
 against wrath and contention. 
 
 Thomas Wilson James Dickenson, these were 
 both very noted men ; they had an open door among 
 all sorts, and reached the hearts of many people. 
 
 William Armstrong and James Graham, their 
 testimony was precious. Oh, the good frame of spirit 
 they were in, exhorting the people to walk humbly and 
 serve the Lord daily ; it was a laborious work, there 
 being that to weigh down that would do hurt, and to 
 search out the obstructions to the love and life of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ, and to gather back and hedge in 
 such as were like to wander awaj-. 
 
 The preceding notes refer to those who visited 
 America from other lands on Gospel Service, to which 
 a few may be added as to those amongst the Emigrants 
 themselves, who were in much esteem amongst them 
 for their ministry. 
 
 Israel Pemherton, of Philadelphia, himself largely 
 engaged as a Merchant, and influential both in the 
 affairs of the Colony and the Society, had three sons, 
 Israel, James and John ; each of whom devoted him- 
 self to the service of the public and their Friends. 
 All three were men of superior abilities and character, 
 high also in social position. John travelled much in 
 
138 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 the ministry, and lies buried at Pyrmont, in Germany, 
 where his death occurred whilst on religious service 
 there, having undertaken the journey when nearly 70 
 years of- age. 
 
 Members of the Lloyd family were of much service 
 as able statesmen. One whom Whittier calls learned 
 Lloyd, was for some years its Governor. 
 
 Michael Lightfoot, Susanna Morris, Abraham 
 Farrington and Benjamin Trotter, are a group of 
 ministers, zealous in their day and abundant in 
 labours. 
 
 JoJin Woolman's character is monumental for 
 deep piety and conscientiousness, and to get the 
 writings of John Woolman by heart, is, according to 
 Charles Lamb, to fall in love with the early Friends. 
 
 Daniel Stanton and John Churchman, Sarah 
 Morris and Joseph WMte, are each of them ministers, 
 whose journeys were extensive in America and 
 England, John Churchman's especially, as his pub- 
 lished Journals set forth. 
 
 Samxiel Emlen possessed a highly cultivated mind 
 and though infirm as to health, it seemed in no way to 
 plaken his efforts in the work of the ministry, both in 
 America and in visits to England. 
 
 William Savery also was of a very superior order 
 of mind, so highly cultivated as to add greatly to the 
 power of his ministry, in the course of which during a 
 visit to England, Elizabeth Fry, when a gay Miss 
 Gurney, became changed from a lover of the world, to 
 a life of such devotedness to her Saviour as to have 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 139 
 
 made her piety and good works so widely known. 
 
 Nicholas Wain was a Barrister and a most able 
 minister of the Gospel, for the sake of which he was 
 content to forego honours that his eloquence in the 
 Courts were opening to him. 
 
 George Dilliinjn was another instance of ability 
 and culture, freely devoted to the service of the 
 Gospel, both in America and England, where he 
 resided for several years, and travelled also on the 
 Continent of Europe, which was difficult of accom- 
 plishment at that time through the wars then prevailing. 
 
 Many more names might be quoted of men and 
 women Friends actively eu gaged in the affairs of this 
 life, yet greatly valued for their Gospel service ; and 
 James Logan, although taking no part in this, dis- 
 charged the responsible office of Chief Judge and 
 other high offices in so exemplary a manner as to show 
 the religious principle that governed his life. He has 
 been described as one of the best and most learned of 
 all the early settlers. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 DEATH OF GEORGE FOX. 
 
 rpHE opening of 1690-1 is marked in the Society's 
 Annals by the decease of George Fox, whose long 
 and laborious life was terminated by an illness of a few 
 days through a chill taken whilst attending meetings 
 in London. He died at a Friend's residence adjoining 
 the Lombard Street Meeting-House, where his voice 
 had been heard for the last time in powerful ministry 
 and earnest prayer. 
 
 Over his closing hours such peace prevailed that 
 it was said " Death seemed to him as if it were worth 
 scarce a mention," but his Friends mournfully gathered 
 by the thousands to accompany the remains to a 
 London Burial Ground near Bunhill Fields, where, 
 amidst tearful eyes and saddened hearts, many testi- 
 monies were borne to his work and blessed results. 
 
 He was about 66 years of age at the time of his 
 death, and for the last sixteen years had been husband 
 to Margaret Fell, the widow of Swarthmore Hall, 
 which marriage might to all appearance have provided 
 for him a country residence during his declining years, 
 but neither of them allowed their own comfort to be 
 other than subordinate to the claims of a Society, to 
 whose welfare they had both of them devoted their lives 
 — and as a consequence but little experience of home- 
 life ensued, so pressing were the engagements connected 
 with its affairs in which Margaret Fell had from the 
 
THE FEIBNDS. 
 
 141 
 
 first taken deep interest. She was at the time ol 
 this second marriage about sixty years of age, and her 
 daughters were well married and settled in homes of 
 their own. These viewed with satisfaction the wed- 
 ding of their mother, with one for whom they felt 
 themselves a strong aflEection, and on his part he was 
 careful lest his marriage with their parent should iu 
 any way affect their pecuniary interest in her 
 property. 
 
 It terminated a widowhood of sixteen years, and 
 after about as many more of this second married life, 
 she survived George Fox by ten years, her own death 
 not occurring until she had reached the advanced age 
 of eighty-eight. 
 
 It will be remembered that almost directly after 
 the marriage, her husband set sail for the West Indies 
 and America, on the return from which long and 
 arduous service, his wife accompanied him in visiting 
 Friends' meetings in the Midland Counties, in the 
 course of which he was arrested at Worcester, and 
 it was not until after a year of much suffering through 
 his ill treatment in prison that Friends succeeded with 
 the King to have his case brought up to London before 
 the Court of King's Bench, where Sir Matthew Hale, 
 one of the best of judges England has ever had, gave 
 him so full an acquittal, that George Fox was never 
 molested further, and was able to recruit his shattered 
 health by a few years of domestic quiet at Swarthmore 
 Hall, during which he arranged his papers connected 
 with the early history of the Society. Having thus in 
 
142 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 measure recovered strength, the rest of his life up to 
 the time of his decease was spent chiefly in the neigh- 
 bourhood of London, attending its meetings, and oft in 
 council with his brethren on important matters affecting 
 the interest of the Society at large. 
 
 As might be expected, many testimonies were 
 borne to his worth by those who knew him, of which 
 some brief extracts have been already given, from 
 such as are printed with his published works. It may 
 be further added that William Penn described him as 
 one who " united a religious majesty with a most en- 
 gaging humility and moderation," and testifies to "the 
 depth and power of his ministry, its convincing and 
 confirming character. Above all," he says, " he ex- 
 celled in prayer. The inwardness and weight of his 
 Bpirit, the reverence and solemnity of his address and 
 behaviour, and the fewness and fullness of his words, 
 the most awful living reverent frame I ever felt or 
 beheld was his in prayer." 
 
 To his friends of the present day is the memory 
 of this eminent labourer in the gospel vineyard very 
 precious, as of one enabled to open more fully than any 
 before, the riches of the truth as it is in Christ Jesus. 
 He desired not personal honour nor any dependence 
 of others on himself, but that all might be directed to 
 the true Light that lighteth every man that cometh 
 into the world, the Teacher that teacheth as never man 
 taught, and he so directed his hearers that they migh t 
 seek to know in their hearts an experience, that woul I 
 1 ring them to adopt for themselves his own declara- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 143 
 
 tion : — We were nothing, Christ is all. 
 
 True to their practice of makinfjf no distinction in 
 the grave, whereunto all men hasted, the Friends (who 
 to the number of 4,000 had followed their beloved 
 chief to the burial ground) raised no monument over 
 the place of his interment, but an aflEectionate interest 
 preserved its situation in remembrance through various 
 generations, and about a hundred years ago, during an 
 excavation needed in some repairs to foundations of a 
 boundary wall against which it had been made, a coffin 
 was uncovered with the initals G. F. cut on it. An 
 apprentice engaged in the work, tempted by curiosity 
 whilst the others were gone to dinner, lifted its lid and 
 saw the fine features and long hair of the corpse still 
 remaining. Astonished at the sight he called for his 
 master, whose greater weight as he descended the 
 ladder so jarred the coffin that all as in a moment 
 vanished into undistinguishable dust. The apprentice, 
 however, retained throughout his long life a vivid re- 
 membrance of what when a boy he had thus seen, and 
 there are those still living who have heard from Friends 
 of cool judgment what they had been told by him of 
 this remarkable occurrence. A plain headstone now 
 mai'ks the site of the grave as the discovery of an old 
 vellum plan enabled its position to be thus indicated 
 with approximate certainty, and large Memorial Build- 
 ings recently erected in this locality, shew that the 
 Society he founded is in its two hundred and fortieth 
 year still active for good amidst London's population. 
 
CHAPTER XVIL 
 
 SOCIETY ORGANISATION. 
 
 " The age of intolerance, of popular violence, of systematic 
 persecution, was gone by, but the age of prosperity, and of self- 
 indulgence ; the age of formality, of spiritual lethargy and lean- 
 ness was stealing on." — Bancroft. 
 
 nnHE Revolution of 1688, which deposed James the 
 Second and gave the English Crown to William of 
 Orange, introduced an era of Toleration for loyal Pro- 
 testants in their various forms of worship. 
 
 William had been accustomed thus to govern in 
 Holland, and found it his interest to secure the support 
 of those of various Denominations against Catholic 
 efforts — fostered by the French King — to replace James 
 on the throne. 
 
 For Friends' relief a form of Declaration of Allegi- 
 ance and Fidelity was arranged with King and Parlia- 
 ment in substitution of the Oath formerly required ; 
 and their Assemblies were now recognised as entitled 
 to legal protection if continued to be held, as they 
 always had been, with unbolted doors. 
 
 With this peaceful termination of nearly forty years' 
 continued suffering, the history of the Society changes 
 to one of its internal government and organisation, 
 which suggests that some account should be given of 
 the arrangements by which its social unity is regulated. 
 
 These as they are examined will be found to 
 combine freedom of parts with unity as a whole, and 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 are effected through three classes of meetings, known 
 as Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly Meetings. 
 
 The first of these which it has been seen George 
 Fox was the means of establishing throughout the nation, 
 remain now — as ever — the executive feature of the whole 
 system, and are composed officially of representatives 
 chosen monthly from each of two or more congregations, 
 who when thus assembled consider and order what 
 may be found necessary for the welfare of those whose 
 congregational interest they represent. Entrusted with 
 such powers, it will be understood how earnest was 
 the desire, as ancient records show, to secure for this 
 service "just and righteous men of sound principles 
 and judgment in the truth of Christ, and sound and 
 blameless conversation, men in love and unity among 
 themselves," and also that whilst such are chosen to at- 
 tend there may yet be liberty for any other Friend to 
 be present. Such arrangement ensures publicity and 
 general interest among the members in the welfare of 
 these congregations ; women Friends have also their 
 their own Monthly Meetings, formed on a similar plan 
 and often are the two united in a /omi consideration of 
 subjects of special importance. 
 
 The subjects that come before these gatherings 
 refer rather to good order and right conduct in life 
 than to doctrinal questions. For with the poet is the 
 Friend in accord when he says — 
 
 " For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight. 
 His can't be wrong whose life is in the right." 
 
 If any were found walking disorderly or failing to 
 
146 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 discharge just debts, such would be visited by appoint- 
 ment of these Monthly Meetings, and if remonstrance 
 failed to effect amendment, and no other course opened, 
 a testimony of disunity would be issued to clear the 
 Society from sharing in any reproachful conduct. All 
 differences between Members it would be sought to 
 settle by arbitration, and so avoid " brother going to law 
 with brother." Over marriages it exercised a watchful 
 care, especially needful in an age when so many were 
 clandestinely effected. The parties proposing to enter 
 into such engagements were required to attend per- 
 Bonally at the Monthly Meeting and there individually 
 express their intentions, and not until the Meeting was 
 assured by appointments then made that they were 
 clear from all other, and had consent of parents -^tr 
 guardians, would it issue its sanction for the solemniza- 
 tion of the marriage ; which it was also careful should 
 take place at one of its public assemblies for worship. 
 Owing to these precautions Friends' marriages have 
 rarely failed in proving the source of hajipy homes, 
 and the State has acknowledged this judicious care, by 
 granting the Society a privilege shared by no other 
 Nonconformists except the Jews of having its own 
 Registering Officers of Marriage. A like care was shown 
 from the beginning in keeping a record of births in 
 Friends' families, and deaths and burials, which are now 
 collected into books at the central office in London, 
 and form an important genealogical series extending 
 throughout more than two hundred years, in frequent 
 use in connection with wills and successions to property. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 147 
 
 At such Monthly Meetings funds were also raised 
 to meet the necessities of poorer members, assist in the 
 education of their children, or in binding them ap- 
 prentice to some useful employment, so that there 
 might be no want nor preventible distress unrelieved 
 amongst them, and everyone be concerned for the 
 other's good. 
 
 Many practical details respecting the provision of, 
 and care over Meeting-places and Burial Grounds 
 would receive attention on these recurrent occasions, 
 and suitable appointments be made such as Over- 
 seers in respect to the poor, and Elders to watch 
 over the spiritual interests of the congregation. As to 
 the ministry, no such arrangements are made, for with 
 Friends its exercise is regarded as the result of a Divine 
 gift, which when by experience they feel has been con- 
 ferred on any, they acknowledge it, not by appointment 
 but by recording the Friend as a Minister, which con- 
 veys in itself no legislative power in the Church, 
 as is so much the case with other religious organisa- 
 tions. 
 
 In thus reviewing the Society's constitution, it will be 
 obvious that as individual congregations derive strength 
 from union with some others in Monthly Meetings, 
 so do these latter by an arrangement that groups them 
 into Quarterly Meetings to which they send their Repre- 
 sentatives ; and yet further, such Quarterly Meetings, of 
 of which there are Eighteen in England and Scotland, 
 unite by an annual choice of representatives in holding 
 a General Council once a year ; which is so important 
 
148 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 a feature in the Society that some further particulars 
 of it may be acceptable. 
 
 It is a Composite as "well as a Representative 
 Assembly, for every recorded Minister or appointed 
 Elder throughout the Society is a member of it, and of 
 later years it has been the custom to exclude no 
 one who is a member from its deliberations, although 
 not under appointment as a representative from the 
 Quarterly Meetings. 
 
 This openness much favours the general acceptance 
 of any advice it may issue, or conclusions it may have 
 formed. It is controlled by no President or Chairman, 
 but each year it selects a Clerk and two Assistants to 
 guide and record its decisions. 
 
 Frequently nearly a thousand men Friends of 
 various social rank and age will be thus assembled, and 
 as nothing is decided by majorities, or ascertained through 
 voting or by show of hands, it might seem impracticable 
 for anyone acting as its Clerk to arrive at the judgment 
 of the Meeting, when debateable subjects of great 
 interest were under consideration. But there is such a 
 sense of being assembled under the Presidency of the 
 great Head of the Church Himself ; present by His Spirit, 
 that it keeps down heated discussion, and preserves, 
 amid earnestness of feeling, a reverential spirit. 
 All who speak are expected to confine themselves to 
 the subject in hand, and not to make speeches founded 
 on others' remarks. They are listened to without any 
 of the usual expressions of dissent or applause, which, 
 when occurring, the Clerk is prompt to repress, and 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 149 
 
 thus the Society has in this large and annually occurring 
 Assembly never been without some Friend who, as its 
 Clerk with his two assistants, could offer what seemed 
 to him as the judgment of the meeting, and embody it 
 in a minute that met with general acceptance. 
 
 A care also exists not to press matters on which 
 much difference of opinion prevails to a decision, and 
 the rather when such may be the case, to defer it for 
 reconsideration another year. Often (if important) 
 will it thus have deferred subjects for several years in 
 succession, or else let them form the subject of a special 
 Conference, convened for their consideration and 
 report. 
 
 In these ways and by this care great changes have 
 from time to time been made in the rules and regula- 
 tions of a Society, which can believe in "walking on 
 the old ways " with an attention to Divine guidance, 
 that shows when alterations are needed, and how they 
 can be made to suit present circumstances, without 
 infringing on original principles. 
 
 These meetings in their ascending scale of Monthly, 
 Quarterly, and Annual, though chiefly concerned with 
 subjects affecting good order in outward conduct, must 
 not be supposed to omit watchfulness over the spiritual 
 interests of the Community, for there is the same 
 gradation of meetings composed of ministers, elders, 
 and overseers, men and women together, who have these 
 under their more especial care, but without any legis- 
 lative power. And should any Friend feel him- 
 self called to travel in the ministry to other Yearly 
 
150 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 meetings in different parts of the world, it is from 
 these meetings of his brethren and sisters in the 
 ministry, that sanction must be obtained before under- 
 taking such a distant service. 
 
 Looking at the subject historically it is seen that 
 it was through this its Annual Assembly founded on 
 so broad a basis, that the Society was able on the 
 cessation of Persecution to establish uniformity of 
 practice amongst its numerous and widely spread Con- 
 gregations, amongst which were many independent 
 spirits who little wished for what they were inclined to 
 regard as seeking to abridge liberty of individtial 
 conscience. Such ideas firmly held and strongly ex- 
 pressed, gradually disappeared before the wise councils 
 of such legislative minds as George Whitehead, Robert 
 Barclay, Alexander Parker, Stephen Crisp, and some 
 others who became prominent at this critical stage in 
 directing the Society's affairs. Through their influence 
 the Yearly meeting acquired a 23Ciramount influence in 
 the councils of the Society, which was gained not through 
 issuing anything by way of command, but only as 
 of exhortation, " brotherly recommendation, or tender 
 advice." 
 
 The Epistles issued year by year from these General 
 Assemblies in London are all preserved and published 
 from the beginning. Those of the earlier period will be 
 found replete with counsel for maintaining unity, good 
 order, and conduct in all the walks of life, offered in so 
 loving and wise a manner as to make it the easier to un- 
 derstand how under these arrangements, the Society be- 
 
THE FRIENDS, 
 
 151 
 
 came as a whole fitly joined and compacted together, in 
 which service the Yearly Meeting has had so large a share. 
 
 If such were possible this becomes yet more 
 evident in connection with the Society's career in a 
 succeeding generation, when it had found to its grief 
 how seriously the Friends had become affected by the 
 spirit of an age which it could describe in no milder 
 terms than one " of great dissipation, luxury, and pro- 
 fanenees, when the genuine fruits of the spirit of 
 Christianity were rarely to be seen." 
 
 The Yearly Meeting appointed committees who 
 spent ?/ears in visiting the Society throughout the nation. 
 It issued exhortations which stirred up a general purg- 
 ing of the camp from disorderly walkers,whilst those who 
 remained, adopted according to its recommendations a 
 strictness of manner and life, a plainness of speech and 
 behaviour, that marked them out as a peculiar people, 
 undoubtedly desirous of being found zealous also in 
 good works, 
 
 A prominent feature associated with and assisting 
 in this Revival was the printing and issue, in 1783, of 
 " Extracts from the Minutes and Advices of the Yearly 
 Meeting," which had till then been circulated only in 
 manuscript, and v/ere but indifferently preserved. This 
 work became the acknowledged guide on all subjects 
 relating to the Society, and has continued ever since to 
 hold this position. It has been revised up to date 
 through five successive Editions issued at intervals of 
 about twenty years between them, the last being as 
 recent as 1883. 
 
152 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 The -work as first published consisted of fifty-one 
 chapters treating on such subjects as meetings for wor- 
 ship and discipline, marriages, education, removals, 
 settlements, trade, tithes, reading the scriptures, willB, 
 arbitration, conduct and conversation, moderation and 
 temperance, love and unity, liberality to the poor, 
 counsel to the young, &c., &c. 
 
 Another feature of this time to be specially noticed 
 is Avhat are called "The Queries," which may be thus ex- 
 plained : — The representatives on coming to the annual 
 assembly had from the first been expected not only to 
 bring some written answers as to matters of fact as to 
 Bufferings, number of prisoners, death of ministers, &c., 
 but also to report ve7'hally on the general state of the 
 Friends in the localities they represented. But now the 
 Yearly Meeting asked for written replies to a series of 
 questions of a comprehensive nature which inquired 
 whether meetings for worship and discipline were kept 
 up and in a proper manner, and whether love and unity 
 were being preserved ; whether families were careful to 
 train up children for a good life and conversation and 
 frequent readings of the Holy Scriptures ; did Friends 
 keep clear of paying priests' demands, and are they avoid- 
 ing vain sports or any intemperance ; was their trade 
 being conducted on sound principles ; were marriages 
 made the subject of careful regulation, and the registries 
 of births and deaths kept; also records of all Meeting 
 House properties. 
 
 These subjects, expressed much more fully and 
 arranged under separate headings, being yearly replied to 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 153 
 
 by the Monthly meetings to the Quarterly and these in 
 turn to the annual Assembly, enabled it to be 
 kept in touch with the whole Society to such an extent 
 that it could review its condition year by year, and thus 
 issue such advice or recommendation as circumstances 
 might require, either by special minute or through that 
 Epistle already referred to, which it has ever been its 
 custom to address annually to Friends everywhere. 
 
 In this re-constructive work of the close of the 
 Eighteenth century, such names as Tuke, Fothergill, 
 Stacey, Birkbeck, J. G. Bevan, &c., &c., occur amongst 
 those by whose wise counsels it was effected. 
 
 Stern disciplinarians were these, and yet not more 
 than the Society needed to secure its preservation amid 
 a general social and religious laxity. Its vitality has 
 been shown in a safe relinquishment of peculiarities 
 it was in danger of regarding as perpetual Testimonies, 
 and the world of associating with its continuance. In 
 BO doing it but returns to its originals, for, as George 
 Whitehead told King Charles, "We affect not singularity 
 in Words or Behaviour, but desire to demean ourselves 
 in that plainness and simplicity which we are in Coii- 
 ecience and Truth persuaded unto." 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 YEARLY MEETING PREMISES. 
 
 XNDICATIVE of the increased importance attached to 
 the Yearly Meeting towards the close of the eigh- 
 teenth century, is the necessity that arose for acquiring 
 some premises large enough to accommodate the greater 
 number of country Friends that desired to come up to Lon- 
 don for its attendance, for none of the old meeting houses 
 in the city were sufficiently extensive for the purpose. 
 Accordingly a large inn, known as the Dolphin, ad- 
 joining the old Meeting Place of Devonshire House, 
 was purchased, and on its site two spacious and lofty 
 Halls of Assembly erected, each capable of holding 
 near upon a thousand persons, with committee-rooms 
 adjoining. One of these Meeting Houses was for men, 
 and the other for women Friends, so that each had 
 room not only for their representatives, but also for any 
 Friend who might be in London though not a rep- 
 resentative, to attend the sittings, which arrangement 
 worked to advantage, not only through promotinga more 
 general interest in Society affairs, but in giving yet 
 more importance to any decision or advice that might 
 be issued by so large and thoroughly representative an 
 Assembly. 
 
 The mention of a large and separate House for 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 .155 
 
 women Friends during Yearly Meeting, needs the ex- 
 planation that it had not been customary up to this 
 time for them to have any Yearly Meeting of their own 
 for Discipline, though they used to unite in those held 
 for worship in the various meeting houses of the 
 Metropolis whilst the Assembly was in session. But 
 in this work of Reformation they took so great an 
 interest, and felt there were so many matters concerning 
 themselves needing attention, as to make them desire a 
 place large enough for assembling in council together. To 
 gain assent for which, they approached the men's 
 Yearly Meeting by a deputation of their own to lay this 
 subject before them. It is said that J. G. Bevan, then 
 acting as clerk to the men Friends, himself remarkable 
 amongst them in bodily and mental endowments, no 
 sooner saw the graceful yet dignified figure of Esther 
 Tuke, advancing towards him at the head of this 
 deputation, than he felt inclined to address her in the 
 words of King Ahasuerus, "What is thy petition Queen 
 Esther ? and it shall be granted thee ; and what is thy 
 request ? and it shall be performed." Needless to say, 
 no difficulty occurred in granting this of hers, made on 
 behalf of her sister Friends, and in these extensive 
 building operations on the old Dolphin Inn was a large 
 meeting place provided also for them. It is an arrange- 
 ment that has ever since worked to mutual satisfaction, 
 for whilst uniting with their brethren in worship, they 
 are able to attend on their part to the general state or 
 women Friends all over the country, without infringing 
 on the legislative character of the men's Yearly Meeting. 
 
THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 Richly endowed were many women Friends of 
 those days, in spiritual and mental gifts, true Mothers 
 of Israel ruling not only their own houses well, but 
 society affairs also. Some of them were regarded as 
 prophetesses in their copious and powerful ministry/so 
 much so that men of mark in the community have 
 owned to its having had great influence on their re- 
 ligious convictions amid a careless age, and inducing 
 in them a strong attachment to the principles of 
 Friends. 
 
 When Thomas Wilkinson, a Lake poet, and friend 
 of Wordsworth, returned from his 300 miles walk to 
 London, his verse that recounts his City experiences, 
 dwells on the virtues of the women Friends he met 
 with at London Yearly Meeting. 
 
 Saw Sterry's zeal her Christian life adorn, 
 
 Saw female piety preside in Horn, 
 
 Heard her sweet voice inspiring counsel bear, 
 
 And fraught with love her drooping brethren cheer — 
 
 Kaw gentle Gurney with a sweet address 
 
 Allure her friends to heaven and happiness, 
 
 Saw Fowler s gift with love divine abound, 
 
 Her precepts life, her voice a heavenly sound, 
 
 Saw Abbott to her old friends ever dear, 
 
 In life correct, in testimony clear, 
 
 Saw powerful Grubb that sounds her Master's praise 
 
 In streets, in markets, prisons and highways. 
 
 What the Society owes to its saintly practical 
 women Friends, from Margaret Fell to the present days 
 can never be over-estimated, nor iu any tribute to their 
 worth must the share that these Society arrangements 
 have had in training such characters for their field of 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 157 
 
 service be forgotten. In the discipline of these meet- 
 ings, minds have been educated from early years for 
 their excellent conduct of affairs, which an Elizabeth 
 Fry may have exhibited in a manner specially observable 
 to the public ; but it is one which any Women's Yearly 
 Meeting shows as a general characteristic of her sister 
 Friends, when gathered in council together ; grave, wise, 
 I'xecutive, guiding important affairs with discretion; 
 self-contained, and firm in opinion and expression, 
 without forwardness or the slightest infringement of 
 leminine delicacy. "Where indeed, it may well be 
 .;sked, could another group of mothers be found, so 
 many of whose children, whether by natural birth or 
 spiritual influence, can rise up and call them blessed ? 
 
 Friends begin the training in this service early, as 
 it is the practice to associate some of the well disposed 
 amongst the younger members with those of maturer 
 age when nominating Representatives .to attend meet- 
 ings for conducting the affairs of the church — whether 
 Monthly, Quarterly, or even the Yearly Gathering ; an 
 instance of which latter may be quoted from the clever 
 authoress of " The Richardsons of Cleveland " as having 
 occurred to one of her heroines when about eighteen. 
 " While different names (for Representatives) were 
 being thus mentioned in a Durham Quarterly Meeting, 
 a Friend, of Newcastle, whose powerful intellect and 
 strength of will gave her great influence in the meeting, 
 pointed to Isabel Richardson and said, ' I do not know 
 the name of that young Friend, but I should wish her 
 to be one of our representatives to the Yearly Meeting.' 
 
158 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 The timid girl sat in speechless terror, equally unable 
 to raise her voice in refusal, or to endure the thought 
 of what was involved by acceptance. No sound came 
 from her lips. The Friend who acted as Clerk to the 
 Meeting, and who knew her name (though the New- 
 castle lady did not) wrote it down ! and Isabel went, 
 as the narrative proceeds to tell, to London Yearly 
 Meeting as one of its Representatives ; and to the end 
 of her days, after a life of great journeyings, even as 
 far as America, in the ministry of the Gospel, she loved 
 to tell of the spiritual benefit received from this " her 
 first Yearly Meeting, the attendance of which she had 
 anticipated with so much fear." 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE AND COUNSEL ISSUED 
 BY THE YEARLY MEETING. 
 
 TN an historical review of this kind little opportunity 
 occurs for any development of the special and 
 distinctive views taken by the Society on Christian 
 Doctrine, which to be understood in their proper relation 
 to those of other Christian communities must be learnt 
 from works especially devoted to these subjects, of 
 which any Friend's library will be found to contain 
 ample store. Even here a glance may be taken at them 
 through a few extracts from the last edition of the 
 work on " Christian Discipline " referred to in a 
 former chapter. 
 
 From the general epistles of 1830, 1861, and 1868, has 
 been framed this statement, that " We as a Christian 
 Church accept the immediate operations of the Spirit 
 of God upon the heart in their inseparable connection 
 with our risen and exalted Saviour. We disavow all 
 professed spirituality that is divorced from faith in 
 Jesus Christ of Nazareth, crucified for us without the 
 gates of Jerusalem. One with the Father and the Son, 
 the Holy Spirit works for the regeneration of fallen 
 rebellious man. Not merely as the Enlightener of the 
 conscience and the Reprover for sin, is the Spirit merci- 
 fully granted, but also, in an especial manner, to testify 
 
160 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 of and to glorify the Saviour, to apply, witli sanctifying 
 efficacy to the soul, His words and work when upon 
 earth, and His mediation and intercession for us in 
 heaven. . To be guided by the Spirit is the 
 practical application of the Christian religion." 
 
 AS the mode of worship adopted by Friends is 
 peculiar to them, a few sentences may be offered on 
 their views of this religious engagement, taken from 
 an epistle of 1866. " The worship of God imder the 
 Gospel consists not in ceremonies, or in external 
 observances. It is a simple, sjnritical service. That 
 which was represented in the sacrifices of the law was 
 fulfilled and ended in the Lord Jesus Christ, and in 
 the exercise of faith in Him the reality is now to be en- 
 joyed. . . No worship ought now to be made depen- 
 dent upon the presence of any one man or order of 
 men ; no service or stated vocal utterance in the con- 
 gregation ought to be allowed to interfere with the 
 operation of the Lord's free Spirit. We thankfully 
 recognize, as a means of edification, the preaching of 
 the Gospel, and offerings of public prayer or thanks- 
 giving, under the renewed anointing of the Holy Ghost ; 
 but we dare not make these dependent upon human 
 arrangements, or exclude, by any such arrangements 
 the silent and unseen, but not unfelt ministrations of 
 the Spirit of Christ, " dividing to every man severally 
 as He wills " 
 
 Herein may be seen, by those open to perceive 
 it, that Friends, when come together for worship, sit 
 down in silence through belief in an efficacy at- 
 
THE PRIE^D!^. 
 
 161 
 
 tendant on sucL. reverent waitings upon the Lord of all 
 Spirits, and any vocal utterances ensuing are received 
 as His fresh anointing to the service. " We recognise 
 the value of silence not as an end, but as the means to- 
 wards the attainment of an end ; a silence not of 
 listlessness, or of vacant musing, but of holy expectation 
 before the Lord." 
 
 In like manner some may find it not difficult to 
 understand why, as there is no outward priest or 
 officiating minister, it is not thought needful to intro- 
 duce any material element for a due remembrance 
 of the Lord's death for us, or for the waiting soul 
 to partake of true communion with Him. 
 
 Onthesubjectof ministry may be quoted the follow- 
 ing passage under date of 1841 : — " It is the prerogative of 
 Christ to call and qualify by the Holy Spirit his servants 
 to minister in word and doctrine. . . The servants 
 of Christ who labour in the ministry are to be highly 
 esteemed for their work's sake ; and when at His call 
 they leave their outward avocations to preach the gospel, 
 their outward wants should be cheerfully supplied. 
 Yet we consider the gifts of the ministry to be of so 
 pure and sacred a nature, that no payment should be 
 made for its exercise, and that it ought never to be 
 undertaken for pecuniary remuneration. . . We 
 believe it to be the duty of the ministers of the Gospel 
 to be diligent in the fear of God in reading the Holy 
 Scripture ; neither do we undervalue human learning, 
 but to subject any to a course of teaching as a necessary 
 preparation for the ministry, is in our apprehension, to 
 
162 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 interfere with that work of the Holy Spirit, which our 
 Lord carries forward in the hearts of those whom He 
 calls to preacii His gospel unto others." 
 
 Further to quote from these paragraphs relative 
 to ministers and Ministry, "We thankfully believe 
 that from the early rise of our Society, the Lord has 
 been pleased to bestow this gift upon servants and 
 upon handmaidens without respect of persons, and 
 that it has been exercised in His fear and to the honour 
 of His name ; and we pray that He may be pleased to 
 grant us its continuance and increase, and to keep us 
 from ever desiring any other." 
 
 Amidst much valuable advice on faithfulness in life's 
 stewardship, is this of 1865: — "Let none so overcharge 
 themselves with business, pleasure or other pursuits, 
 or so give way to the love of ease, as in any degree 
 to obstruct the exercise of their gifts or hinder their 
 right service. . . How influential is the example 
 of the Christian in the midst of his outward 
 affairs. . . If things are in their right places, ber t 
 things will be uppermost, and joy in the Lord's work 
 on earth will be increasingly known as a foretaste of 
 his perfected service in heaven." 
 
 Here is an extract among many on love and 
 unity in the Church, taken from an Epistle of 1857: — 
 " How precious is the unity which is known among 
 brethren who are made one in Christ. — Their characters, 
 their position, their gifts, their services may greatly 
 differ, but their hearts are one. They have one 
 Father, who is in heaven ; they serve one Master, even 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 163 
 
 Christ ; and amidst all the diversities of gifts and 
 administrations it is the same Spirit that worketh all 
 in all, dividing to every man severally as He will." 
 
 Much of counsel is — in this valuable collection — 
 extended to parents, but space will only permit these few 
 words of affectionate appeal under dates 1866, &c. : — 
 "Christian fathers and mothers honour the Lord in 
 your families. Let your lives be a daily confession of 
 Christ in your households. In connection with the 
 family reading of the scriptures, and the accompanying 
 devotional silence, which we trust will ever be felt to 
 be precious, quench not the gentle drawings of Divine 
 love, prompting the word of exhortation or instruction, 
 or the outpouring of the heart in prayer. Pray with, 
 as well as for your children, watching for opportunities 
 of uniting with them individually in the exercise of 
 this blessed privilege. . . They partake with you 
 of a fallen nature ; and it is your sacred duty to strive, 
 through divine help, to lead them to Him in whom is 
 plenteous redemption." 
 
 Then in training of families in this wise 
 counsel, that " whilst providing liberal instruc- 
 tion for your children you may never be drawn 
 aside by the desire for fashionable or merely orna- 
 mental accomplishments, from a course of training 
 and education conducive to a useful and honourable 
 life upon earth, and in harmony with the discipline 
 that renders meet for heaven." 
 
 On the subject of simplicity and moderation — 
 "It is our tender and Christian advice that Friends 
 
164 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 take care to keep to truth and plainnesB, in 
 language, habit, deportment, and behaviour ; that 
 the simplicity of truth in these things may not 
 wear out or be lost in our days, nor in those of 
 our posterity ; and to avoid pride and immodesty in 
 apparel, and all vain and superfluous fashions of the 
 ■world," In 1691 and again in 1868, " Words fail to con- 
 vey our sense of the importance of realising the in- 
 fluence of the Spirit of God, in its sanctifying power, 
 upon the habits, the affections, and even the tastes. 
 We plead for no mere outward imitation of that which 
 is good, but rather for that conformity to Christ which 
 springs from the renewal of the mind." 
 
 In a chapter devoted to enforcing uprightness and 
 integrity much sound counsel is offered as to the con- 
 duct of business and trade, referring also as expressed 
 in the following extracts to overtrading and watchful- 
 ness that a right time may be known for withdrawal 
 from business. " We would bid all beware of 
 that spirit which ' hasteth to be rich,' and which so 
 often leads those who give way to it, to trade beyond 
 their ability, to the great hurt of themselves and their 
 families, and to the grievous injury of others. . . 
 Be upon the watch to know the right time for retiring 
 from business. In these, and in all other things, seek, 
 both for yourselves and for your children, to be 
 limited by the will of God.— 1872. 
 
 It has been already mentioned that by a Series of 
 Queries answered in writing from Monthly Meetings to 
 those held Quarterly, such were helped to see whether 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 165 
 
 the varions congregations were in good order and 
 living up to the spirit of this Christian counsel, and as 
 these eighteen Quarterly gatherings themselves render 
 answers to the Annual Assembly it is enabled yearly 
 to review the State of the Society, and frame its 
 advice in a General Epistle accordingly. It is also a 
 practice of Friends once a year to read, at the close of 
 a Sabbath morning meeting, a Series of Advices so 
 excellent that even the pressure on our space may not 
 excuse their being quoted in the brevity of their 
 fulness : — 
 
 Take heed, dear Friends, we entreat you, to the 
 convictions of the Holy Spirit, who leads, through 
 unfeigned repentance, and living faith in the Son of 
 God, to reconciliation with our Heavenly Father ; and 
 to the blessed hope of eternal life, purchased for us by 
 the one ofEering of our Lord and Saviour Jesns 
 Christ. 
 
 Be earnestly concerned in religious meetings 
 reverently to present yourselves before the Lord ; and 
 seek by the help of the Holy Spirit to worship God 
 through Jesus Christ. 
 
 Prize the privilege of access by Him unto the 
 Father. Continue instant in prayer, and watch in the 
 same with thanksgiving. 
 
 Be in the frequent practice of waiting upon the 
 Lord in private retirement ; honestly examining your- 
 Belves as to your growth in grace, and your preparation 
 for the life to come. 
 
 Be diligent in the private perusal of the Holy 
 
166 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Scriptures ; and let the daily reading of them in your 
 families be devoutly conducted. 
 
 Be careful to make a profitable and religious use 
 of those portions of time on the first day of the week 
 which are not occupied by our Meetings for "Worship. 
 
 Live in love as Christian brethren, ready to be 
 helpful one to another, and sympathising with each 
 other in the trials and afflictions of life. Watch over 
 one another for good, manifesting an earnest desire 
 that each may possess a well grounded hope in Christ. 
 
 Follow peace with all men, desiring the true 
 happiness of all ; be kind and liberal to the poor, and 
 endeavour to promote the temporal, moral and religious 
 well-being of your fellow men. 
 
 With a tender conscience in accordance with the 
 precepts of the Gospel, take heed to the limitations of 
 the Spirit of Truth in the pursuit of the things of this 
 life. 
 
 Maintain strict integrity in your transactions in trade 
 and in all your outward concerns. Guard against the 
 spirit of speculation, and the snare of accumulating 
 wealth. Remember that we must account for the mode 
 of acquiring, as well as for the manner of using, and 
 finally disposing of our possessions. Observe simplicity 
 and moderation in your deportment and attire, in the 
 furniture of your houses, and in your style and manner 
 of living. Carefully maintain in your own conduct, 
 and encourage in your families, truthfulness and 
 sincerity ; and avoid worldliness in all its forms. 
 
 Guard watchfully against the introduction into your 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 167 
 
 households of publications of a hurtful tendency ; and 
 against such companionships, indulgences and recrea- 
 tions, whether for yourselves or your children, as may 
 in any wise interfere with a growth in grace. 
 
 Let the poor of this world remember that it is our 
 Heavenly Father's will that all His children should be 
 rich in faith. Let your lights shine in lives of honest 
 industry and patient love. Do your utmost to maintain 
 yourselves and your families in an honorable indepen- 
 dence, and, by prudent care in time of health, to pro- 
 vide for sickness and old age, holding fast to the 
 promise " I will never leave thee nor forsake thee." 
 
 "Whatever be your position in life, avoid such sports 
 and places of diversion as are frivolous or demoralising ; 
 all kinds of gaming ; the needless frequenting of 
 taverns and other public-houses, and the unnecessary 
 use of intoxicating liquors. 
 
 Tn contemplating the engagement of marriage, 
 look principally to that which will help you on your 
 heavenward journey ? pay filial recard to the judgment 
 of your parents ; bear in mind the vast importance, in 
 Buch a union, of an accordance in religious principles 
 and practice ; ask counsel of God, desiring above all 
 temporal considerations, that your union may be owned 
 and blessed of Him. 
 
 Watch with Christian tenderness over the opening 
 minds of your children ; inure them to habits of self- 
 restraint and filial obedience ; carefully instruct them 
 in the knowledge of the Holy Scriptures ; and seek for 
 ability to imbue their hearts with the love of their 
 
168 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Heavenly Father, their Redeemer, and their Sanctifier. 
 
 Finally, dear friends, let your whole conduct and 
 conversation be such as becomes the Gospel ; exercise 
 yourselves to have always a conscience void of offence 
 toward God and toward men ; be steadfast and faithful 
 in your allegiance and service to your Lord ; continue 
 in His love ; endeavouring to keep the unity of the 
 Spirit in the bond of peace. 
 
 These " General Advices " ai'e as they now stand 
 in the last revision of them made in 1883. There have 
 been various previous revisions, as many as six. indeed, 
 since their adoption in 1791. 
 
7 
 
LINDLEV MURRAY 
 
•JIIAPTER XX. 
 
 EDUCATION. 
 
 RE the necessities of the poor amongst you properly 
 
 inspected and relieved ? and is due care taken 
 of t/ie EDUCATION of their offspring ? This Query (re- 
 marked a leading Friend) is the one answered annually 
 without an exception ; but before the way is described 
 by which the latter part of it came to be so fully 
 answered, a few observations may be made on the 
 general subject of Education in the Society. 
 
 For their youth of both sexes to have a sound 
 English education was from the first a desired object 
 in Friends' families, which it was the easier to secure 
 from the circumstance that several of the earliest 
 adherents to the Society had previously been school- 
 masters, and there has never been wanting a succession 
 of those qualified to conduct educational establishments. 
 Besides many of a private character, some have been 
 undertaken under the care of committees of the 
 Quarterly Meetings, and a high class standard of in- 
 struction is given in some of these. 
 
 It is interesting to observe how some of the earliest 
 of these establishments for girls were commenced and 
 conducted by women Friends, so earnest for securing 
 education and right training as to give their services 
 gratuitously, thus reducing the cost of the establish- 
 
170 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 ment to that of maintenance only. At one of these 
 commenced in York by the daughters of William Tuke, 
 the attempts of these volunteers to teach English system- 
 atically led to the production of the well known Lindley 
 Murray's Grammar. 
 
 This Friend was a retired American merchant, 
 living in the outskirts of York for the benefit of his 
 health, and became so greatly interested in this object 
 as to encourage the visits of these earnest minded 
 teachers to him, with whom he would hold long con- 
 ferences in explanation of the structure of the English 
 language ; such were so often prolonged to a late hour 
 that their father's servant would be seen, lantern in 
 hand, guiding them homeward across the fields. A 
 natural desire on their part that such valuable matter 
 should have wider influence in a more permanent form, 
 induced their kind councillor to commit his grammatical 
 teachings to writing, and if any proof were needed of 
 the service it has had in English education, it would be 
 shewn by the two hundred separate edititions of this 
 grammar, which have been called for by the public 
 since its first appearance in 1795. 
 
 Several other works of Lindley Murray's followed 
 with the same educational object, chiefly in reading 
 lessons. 
 
 In reference to the important duty of assisting 
 parents whose circumstances did not permit their 
 children to share these advantages, much care has been 
 extended by the Society, by an early establishment of 
 schools for this class of children, in the neighbour- 
 
L>R. JOHN FOTHEROILL 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 171 
 
 hoods of London, Bristol, Leeds, and some other 
 places. But the Yearly Meeting in its watchfulness, 
 lest all of this class were not being thus reached, added 
 in 1737 to its list of general enquiries, a request to be 
 iaformed of what was being done towards the educa- 
 tion of such children ; from which such prevalent 
 deficiencies became apparent as to awaken its desiru 
 for some Institution of its own of more general educa- 
 tional use for the offspring of those who were not in 
 aflBuent circumstances, that these might have the same 
 kind of benefits which parents who could afford it, 
 obtained for their children at the private or other 
 schools of the Society. 
 
 Amongst those earnestly solicitous for a solution 
 of this question was Dr. John Fothergill, a member of 
 a family largely instrumental in the zealous reformation 
 of the Society, and himself become eminent as one of 
 the leading physicians of the day and a generous prc^ 
 moter of scientific and philanthropic objects. Truly 
 was he one in whom talent, generosity, and high 
 principle met in close combination. " My onlj' wish," 
 he said, " in entering on the medical profession was 
 to do what little might fall to my share as well as 
 possible, and to banish all thoughts of practising 
 physic as a money-getting trade with the same 
 solicitude as I would the suggestions of vice and in- 
 temperance." As a native of Westmorland he Avae 
 accustomed (in later life) to retire thitherward for his 
 innual recess, and on one of these journeys heard there 
 was at Ackworth, near Pontefract, an estate with some 
 
172 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 large premises for sale that liad been erected at great 
 cost by the managers of the Foundling Hospital, and 
 vacated by them when the system changed from keep- 
 ing the children at work on the premises, to apprenticing 
 them out to learn trades. It had been vacant so many 
 years that the foxes had made themselves holes in its 
 floors, and the trustees were found willing to sell for 
 £7,000 what had cost them £17,000. 
 
 The good Doctor consulted with one or two of 
 his intimate friends, who agreeing with him in its 
 adaptability for such an Educational Establishment aa 
 the Society needed, they made the purchase them- 
 selves, and offered it to the next Yearly Meeting 
 on the same terms, which being cordially accepted, the 
 needed money was raised among Friends generally, 
 amongst whom the worthy Doctor ranks as one of the 
 liberal contributors. His memory will thus ever be 
 associated with the origin of an institution that has 
 proved of incalculable benefit to the Society throughout 
 many generations. " It gives (said an Ex-mayor of 
 I'ork lately) an education far in advance of that 
 enjoyed by horjs of the same rank in life, . . and as 
 to girls, a far more thorough and character-strengthen- 
 ing education than was common in the Community at 
 large." 
 
 Ten thousand children have there received moral 
 training and education since its establishment iu 1779, 
 and throu.rrh its influence exerted on similar establish- 
 ments, it has come to pass that year by year all meet- 
 ingri throughout the Society make no exception in 
 
THE FillENDS. 
 
 173 
 
 reporting " that the necessities of the Poor amongst us 
 jire properly inspected and relieved, and good care is 
 laken of the education of their offspring P 
 
 Wise men have directed its course, and prevented 
 jny pauperising results. Children of those parents 
 who can pay either full or partial cost associate on 
 equal terms with those whose education is beinij: 
 defrayed by their friends, and the fees from those 
 whose parents are able to afford the higher scale of 
 payments help to diminish the cost of the institution 
 over its income. 
 
 Ackworth School has now become a noble range 
 of buildings, accommodating 150 Boys and 150 Girls, 
 with Superintendent's Apartments, Committee Room, 
 and spacious Meeting House. Large sums have from 
 time to time been expended in perfecting these 
 accommodations, with Gas Works and Steam Laundry, 
 Baths and Swimming Bath, obtained as gifts from :i 
 succession of generous and wealthy patrons, who have 
 loved to assist in keeping the institution John Fothergill 
 initiated, up to the mark in sanitary, residential, ami 
 educational buildings and arrangements. 
 
 "Happy estate (wrote William Howitt, one of its 
 many scholars who have attained distinction), may the 
 after intercourse of the world never be able to eradicate 
 the effects of this little golden age from the hearts of 
 those who have enjoyed it." And J. G. Fitch, who at 
 Government Education Inspector, visited the Establish- 
 ment, concludes his report of 1866 : " I cannot 
 sufficiently express my admiration of the order 
 
174 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 seriousness, and repose of this great Institution ; nor 
 my sense of the advantages which the pupils enjoy in 
 the watchful supervision of the Society to which they 
 belong." 
 
 Whilst Ackworth continues to be the only school 
 under the care of the Yearly Meeting, it far from absorbs 
 all children of the class intended within its walls. The 
 example it sets has served as stimulus for Friends to 
 establish at various times similar establishments in 
 other districts. Thus have the home counties one {i t 
 Saffron Walden (1811), the western at Sidcot (1808), 
 the northern at Wigton (1815), Rawden (1832), Penketh 
 (,1834), Ayton (1841), the midlands at Sibford (1842) ; 
 each of these having some special characteristic observ- 
 able in their foundation and management. Ireland 
 also has four : Waterford, Mountmellick, Lisburn, and 
 IJrookfield. In all, including Ackworth, 1,187 children 
 are thus being provided with excellent moral training, 
 and an education sound and serviceable for entrance 
 into industrial or commercial life. 713 of these aro 
 boys, and 474 gii'ls, and it may be mentioned that the 
 cost of maintenance and education at these 12 establish- 
 ments averages jQSl 6s. 9d. per head, of which ;Q2S 
 lis. Od. is from parents' payments, £4 16s. lOd. from 
 'nvestmenis, and jQ2 12s. 6d. from annual subscriptions. 
 It should also bo mentioned that there is a valuable 
 mstitution for the training of teachers located in some 
 line premises at Ackwortli, and known from the name 
 of its founder as "Tlio Flounders Institute." 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 DISRUPTION AND SECESSION. 
 
 TTAVING in the course of this history traced the 
 ■^-^ Society's survival uhrough forty years of persecii- 
 tion, its spread in the Western World, its successful 
 efforts at self-reformation during a lax and unbelieving 
 age, and its educational institutions, it is but right to 
 notice some serious controversies that have arisen at 
 various times and caused secessions, both in England 
 and America. 
 
 The first of these — amongst English Friends — 
 occurred during the wars of the French Revolution, 
 when England rose to arms in preparations to resist 
 ihe invasion with which it was threatened by Napoleon. 
 Sentiments of patriotism or feelings of necessity for 
 self-defence caused large numbers — especially of the 
 wealthier members — to relinquish that conscientious 
 objection felt by Friends against all war, which pre- 
 vented their sharing in these preparations. Such, in 
 consequence, either withdrew from further member- 
 ship or were disowned by a community that pre- 
 ferred to suffer loss rather than relax its testimony 
 against bearing arms, or joining by subscription or 
 personal service in any volunteer force, or being in 
 any manner concerned with the Militia, It was- a 
 secession that materially lessened the social position 
 
17G 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 aud influence of a Society, that had until this numbered 
 amongst its members a large portion of the leading 
 bankers, merchants, and ship-owners, both in London 
 aud the chief towns and seaports of the country, but 
 it strengthened those who remained in a desire yet 
 firmer, to maintain their principles of peace as opposed 
 to all war, even of a defensive nature. 
 
 About the same time there occurred amongst 
 American Friends a yet sadder and wider separation, 
 bince it concerned the fundamental truths of our Lord's 
 Divinity and mediatorial office, which an Elias Hicks 
 (like Arius of old) called into question, and having 
 drawn great numbers of Friends to his views, caused 
 what is known as the Hicksite secession. That, in 
 many of the American meetings, lost them half their 
 uaeinbership. 
 
 As both sides in this sad and bitter contention pro- 
 fessed to be true followers of the early Friends, and each 
 quoted from their writings in support of such claims, 
 it needs a recurrence to the circumstances under which 
 these works were written, to understand how Evangeli- 
 cals and Unitarians could alike draw from the same 
 source such widely differing conclusions. Some, no 
 doubt, of these ancient controversial writings might 
 be taken as favouring Unitarian principles, if it were 
 forgotten that these sublime mysteries of the Christian 
 faith were not the subject in hand. They were 
 written against an exaltation of the letter of Scripture, 
 over the Spirit that inspired it, or to controvert the 
 Calvinist in his extreme views on Divine Election and 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 177 
 
 Reprobation, or else to draw men oflp from that exclusiivo 
 dwelling on our Lord's outward work and sacrifice for 
 men, which took not into account the necessity of o!iv 
 becoming ourselves the subject of his inward and 
 spiritual work in the heart. 
 
 But whenever challenged for appearing to neglect 
 or deny the fundamental truths of the Gospel, they ex- 
 plained themselves as not having felt it necessary, in 
 these controversial writings, to dwell on what all 
 Christians alike believed. They sought to enforce what 
 they thought was not being sufficiently recogniseil l)y 
 those whom they addressed, and on all occasions that 
 required a full statement of their Christian belief (such 
 as when called upon by the Governor of Barbadoes), 
 their doctrinals were shown to be fully in accord with 
 those of all Evangelical Christians. Thus orthodox 
 Friends had, in this controversy, no difficulty iu 
 obtaining from their published works, conclusive testi- 
 monies to the inspiration and authority of Ploly 
 Scripture, and the Divinity and mediatorial work of 
 our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
 
 Elias Hicks, whose name has become associated 
 with that of the unitarian Friends, was, by occupation, 
 a carpenter, and also a farmer. Of a fine stalwart 
 build, he bore in his personal appearance some 
 resemblance to General Washington. His ministry l-^ 
 described as characterised by "an astonishing and 
 animated flow of plain but powerful and penetratin;^ 
 language, a train of argument that lightens, and senti- 
 ment that warms whatever it touches." It was net 
 
178 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 vintil the latter part of his long life, that he tooK 
 that antagonistic attitude to the distinguishing facts 
 and fundamental truths of Christianity, which caused 
 the schism that shook the Society to its foundations, 
 and lost it nearly a third of its members. Families 
 were divided, congregations thrown into commotion, 
 and where the numbers on either side were nearly 
 equal, much difficulty arose, even to contentions in 
 Law Courts over possession of Meeting House Property 
 and Records. 
 
 This sad disruption made those who held to 
 orthodox views conscious of having given too great a 
 place to the Journals and writings of Early Friends, 
 and a use of Manuals or selections from Scripture, 
 rather than the Sacred Volume itself, to which they 
 now turned with affectionate and earnest attention. 
 
 In this they were encouraged through some visits 
 paid them during this painful period by various English 
 Friends, amongst whom Hannah Chapman Backhouse 
 and Anna Braithwaite were — with their husbands — 
 especially earnest in travelling throughout the American 
 meetings, a service of Christian love which was per- 
 formed by them in arduous journeys through distant 
 and thinly settled districts, involving much personal 
 fatigue and discomfort to those, who, like them- 
 selves, were accustomed to all the refinements of 
 wealthy homes. These they freely left for years at a 
 time, in the desire to stimulate a closer and more 
 reverential study of the text and teachings of Holy 
 Scripture, and continued the service even after 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 179 
 
 pressure of business had summoned their husbands 
 home. 
 
 Notwithstanding this separation in 1827, both sec- 
 tions continue to be known as Friends, though for 
 distinction one is termed Hicksite and the other 
 Orthodox. Both have numerous and large establish- 
 ments in meeting premises, schools, and colleges 
 but it is only with the Orthodox section, that tho 
 English Friends continue to hold correspondence. 
 It has proved itself the more vigourous section, for 
 whilst the other is marked by much culture, spiritual 
 feeling, and social influence, its numerical accessions 
 liave depended chiefly on family increase ; whilst 
 the other, that retains belief in a Divine Saviour, 
 has, in a desire to promote and extend His kingdom 
 in the heart, gained so many adherents that out 
 of the 100,000 now bearing the name of Friends in 
 America, only 22,000 do not belong to the Orthodox 
 section. It has expanded over the Western prairies, 
 forming fresh Yearly Meetings through large accessions 
 due to these zealous efforts. It has also been responsive 
 to our Lord's command of preaching the gospel to 
 every creature, and maintains successful missions in 
 Indian territories, in Mexico, Syria, and Japan, besides 
 giving liberal support to evangelistic labours in other 
 directions. 
 
 It was not only by declining correspondence with 
 the followers of Elias Hicks, that English Friends testi- 
 fied to their own orthodoxy, for they had had several in- 
 stances amongst themselves, which required from, them 
 
180 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 a decision as to which section they belonged. One was 
 of a woman Friend from America, whose minis.try, as 
 she travelled in England and Ireland, was of a character 
 that awakened such uneasiness amongst the elders, that 
 lier visit was promptly closed by her acceding to their 
 expressed wish for her return. 
 
 Not long after this a London Monthly Meeting had 
 to deal with one of its members on account of his 
 Unitarian sentiments, that had led him so far as to sub- 
 scribe to an organisation for spreading these views. 
 After much patient effort had failed to effect any change 
 it proceeded to his disownment, according to the advice 
 given in a minute of the Society, dated as early as 
 1694, " that if there be any such gross errors, false 
 iloctrine, or mistakes held by any professing truth, as 
 are either against the validity of Christ's sufferings, 
 blood, resurrection, ascension, or glory in the heavens, 
 according as they are set forth in the Scriptures, or any- 
 wise tending to the denial of the Heavenly Man 
 Christ," such, it proceeds to say, should if persisting iu 
 I hese after instruction and remonstrance, " be further 
 dealt with according to Gospel order, that the Truth, 
 Church, or Body of Christ may not suffer by any 
 particular pretended member that is ' so corrupt.' " 
 
 From this decision of his Monthly Meeting, the 
 Friend appealed to the Quarterly, and on finding its 
 judgment given against him, carried his case, as was 
 iiiB right, to be finally decided by the Society at large 
 ill Yearly Meeting assembled. 
 
 Such appeals, where faith and doctrine ia con- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 181 
 
 cerned, are not heard like others by committees, but 
 in the Meeting itself, which on this occasion, throna;h 
 the great interest awakened, formed a crowded 
 assembly of near upon a thousand men Friends of 
 varied age, rank, and education. 
 
 The appellant fully availed himself of such oppor- 
 tunity for shewing how his views were, as he contended, 
 within the lines of the Society's ancient belief, which 
 his very superior abilities and culture enabled him to 
 expound and enforce, in a manner well calculated to 
 favourably impress so large and varied an assembly. 
 But he was confronted with brethren who, if they could 
 not equal him in oratorical powers, were well prepared 
 with extracts and documents of an authoritative 
 character in support of their case, "that the appellant, 
 having departed from the Society's principles, could 
 no longer be retained as a member." 
 
 Several sittings, prolonged through hours at a time, 
 having been thus spent and both parties having declared 
 that they had been fully and fairly heard, the appellant 
 and his assistants and the respondents withdrew to leave 
 the large and deeply moved Assembly to its decision on 
 this momentous question. " A solemn silence (wrote 
 one who was present) prevailed, and continued for a 
 considerable time. At length an elderly Friend arose 
 — as remarkable for his clearness of mind as he was 
 striking from his pleasing and venerable appearance. 
 In a single expressive sentence he gave his judgment 
 against the appellant. Then many other elder Friends 
 arose one after another with the same conclusion ; then 
 
182 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 otherB from all parts of the meeting of various ages, 
 circumstances, and characters, in a general concurrence 
 that cast the verdict of that great gathering adverse to 
 the appellant in an unmistakable adhesion to evan- 
 gelical doctrine." 
 
 Thus the Yearly Meeting when challenged by 
 individuals gave its firm adhesion to Evangelical prin- 
 ciples, but it found itself and the whole Society 
 greatly disturbed, some ten years afterwards (1836), by 
 a controversy that arose respecting the obligation of 
 Christians to observe the rites of Baptism and the 
 Lord's Supper. 
 
 It may be said to have arisen in a measure from an 
 earnest study of the original Greek text of Scripture 
 through Bible Classes, by which many came to regard 
 it as a literal guide in practice as well as doctrine, so 
 that " resigning themselves to its guidance, they began 
 to find ivater in the commission, Matt, xxviii. 19, and 
 bread and ivine in the command, Matt. xxvi. 26-30. 
 
 Several prominent ministers in the Society, now 
 submitted to the one rite and practised the other, 
 making no reserve in pressing a similar compliance on 
 others as a religious duty. 
 
 Such teaching and conduct occasioned great dis- 
 union and controversy, and it was in vain that tho 
 Yearly Meeting by its committees, endeavoured to 
 effect some settlement of the question. It resulted in 
 the Society holding firm amid such discussion, to its 
 ancient testimony of the non-obligatory character of 
 these ceremonials. As a consequence, those who could 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 183 
 
 not but regard tliem as Ordinances of Divine appoint- 
 ment withdrew, and in such numbers as to inflict 
 upon the Society a loss, the more severe from these 
 dissentients having been some of its most esteemed 
 members for character, piety, and intelligence. Other 
 communities, especially the Evangelical section of the 
 Anglican Church, which most of them eventually 
 joined, reaped no doubt much advantage by the 
 accession to their ranks of such zealous, pious, and in- 
 tellectual converts. 
 
 How much further the rent might have gone it is 
 impossible to say, if some gifted minds had not arisen 
 to stand as in the breach and reconcile the waverers on 
 the question of the non-obligatory character of Ritual 
 for Christians. Amongst these none became more 
 prominent than Joseph John Gurney and William 
 Forster, the one learned, wealthy, and gracefully per- 
 suasive in his discourse, the other deep and fervent, 
 both thoroughly imbued with evangelical views, and in 
 the highest esteem amongst their friends for Christian 
 and social virtues. 
 
 Joseph John Gurney having a reputation for 
 Scholarship and Biblical acquirements, could well pro- 
 mote a study of Holy Scripture in preference to the use 
 of Manuals and doctrinal Abstracts, until then much in 
 vogue, especially in schools, and by contrasting and 
 applying varied passages from the Old and New Tesia- 
 ments, succeeded in making it seen that the Scriptures 
 are the best interpreters of their own meaning ; a Lock, 
 to which they themselves give the opening Key. 
 
184 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 He would do this in so pleasing and convincing a 
 manner as to interest while it edified — none more so 
 ihan the young — at the various Schools to whose 
 Biblical instruction he attended with the deepest 
 solicitude. 
 
 He was a voluminous Author on doctrinal sub- 
 jects, and a great traveller in the work of the ministry, 
 not alone in Great Britain but also America. His dis- 
 courses were often long expositions of Christian Truths 
 in a style so impressive that a burlesque of the day said 
 " If the lawn in thy hand were but riband and band, 
 oh how as a bishop thou'd shine, Joseph John." The 
 Friends' community owes to him very much in having 
 fcit6mmed the tide of secession from its ranks of those 
 who thought that to reverence Scripture aright, was to 
 accept its literal interpretation in ceremonial ob- 
 servances. 
 
 William Forster, his most intimate friend, was de- 
 voted from his youthful manhood, to the service of the 
 Gospel. He never followed any profession for a liveli- 
 hood, though he had been trained to his father's of 
 surveyor and land agent. His early dedication added 
 to the impressiveness of his deep and earnest expositions 
 of Gospel truth, free from all external rites and cere- 
 monies, and the power and pathos of his eloquent dis- 
 course aroused the consciences and warmed the hearts 
 of his hearers. So extensive were his travels in this 
 service of Gospel love, that it has been said " hardly any 
 Friends in any part of the three Kingdoms but had en- 
 joyed the opportunity of listening to William Forster, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 185 
 
 as he Bet forth to them the unfathomable mysteries of 
 the Divine love in Christ Jesus, and dwelt upon the 
 fallen state of Man," 
 
 By his marriage in early middle life with Anna Bux- 
 ton he had sufficient means for a country residence, where 
 he might have lived continuously in a quiet way well 
 suited to his natural love of ease, but he never allowed 
 his own comforts to interfere with seldom ceasing 
 labours; now to serve the starving Irish by personal 
 exertions — that tired out many a younger assistant — in 
 its years of sore famine, then to travel hither and thither 
 on some service throughout the British Isles, and 
 (wretched sailor as he was, like so many another bulky 
 person) he crossed and recrossed the Atlantic three or 
 four times on missions of ministry or mercy to ma 
 American continent, the last of which (as will be seen 
 in the Chapter on Slavery) cost him his life. 
 
 Though it may seem invidious to name any of the 
 many others who equally laboured for settlement in this 
 time of unrest, yet it may be noted how much its at- 
 tainment was due to the calm and dignified wisdom 
 of Samuel Tuke, the indefatigable cciicitude of Josiah 
 Forster, the steadfastness of a George Stacey, a Grover 
 Kemp, a Joseph Tregelles Price, or the advisatory 
 help of a Joseph Davis ; men representative of so 
 many more ; with Susanna Corder, guardian and in- 
 structress of maiden youth, and other sister Friends, 
 wise in Christian counsel and experience. Ministry 
 of a varied kind abounded, from the rich mosaic 
 .Joseph Shewell would construct from apposite 
 
186 
 
 THE FR1E>"DS. 
 
 texts, or what his brother John would more logically 
 evolve from the same source, the strident tones of a 
 Thomas Shillitoe, or the stream of verbal and Doctrinal 
 eloquence amounting with some to enchantment, that 
 would flow by the hour together from a John Pease — 
 these, amid so many others were as pillars in the 
 Church. "Women Friends there were in the same ministry 
 — cogent as Hannah Backhouse, gracefully persuasive 
 as Elizabeth Fry, copious as Elizabeth Dudley, and 
 stately in Gospel peroration as a Mary Ann Bayes. To 
 such as these, those who can recall times of fifty years 
 ago, trace much influence in steadying minds to 
 Friends' principles, and raising a generation prepared to 
 carry on the Society for future service in its coming 
 vearn 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE FRIENDS AS PIONEERS IN PHILANTHROPTifl 
 EFFORTS. 
 
 rpHE presence in any country of a community widely 
 dispersed and well organised like the Friends, 
 pledged to right living, must under Divine guidance 
 prove morally influential. 
 
 That England's betterment has been thus promoted 
 is manifest by their continued exertions in the cause of 
 philanthropy and social reform. Not so much by 
 ofBcial acts of the Society, although these have never 
 failed, but through a general willingness and aptitude 
 of its members everywhere to serve as pioneers in 
 efforts for the abolition of evils, or introduction of social 
 reforms, and to form a phalanx around which good men 
 of every shade of opinion could rally for their promotion. 
 
 As it would be unfair to claim Friends as the ex- 
 clusive originators of any one of the great social move- 
 ments of the age, so would it be yet more unjust to 
 forget that many of its prominent reforms .have 
 owed their success to support given by them at times 
 when authorities opposed, or public opinion was in a 
 state of indifference to what are now recognized as 
 blessings of freedom and justice to Society at large. 
 
 When Thomas Clarkson's youthful spirit had been 
 stirred by the horrors of the slave trade, the only book- 
 
1S8 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 seller he could fiad willing to publish his essay for its 
 abolition was William Phillips ; a Friend in whose 
 parlour gathered the first little group of some dozen 
 warm hearts that pledged themselves thenceforth to 
 agitate without ceasing, for an end to this iniquitous 
 traflScking in their fellow men, and of these twelve 
 three-fourths were Friends. 
 
 So when some half-century of unceasing labour had 
 ended in the abolition both of the Slave trade and Slavery 
 from British Dominions, and a great gathering in Free- 
 masons' Hall met to celebrate the victory, those who 
 look upon the picture of it, painted by Haydon, will see 
 that most of the faces which crowd his huge canvass, 
 and most of the principal figures seated around the 
 patriarchal Clarkson are members of the Society of 
 Friends. 
 
 With this Society was Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton 
 connected both by descent and close association, and 
 through one of its gifted Ministers, a dearly beloved 
 sister-in-law, he was induced by her earnest entreaties 
 addressed to him from a dying couch, to give his energy 
 and tenacity of purpose to a cause in which her own 
 heart's feelings had been greatly enlisted. From such 
 a source an appeal came to him almost as a Divine 
 command, for Priscilla Gurney possessed spiritual and 
 mental endowments, as much held in affectionate 
 remembrance by her Friends, as those of her sister 
 Elizabeth Fry have come to be esteemed by the world 
 ut large. 
 
 Then as to Public Elementary Education. When 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 189 
 
 Joseph Lancaster, a young Friend, was showing in his 
 School at the Borough Road how large numbers could 
 be so taught by Monitors as to reduce its cost, none 
 rallied more firmly to his support than members of 
 his own Society. By their zealous efforts the system of 
 Monitorial education spread to the opening of such 
 schools all over the country. The local committees foi- 
 their management were at first chiefly formed from 
 amongst the Friends, to whose generous contributions 
 England stands largely indebted for the school build- 
 ings that quickly arose in her cities and country towns. 
 
 None worked more zealously in this cause than 
 William Allen, the philosophic and philanthropic 
 chemist of Lombard Street, by whose personal influence 
 many of the great and noble were induced to favour 
 extension of Education to classes, which public opinion 
 then thought it best for their easier government to 
 keep in ignorance. It led to the formation of the 
 British and Foreign School Society, to which he acted 
 for many years as honorary secretary. 
 
 Then again at a time when mobs would gather 
 week by week around scaffolds to feast their brutalised 
 gaze on the executions of fellow creatures, often 
 for but trifling offences, none of the humane hearts 
 shocked at this legalised cruelty gathered more per- 
 sistently than Friends around a Romilly, a Basil 
 Montague, or a Lushington, to inaugurate those efforts 
 that have at last abolished the death penalty from no 
 less than one hundred and sixty offences and confined 
 its rare infliction to the gravest of crimes. 
 
190 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Long before a Shaftesbury had come upon the 
 Bcene, when thieves held such possession that none 
 ventured near their quarters without some officer of 
 the law, the person of a Peter Bedford, of Spitalfields, 
 was ever welcome as one who, whilst condemning the 
 sin could pity the sinner, and who strove for his refor- 
 mation by acts of kindness that oft saved him from 
 punishment by gaol or halter. His judicious benevo- 
 lence, exerted in many ways on behalf of the poor by per- 
 sonal visits, raising funds in times of distress, promoting 
 soup kitchens, clothing clubs, &c., made his long 
 residence in these oft distressed localities a blessing. 
 Old age found him in a country retirement, rejoicing 
 in the general efforts made for social amelioration of 
 the lower and criminal classes. He had many an anecdote 
 of his personal experiences amongst them, of which 
 one, though but trivial in character, may be permitted 
 as showing how even thieves respected his belongings. 
 They had taken oflE luggage from the post-chaise of a 
 bridal party, that came in distress to Peter for help. 
 He at once knew where to go and reproached the 
 captain of the gang. " Very sorry (he replied) no idea 
 it was one of yourn Friends, we never touch them if we 
 knows it — the things shall be on your doorstep to- 
 night," — and so they were, but not the portmanteaus 
 themselves which had been already destroyed. To 
 meet with characters such as Peter Bedford, working 
 quietly for good at the dawn of this century, is like 
 coming on the bubblings up of the fountain, in com- 
 parison with the broad stream of benevolence that 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 191 
 
 happily now flows towards these then much-neglected 
 classes of society. 
 
 At regular and frequent intervals were Lord 
 Mayors found presiding in solemn state at Courts of 
 Assize, yet giving little heed as to how those brought 
 before them were being cared for within the massive 
 walls that adjoined their Judgment Hall. 
 
 It was a French Friend who first unveiled the 
 wretched state of prisoners in Newgate. Stephen Grellet 
 whilst visiting London on gospel service obtained per- 
 mission to visit these, and after his interviews with the 
 men prisoners, requested to be shown into the ivomen's 
 ward. " You will enter there (replied the jailor) at your 
 own peril, for those demons will tear the clothes from 
 your back." Unappalled at the prospect, he entered 
 alone, and his look, manner, and voice, as he lovingly 
 addressed them, made him seem as an angel to their 
 astonished gaze, whilst they crowded around in earnest 
 attention. 
 
 Never before had such words of kindness reached 
 their ears, and never before had this Christian noble- 
 man — as was Grellet by rank — seen such misery within 
 prison walls as these poor creatures showed in their 
 ragged half-clothed condition. He hastened to his 
 Friend, Elizabeth Fry, with an account of what he had 
 discovered as the state of London's chief prison. Her 
 warm heart, touched at the narration, summoned a 
 group of women friends to meet that afternoon in 
 the parlour of her husband's Bank, where many ;i 
 bright face and skilled hand quickly transformed the 
 
192 
 
 THE FRIEKDS. 
 
 flannel she had ordered of the tradesmen, into some 
 garments for the ne-wly-born babes amongst these poor 
 neglected sisters of a criminal class, whom none until 
 then had thought worthy of care except for imprison- 
 ment, transportation, or death. 
 
 Furnished with these outward proofs of kindness, 
 her own visit next day to Newgate aided the effect of 
 her loving and majestic presence, and proved the com- 
 mencement of what issued in regular Bible readings 
 amongst them, and led also to the formation of Com- 
 mittees for Prison inspection, and to those wide 
 measures of reform with which the name of this re- 
 markable Friend is so closely associated. 
 
 In efforts for abolition of capital punishment, another 
 member of the Society became so deeply interested, as 
 to spend nights and days throughout many a year in 
 preparing documents and appeals, and in personal efforts 
 with those in authority, until the tall form and finely 
 chiselled features of John Thomas Barry, dressed in 
 the Friendliest of Friends' costume, became a familiar 
 object in the Lobbies of the Houses of Parliament, 
 whose members each in turn would be made the 
 subject of his earnest solicitations for an entire aboli- 
 tion of the death penalty. 
 
 No less persistent was the benevolence of a Friend 
 physician towards the native population of Foreign 
 Lands, on whose behalf Dr. Thomas Hodgkin founded 
 the Aborigines' Protection Society, at a time when 
 " whites treated blacks as if they were but wild 
 beasts" — happily, and largely through these efforts. 
 
8 
 
ELIZABETH FRY {KROM A PAINTING BY S. DRUMMOND, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 treated so no longer. His character for universal 
 benevolence received from Sir Moses Montefiore^ 
 whom he often accompanied as physician in his long 
 journeys, a generous tribute by his having erected an 
 obelisk over the grave at Jaffa, where the doctor died 
 during one of these expeditions, engraved with the 
 classic sentence, " No man, if he be a man, can be to 
 me other than a brother." 
 
 Friends' well known prominence in the Temper- 
 ance and Total Abstinence movement is the more^ 
 observable, seeing how many of them were at one time 
 engaged in the manufacture and sale of alcoholic 
 beverages, so that it would have been as difficult in the 
 early years of this century to find a town or city where 
 some member of the Society was not a leading 
 Maltster, Brewer, or Wine Merchant, as it is now to 
 meet with any engaged in such trades, or having their 
 produce in their homes or on their tables. Some of 
 the most successful advocates for the change have come 
 from among themselves, such as Samuel Bowly, of 
 Gloucester, who may be credited through Iiis^ 
 drawing-room meetings with much of the support 
 gained to the cause of total abstinence from among the 
 upper ranks, and especially the clergy. " Never," said one 
 of the leading dignitaries of the present day, " have 1 
 listened to a more persuasive speaker." 
 
 So earnest also at all times have Friends been 
 f or the promotion of Peace and condemnation of War,, 
 that their position in this question must be treated of 
 in a separate chapter. 
 
194 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 In the foundation and work of the British and 
 Foreign Bible Society no one Friend may have become 
 prominent, though few members of its present Com- 
 mittee have travelled further in Foreign Lands 
 to promote its interests, than their much esteemed 
 colleague, J. B. Braithwaite. Nor can the long ser- 
 vice of the Forster Brothers, with that of many other 
 Friends, have been forgotten. The presence of a 
 "Friend" element on the Committee was until late 
 years so marked that a devotional pause for free offer- 
 ings of prayer was observed, instead of opening with any 
 delegated service. But Friends' chief assistance to 
 the cause Avas rendered in the formation and working of 
 Auxiliary societies all over the country, these being 
 found to become independent centres around which 
 other Denominations would rally. Meetings arranged 
 by them would be attended by earnest minded 
 Christians of all denominations, and the travelling 
 agents of the Society, such as Dr. Steinkopff and others, 
 learnt to highly value and esteem the Friends who 
 offered them the hospitality of their homes, at a time 
 when the Gentry were apathetic, and Clerical digni- 
 taries fearful, lest a free circulation of Scripture should 
 lessen regard for the Lessons taken from it as read in 
 Churches. On the Friends themselves the association 
 it brought with those of other denominations had a 
 beneficial effect, in liberalising views that in any close 
 attention to Society interest might have become narrow 
 or exclusive. 
 
 In Political affairs their influence as Electors has 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 195 
 
 been liiberal, often Radical, and their service as Mem- 
 bers has been marked by that high moral tone 
 politicians of all shades recognised in John Bright, of 
 which also William Edward Forster, who was nurtured 
 in the same Society, gave proof in the manner" by which 
 he was able to steer an Education Bill into legal 
 operation that had hitherto baffled all previous States- 
 men, and one which in its successful operation has 
 largely realised the poetically expressed aspirations of 
 Wordsworth : 
 
 0 for the coming of tliat glorious time 
 
 When prizing Knowledge as her noblest wealth, 
 
 And best protection, this Imperial Realm, 
 
 While she exacts Allegiance shall admit 
 
 An Obligation on Her part to Teach 
 
 Those who are born to serve Her and obey, 
 
 Binding Herself by Statute to secure 
 
 For all the children whom her soil maintains, 
 
 The rudiments of letters and inforce 
 
 The mind with Moral and Religious Truth. 
 
 Foremost as Friends have shown themselves 
 amongst the labourers for general education, freedom, 
 and social reform, it may also be observed that across 
 the Ocean their influence has left its mark on the 
 framework of the great American Nation, whose con- 
 stitution still bears foundation traces of the original 
 basis of perfect civil and religious liberty, which Friends 
 exemplified in the settlement of Pennsylvania ; within 
 whose Capital its declaration of Independence was 
 signed, and it is still the one which amongst all its 
 sisters who crowd the Nation's Star-spangled Banner, 
 bears the name of the " Key-stone State." 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 SLAVERY. 
 
 He who values Liberty confines 
 nib zeal for her predominance, within 
 No narrow bounds, her cause engages him, 
 Wherever pleaded — 'Tis the cause of Man. 
 
 COWPER— TFeM<er Morning Walk. 
 
 TjIXGLISH Friends first made acquaintiince with the 
 
 system of Negro Slavery when their early ministers 
 visited the West India Islands, and found how many 
 fellow countrymen, settled there, were become depen- 
 dent on bondsmen for the cultivation of sugar planta- 
 tions. These they exhorted " to deal mildly and gently 
 with their negroes and not use cruelty towards them, 
 and that after certain years of servitude, they would 
 make them free." 
 
 They also held religious meetings amongst this 
 slave population, in the assurance of their being as 
 much entitled to the blessings of the gospel as their 
 masters, and they induced those of the Settlers who 
 became Friends to continue this Christian interest in 
 their welfare. 
 
 This conduct caused much opposition, from a 
 belief that the blacks were an inferior race, unworthy 
 of liberty or regard as Christian beings, and could only 
 be managed safely through their state of ignorance being 
 left undisturbed, tho removal of which was dreaded by 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 197 
 
 the masters as likely to produce rioting and rebellion 
 amongst them. 
 
 Without any such fears the Friends continued 
 solicitous for their slaves' welfare, and on settling in 
 Pennsylvania pursued the same kind treatment towards 
 those they acquired by purchase from the merchants, 
 who traded thither with cargoes of these human beings 
 from Africa. Thus the race of bondsmen which grew 
 up in an otherwise free country, were so well cared 
 for that Watson in his Annals affirms of them that "in 
 contrast to others, those of Philadelphia were a happier 
 class of people than the free blacks." 
 
 The earliest protest against this system came from 
 some German Friends settled near Philadelphia, who 
 in 1688 addressed their Monthly Meeting in an earnest 
 appeal, claiming equal rights of hody^ as well as con- 
 science, for all peaceably conducted inhabitants of the 
 State, whatever might be their colour or race.* Their 
 views were in advance of their time, even among 
 Friends. The Monthly Meeting when thus addressed, 
 thought it " too weighty a subject for them to meddle 
 with," and likewise the Quarterly, to which it was 
 next referred, and the Yearly on its consideration 
 "felt it had so general a relation to many other parts 
 that they forbore at that present to give positive judg- 
 ment in the case" — for as Whittier observes in his 
 
 *A facsimile of this earliest appeal — ^the original of which 
 was discovered a few years since — may be seen in the Gallery of 
 the London Friends' Institute, with the signatures of Pastorius 
 and others. 
 
198 
 
 THE FRIE^•D3. 
 
 lines on Pastorius, who was a leading member of thia 
 little group of freedom's advocates : 
 
 Wealth and station had their sanction lent 
 To hardened avarice on its gains intent, 
 But still these tender hearts their burden bore, 
 In warning message to the Church's door. 
 
 And there the leaven of humanity and justice 
 worked, though but slowly as it must be confessed, 
 for it was not until forty years afterwards that 
 Yearly Meetings in London and America concurred in 
 condemning the practice of importing negroes from 
 their native country, and directed that those already in 
 possession "should be trained up in the principles of 
 the Christian religion." Within another half-century, 
 however, all Friends were become clear both in England 
 and America, not only of trafficking in, but also of 
 holding slaves, and none, moreover, were allowed to 
 remain members who did not on giving these poor 
 creatures their freedom make some remunerative pro- 
 vision for their future. 
 
 It is impossible to look upon these eflEorts of the 
 Society to be freed of having any share in claiming "a 
 property in the human race as if they were beasts who 
 perish," without attention being drawn to three 
 American citizens, of widely different stamp, yet each 
 in his way largely instrumental in rousing this 
 crusade against Slavery. Of this trio Benjamin Lay's 
 share was marked by eccentricity, Anthony Benezet's 
 by a Frenchman's fervour, and John "Woolman's with 
 saintly persistence, to each of whom some personal 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 199 
 
 allusions may be admitted. Of BenjaminLay (who, to be 
 clear of the gains of oppression, lived hermit-like in a 
 cave) Whittier remarks, " his appearance was in keep- 
 ing with his eccentric life. A figure only four feet 
 and a half high, hunch-backed, with projecting chest, 
 legs small and arms longer than his legs, a huge head, 
 showing beneath an enormous white hat, large solemn 
 eyes and a prominent nose ; the rest of his face covered 
 with a snowy semi-circle of beard falling low on his 
 breast." Such was the little man, who, as an " irre- 
 pressible prophet, troubled the Israel of slave-holding 
 Friends." 
 
 A former residence in the West Indies had 
 wrought in him this horror of a system that he grieved 
 to see taking root in the free soil of Pennsylvania, and 
 no protest could, in his opinion, be too vehement in 
 its condemnation. He would accordingly waylay con- 
 gregations, coming from their .places of worship, to 
 harangue them on its iniquity — and close his violent 
 denunciations by sword thrusts into a bladder at his 
 side, which, charged with red fluid, sent it streaming 
 amongst them as witness to their blood-guiltiness 
 towards the poor slaves. His evident sincerity of pur- 
 pose had no doubt its effect, and when told on his 
 death-bed, at an advanced age, that Friends had at last, 
 when assembled in the Yearly Meeting of 1758, resolved 
 to rid themselves of any further share in this system, he 
 exclaimed, " Thanksgiving and praise be rendered unto 
 the Lord God, I can now die in peace." 
 
 Anthony Benezet, who was one of the Frenchmen 
 
200 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 settled in Philadelphia, united learning and judgment 
 with the vivacity of his race, that made him influential 
 not only in personal advocacy, but also by his 
 published works and through his large correspon- 
 dence in awakening minds both in England and 
 America, to the sin of holding fellow men in bonds, 
 "and living in ease and plenty by the toil of those 
 whom violence and cruelty have put out of power 
 to help themselves." Granville Sharp considered one 
 of his works to have had much influence on public 
 opinion, in supporting Lord Mansfield's famous decision 
 of 1772, that "so soon as a Slave sets foot on English 
 soil his freedom is assured." 
 
 "Slaves" — exclaimed the Poet of Olney — "cannot 
 breathe in England, if their lungs imbibe our air that 
 moment they are free. They touch our Country and 
 their shackles fall." 
 
 Of John "Woolman, language cannot adequately 
 describe the deep sense of saintliness and worth, 
 which a perusal of the published Journal of his life's 
 labours produces. Humble as he was in his circum- 
 stances, being only a small tradesman and law writer, 
 he travelled far and oft on gospel service intent ; ever 
 an unflinching advocate for equal rights to all 
 humanity. In the course of this disinterested labour 
 he came to England, where to the great grief of his 
 friends, he died soon after arrival at York, in 
 1772. The Journal published after his decease is what 
 Charles Lamb advises "all to get by heart and love tlie 
 early Friends." May it not further be added, love 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 201 
 
 also what he and they have done for the slave. 
 
 Friends' consciences having been cleared both in 
 England and America, first of dealing in or importing 
 negroes, and also, by 1782, of having any members, who 
 continued to hold slaves, they were prepared for that 
 Anti-Slavery Crusade, in which from first to last their 
 presence was so effectively conspicuous. Like many 
 another great effort it had but a small commencement. 
 The formation of an Association for the Abolition of 
 Negro Slavery was made, it is said, at the instance of 
 William Diilwyn, a Friend from America, who with 
 eleven others met in the parlour of a Friend publisher's, 
 and chose as their chairman Granville Sharp, who 
 with Thomas Clarkson and one other, were the only 
 individuals comjiosing that little group that were not 
 Friends, In 1787 this struggle in the cause of the 
 Slave began, and not till 1834 were the British 
 dominions made wholly free to all men. 
 
 Strange alternation of hope and disappointment 
 marked those fifty years of abolition contest, which took 
 deeper hold of the National mind and conscience after 
 each successive defeat, that self interested parties secured 
 for it in the Legislature, until at last twenty millions 
 sterling were willingly devoted in compensation to 
 slave-holders for the Nation to be freed of their bonds- 
 men. 
 
 The Slave Trade had been declared illegal as 
 piracy thirty years before, but only by efforts of an 
 intensely sustained character, had that national senti- 
 ment of injustice and wrong been formed, that swept 
 
202 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 all slavery away from British dominion before its 
 irresistible current. 
 
 Whilst the public mind associates the great names 
 of a Wilberforce, a Clarkson, and a Buxton, with this 
 success, none more than they knew what was due to 
 the Society of Friends, who everywhere had supported 
 them in their laborious and prolonged contest. Clark- 
 son, in his work on the subject, has earnestly expressed 
 " what we have been compelled to prove to others by a 
 long chain of evidence, that negroes have the same 
 feelings and capacities as ourselves, and that they ought 
 to be considered as persons ransomed by one and the 
 same Saviour, and as visited by the same light for 
 salvation." 
 
 If space permitted many an excellent Address might 
 be quoted, which the Yearly Meeting had issued to 
 encourage its members in perseverance, through times 
 when it seemed hoping against hope to look for success, 
 each based on the recognition of equality of man- 
 kind in the sight of their Creator and Redeemer. 
 
 It now desired that all Nations might become like 
 the British, free from what it described as so " mani- 
 fold an atrocity, that we think even the history of 
 the whole world does not furnish a parallel to its 
 crime " — one which — " we deem it scarcely possible for 
 a man of the most comprehensive mind fully to possess 
 himself of the extent of the evil." Such are expressions 
 to be found in a long and fervent appeal issued by the 
 London Yearly Meeting of 1849, which through its 
 Committee it proceeded to lay before Rulers and States- 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 203 
 
 men on the continent of Europe, and then in a similar 
 manner to gain for it attention from the Governors of 
 the American States. In this arduous service of several 
 years' duration, William Forster had a leading share. 
 
 It took him to Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Holland, 
 Belgium, France, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, 
 Bavaria, Italy and Spain, In nearly all cases he and his 
 companions succeeded in obtaining interviews with 
 kings, emperors, statesmen, and officials, and copies of 
 the Address thus presented were largely circulated in 
 those countries. After four years thus spent, William 
 Forster with three companions proceeded in 1853 to 
 North America, where interviews were had with the 
 President, and also the Governors of most of the States, 
 until, when the service of love was near upon its con- 
 clusion, he was laid to his rest — at three score and ten 
 — in far otf Tennessee. 
 
 Beneath that massive form a heart was bleeding 
 
 For all earth's woe ; 
 'Till the strained tension burst the clay-built dwelling, 
 
 And laid it low. 
 
 M. E. Beck. 
 
 He sought not glory, but he found 
 
 A glorious death at last ; 
 When on the slavers' blighted ground, 
 
 He sank beneath the blast. 
 
 Anna Gurney. 
 His brother Josiah, William Holmes, and John 
 Candler, who had been united with him in this arduous 
 service, were able to complete it by having interviews 
 with the Governors of the few remaining States, not 
 previously visited, before returning to England. 
 
204 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 In the midyt of such general zeal amongst the 
 Friends in the anti-slavery cause, it may seem'invidious 
 to mention individual eiforts, but it should not be for- 
 gotten how a Joseph Sturge, Thomas Harvey, George 
 \Villiam Alexander, and several others were at the pains 
 of travelling on various occasions to the West Indies 
 that they might testify of what they themselves had 
 seen of the evils they laboured to remove. Kor how 
 William Allen journeyed to Paris and Verona, atten- 
 dant on the Congresses assembled there to settle the 
 peace of Europe, and by his influence with the 
 Duke of Wellington, gained opportunities to plead with 
 some success the Negro's cause. Nor amidst the host 
 of advocates it elicited in our own Land, should be left 
 unnoticed the manner in which a Samuel Bowly could, 
 •without any oratorical training, confront and confound 
 in speeches of three hours' length, a practised advocate 
 of the West India interests before vast audiences in 
 Exeter Hall, and by his forcible and pathetic appeals 
 rouse in them a generous and contagious enthusia.sm, 
 greatly assistant to a national desire for the slaves' 
 emancipation. 
 
 Reverting to America it will be found that the 
 Northern States followed the example of Pennsylvania 
 in abolishing Slavery, but out of the thirteen then com- 
 posing the Union, seven of those in the South cherished 
 it as an institution indisjjensable to their welfare, and 
 many Friends resident amongst them, in order to be free 
 from its participation, moved off into the new settlements 
 of the far west, where they are to be found amongst the 
 
JOSEPH STURGF.. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 205 
 
 most enterprising and successful of its populations. 
 
 Events connected with the extinction of Slavery 
 throughout the vast American nation, are too recent to 
 need mention here, save to observe that the sea of blood- 
 shed -which ultimately swept it away might have been 
 avoided, if the Rulers and people would have given 
 effect to the earnest remonstrances, addressed them 
 from time to time, by earnest philanthropists of every 
 shade of opinion, but by none more persistently than 
 the Friends. " Is it not just and reasonable," they had 
 asked, " to fear, if the gentle language of His Spirit 
 ' Let this people go ' is not attended to, that He will, by 
 terrible things in righteousness, evince His sovereignty 
 and sustain the character of a God of Justice, Who is 
 no respecter of persons." 
 
 So deaf an ear was turned to these and similar 
 appeals, that when Spurgeon devoted one of his sermons 
 to the cause of Emancipation it had the effect of stop- 
 ping the sale of his Works, that had had till then an 
 enormous American circulation. " Uncle Tom's Cabin " 
 succeeded better, as its beneficial influence pervaded 
 countries both old and new. 
 
 It is satisfactory to learn — according to recent 
 testimony — that those who are able to look back upon 
 the old days of slave-owning, with all its cares and 
 responsibilities, and who have since had experience of 
 free labour, would not, if they could, restore the old 
 order of things, for wages are found to be the most 
 effective incentive to industry ; and the actual cost of 
 free labour is proved to be less than was that of slavery. 
 
206 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Such was Tvhat the friends of the Negro always main- 
 tained would be the result of his emancipation, whilst 
 its opponents were declaring he was but an animal 
 that would only work under fear of the lash. 
 
 Note. — It will be obvious tbat no attempt has been made to 
 review the general aspect of the great Anti-slavery movement, 
 but only to note some aspects of the important share Friends 
 had in effecting the freedom of the Slave. 
 
 They felt from the first he was entitled as a fellow creature 
 to their moral and religious care which developed into so strong 
 a conviction of the injustice of " Man holding property in Man," 
 tliat they cleared themselves of any participation in Slavery ; 
 r.nd so soon as this was the case their energies became success- 
 fully devoted to the cause of universal freedom. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 TREATMENT OF THE INSANE. 
 MONG efforts made by Friends for mankind's im- 
 
 provement, those on behalf of the Insane deserve 
 mention, on account of their success having had much 
 influence, in producing the generally kind and scientilic 
 treatment, now accorded to such as are mentally 
 aflBicted. 
 
 These it had been the custom to treat as prisoners, 
 rather than invalids, from the belief that their state was 
 more akin to a demoniacal possession than suffering 
 from curable disease. This popular conception of the 
 complaint made their places of confinement, with their 
 small and strongly barred windows, to resemble jails 
 rather than hospitals, and the more violent cases were 
 loaded with irons, or sought to be subdued by corporal 
 chastisement — many were chained as for life like wild 
 beasts, had only straw for bedding, and were dealt with as 
 those hopelessly lost to all claims on humane treatment. 
 
 Under circumstances of this kind. Friends in York 
 had had their sympathies aroused by the loss of one 
 of their members in 1791, within a few weeks after 
 her admission to the County Asylum, where none of 
 her relatives had been allowed to visit her. The 
 question raised itself in their minds, whether such 
 mejital afflictions could not be treated with the same 
 
208 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 judgment and tenderness as those of the body, instead 
 of the barbarous methods then in practice, "far more 
 calculated to depress and degrade than to awaken the 
 slumbering reason or correct its wild hallucinations." 
 
 Animated by thesesentiments,WilIiamTuke, '(a born 
 leader of men) induced his York Friends to unite with 
 him in an appeal to the whole Society, for the establish- 
 ment of an Institution of its own, where the experiment 
 of a kind and curative treatment might be made. 
 
 It obtained a sufficient response, in shareholders 
 and contributors, to enable the purchase of an Estate in the 
 neighbourhood of York, and the erection of premises, 
 to which was given the more agreeable name of a 
 " Retreat," which its home-like appearance in pleasantly 
 arranged grounds well supported. 
 
 Here by the adoption of a system of classification, 
 it was possible to apply varied treatment to the different 
 nature of the cases, all of whom were under a kind 
 resident physician's care as his patients, rather than 
 prisoners. Their sleeping and day apartments were 
 well lighted by, to all appearance, ordinary sash windows 
 instead of grated openings, although little as the patients 
 might know it so far as look was concerned, the sash 
 bars were not wood but iron in their strength ; a 
 fact which few probably tested, for the absence of 
 apparent iron bars produced a quieting effect on their 
 minds. 
 
 ° "In person," writes a coDtcmporary of William Tuke "ho 
 hardly reached the middle size, but was erect, portly, and of a 
 fine step. He had a noble forehead, an eaf^le eye, and a com- 
 manding voice, and his mien was dignified and patriarchal." 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 209 
 
 Cases of cure quickly followed on these humane 
 arrangements, which, in consequence, began to attract 
 the attention of the Medical profession and the Public 
 generally. 
 
 Similar but independent changes were being made 
 about the same time in France, where Pinel, a bene- 
 volent physician, succeeded in obtaining control over 
 one of the largest of the madhouses in Paris, and to the 
 astonishment of the Faculty, liberated successfully 
 some fifty cases, till then thought so dangerous as to 
 have been kept heavily chained for many years. Some 
 of them had even murdered their keepers in spasms of 
 raging madness, but now with regained reason went 
 out after awhile, freed from the dense mental darkness 
 or fury that had so long afflicted them. One of the 
 worst of these, it is interesting to find, was the means 
 of saving Pinel's life, by rescuing him from a mob that, 
 in the time of the French Revolution, was hurrying 
 him to death, till this man rushed in and successfully 
 pleaded his cause. 
 
 One of William Tuke's grandsons, largely endowed 
 with his ancestor's gifts, summarised in an able work 
 published in 1813, what had been the results of this 
 new method of treating the Insane, as shewn by ex- 
 perience gained in the Retreat during some 15 years, 
 which, together with these Foreign instances, so much 
 interested the medical profession and local authorities, 
 as to gradually work that entire change in the treat- 
 ment of those mentally afflicted, which now happily 
 prevails. 
 
210 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Besides the good effect of this publication, Samuel 
 Tuke was incidentally the means of influencing the 
 arrangements adopted in the large pauper Asylum at 
 Hanwell, which was one of the earliest erected on the 
 system now generally adopted. The young Friend 
 whose design proved successful among those sent in 
 by architects in the competition for this great building, 
 drew his inspiration from having paid Samuel Tuke a 
 visit at York, for it was his advice and information that 
 led him to cast aside what he had already prepared, 
 and work out afresh those designs which, as it proved 
 were adopted by the Magistrates from amongst the large 
 number sent in to them, by members of the architectural 
 profession, for their choice. 
 
 The Retreat has in this year 1892 completed its 
 centenary, and at a gathering held on the occasion Dr. 
 Clouston, as President of the Medical Psychological 
 Association, said " the system there adopted had been 
 the key-note, the example to every succeeding hospital 
 in the country. There was no doubt that York was 
 the very Mecca of the mental physician," and if so, it 
 may be asked, was not William Tuke its Prophet ? 
 
 Note. — It should be borne in mind that Dr. Conolly, of the 
 Hanwell Asylum was the first to apply the system so thoroughly 
 as to abolish the use of all methods of physical restraint, and rely 
 on constant supervision, constant kindness, and firmness alone. 
 He became a great authority on the construction of our county 
 asylums and their management, and he bore his testimony that to 
 the works of Pinel and Samuel Tuke " society was indebted for 
 nearly all these improvements." 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 TESTIMONY AGAINST ALL WAR. 
 
 " Are Friends faithful in our testimony against bearing arms, 
 and being in any manner concerned in the militia, in privateers, 
 letters of marque, or armed vessels, or dealing in prize goods?" — 
 Query as formerly. " Are you faitliful in maintaining our 
 Christian testimony against all war, as inconsistent with the 
 precepts and spirit of the Gospel"? — Query as now in " Christian 
 Discipline." 
 
 rriHE uniform testimony borne by Friends as a Society 
 from their beginning, against any participation 
 in War of all kinds, whetiier offensive or defensive, 
 deserves fuller mention than the allusions hitherto 
 made, from its having been so diverse to the views 
 held on this subject, by most, if not all other religious 
 communities. 
 
 Wars and rumours of wars abounded when their 
 voice was first raised against the military system that 
 had made of Europe one great battle-field, and reddened 
 many a fair landscape in England, through hard fought 
 contests in a civil war. Against such scenes of strife 
 the ministers of various forms of religion were so far 
 from protesting, as to have themselves taken a share in 
 them. 
 
 France had seen a Cardinal Richelieu accouti ed 
 with a cuirass, riding at the head of royal armies. 
 Huguenot preachers carried swords as well as Bibles, 
 
212 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 and made no reserve in using the one with the assumed 
 sanction of the other ; nor were Puritan ministers loth 
 to regard the two-edged sword of scripture, as indicative 
 of the permitted use of a carnal as well as a spiritual 
 weapon, and colonels and captains in parliamentary 
 forces were not at that time thought out of place in a 
 pulpit. It was a divinitj' reader of Calvinistic per- 
 suasion who wrote " That it is lawful to defend religion 
 by force of arms, not only against the assaults of such 
 foreign nations as have no jurisdictixsn over us, but 
 also against any part of the same commonwealth which 
 doth endeavour to subvert it." 
 
 Remembering the high sanction thus given to war, 
 it is easier to understand how authorities at Derby 
 should have felt no inconsistency in offering liberty to 
 the young preacher they had imprisoned, if he would 
 but officer one of the troops they had raised for the 
 Commonwealth's defence. Thus can we also the better 
 appreciate those deeper views of human conduct be- 
 gotten in George Fox, that led him to choose a continu- 
 ance in outward bonds, to wounding by the war spirit 
 that love he felt towards all. Not that he enforced this 
 abstinence on others as any outward obligation, but 
 desired to see it arise as resulting from that inward 
 work of the Lord's Spirit on the heart, which had 
 led him in this emergency to resolve " that he could 
 not fight against any, because he had love towards all 
 men." 
 
 To him " Love your enemies " was not so much a 
 command as a result of conscious union in Spirit with 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 213 
 
 Him, Who in love had laid down His life for all men. 
 
 Thus on an occasion when, asked by a convert of 
 gentlemanly birth, whether in becoming a Friend the 
 continuance in wearing a sword, then so general a 
 pi-actice, would bo thought inconsistent, George Fox 
 replied " Wear it as long as thou canst." 
 
 William Penn, though trained at foreign courts to 
 a skilled use of weapons, and the son of a famous 
 Admiral, carried these views, as already shown, into 
 such successful and extensive practice, as to have settled 
 a Colony of thousands of his Friends, like minded with 
 himself, amidst savages passionately addicted to war, 
 without any of the ordinary methods of warlike 
 defence ; he built no Forts in Pennsylvania nor relied 
 for protection, like the Founders of other American 
 settlements, on gunpowder and cannon, and whilst 
 other neighbouring settlements had frequent and 
 sanguinary Indian wars, none sucTi ever visited the soil 
 of Pennsylvania, during the seventy years that the 
 followers of William Penn controlled its government. 
 Once, it is said, in days when they had lost this control 
 and a different policy had led to Indian complications, 
 a party of these dusky warriors came down on a Friends' 
 meeting, breathing fire and slaughter, but over-awed at 
 the sight of such peaceful solemnity, put aside their 
 weapons and their fury, and sat out the meeting as 
 worshippers themselves. 
 
 " These Indian chiefs with battle bows unstrung, 
 Strong, hero-limbed, like those whom Homer aung."' 
 
 Friends' influence with Indians has been shown in 
 
214 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 many ways — and their missionary efforts amongst them 
 are at the present time some of the most successful. 
 Not a few have become members of the Society, and 
 several have proved themselves acceptable ministers of 
 the gospel. Xot a very long while back when two Tribes 
 were at deadly feud with one another through mutual 
 reprisals, a party of Friends hearing a battle was 
 imminent, advanced to meet one of these, and found 
 them gathered and painted for the contest, but by dis- 
 course and prayer in a solemn assembly induced them 
 to return, although it was believed at the time their 
 enemies had set out to attack them, and so they had — 
 not once but twice started with such intent — and yet 
 had gone back. Why ? let those who can believe and 
 trust in the Lord of Peace, determine for themselves. 
 
 Friends in Ireland of various times were in the 
 difficult position of living in a country where, without 
 any Official influence, they were exposed to all the re- 
 sults of its unhappy condition as the theatre of war, yet 
 true to their principles they neither sought protection 
 from either of the contending armies, nor attempted to 
 defend themselves by use of weapons from the ruffianly 
 bands that roved unchecked through the land, and 
 amidst the spoil of goods and property, and perils by 
 night and day to themselves and their families, none of 
 them, as we have already seen, lost their lives through- 
 out these times of long continued bloodshed and 
 horrible murders. 
 
 The English Friends, though spared from scenes of 
 actual warfare, have, nevertheless, had to suffer in 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 215 
 
 various ways from time to time in the maintenance of 
 their peace principles, especially when any want of 
 sharing in warlike preparations seemed to lay them 
 open to a charge of disloyalty, or lack of patriotism. 
 Such was the public feeling towards them during the 
 rebellion of 1745, until they found means to give some 
 lielp in a manner which involved no sanction to war, 
 yet showed a Christian love for the soldiers. Friends 
 discovered these were being sent northward, during an 
 inclement winter season, without any warm clothing 
 under their regimentals, which serious deficiency they 
 proceeded to remedy at their own cost, by furnishing 
 every soldier with a flannel waistcoat. It was the 
 saving, no doubt, of many a life, whilst it assured their 
 detractors that an abstention from warlike proceedings 
 had not arisen through lack of loyalty, or want of 
 patriotism, but solely from a religious conviction of the 
 unlawfulness of war to a Christian.' 
 
 Again, amidst the country's preparations for armed 
 defence against Napoleon's threatened invasion. Friends 
 as a Society remained firm in a conscientious refusal 
 to join or subscribe for the Volunteer forces then being 
 raised ; and preferred, as we have shown, to suffer the 
 secession of very many of their wealthier members — 
 who were not sharers in these views— a loss the com- 
 munity long felt in its diminished social position, but 
 it demonstrated afresh the firmness of its adhesion to 
 this view of Gospel truth. And here also in this 
 national emergency they prepared themselves to serve 
 — if war had broken out — on ambulance corps or in 
 
216 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 hospitals, whilst those at the expected scenes of in- 
 vasion, were enrolled as caretakers over women and 
 children, in case of their flight to a place of safety. 
 
 This abstinence from warlike proceedings had its 
 accompaniment in a refusal to unite in any public re- 
 joicings over victories gained in battle by land or sea, 
 and at much risk to property from excited mobs their 
 houses showed no lights amid general illuminations ; 
 yet the well-known benevolence of their owners oft 
 spared them from the smashings of glass which few 
 others escaped who had not lights in their windows. 
 
 The Crimean War of 1854 was another season of 
 public excitement,when obloquy fell on all who could 
 not approve of this sanguinary effort to check Russia's 
 designs on the East. In the hope of preventing its 
 outbreak, three leading Friends undertook that long 
 and toilsome journey all the way to St. Petersburg, to 
 interview the Czar himself and predispose him to 
 peace. Although the hopes awakened by his favour- 
 able reception of them, vanished as he learnt the 
 furiously warlike tone of the English press, yet this 
 loving effort of Joseph Sturge, Robert Charleton, and 
 Henry Pease has borne more fruit than might — from 
 its failure at the time — have been expected. Public 
 attention has become aroused to adopt means for the 
 avoidance of war, as so happily shown by the substi- 
 tution of Arbitration, in various critical cases of national 
 disputes that have subsequently occurred. 
 
 The solicitude of Friends to make restitution in 
 cases where, unauthorised by themselves, their agents 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 217 
 
 may have inflicted loss on others during times of -war, 
 has had several interesting illustrations. One was that 
 of the Fox family of shipowners at Falmouth, who had 
 advertised in France for any who might have been 
 losers from the capture of a vessel by one of their own 
 captains, against his instructions, which so impressed 
 some Frenchmen in the South of France, as to lead to 
 a correspondence that resulted in the formation of a 
 Community, in religious, fellowship with English 
 Friends, that lasts to this day, and has furnished several 
 bright examples of religiously peaceable fellow- 
 members. 
 
 Another was from an equally unauthorised capture 
 of a Dutch vessel by an English one, in which a 
 London Friend was part owner, and in this case long 
 continued continental wars delayed any attempt at 
 restitution, but the money the Friend had received as 
 his share in the prize was kept so -well invested that, 
 when at last all sufferers who could be found were paid 
 with interest up to date, a balance still remained which 
 became applied, at the suggestion of a Dutch Friend, to 
 the establishment of a free Infant School in Amsterdam, 
 which was the port from whence the captured ship had 
 sailed. It was the earliest school of the kind there, 
 and for nearly a century has it pursued its useful 
 course in a building named the "Holland's "Welfare," 
 which it deserves, not only as having been that of the 
 captured vessel, but also through its past and present 
 benefits to the little ones in a poor quarter of the chief 
 city of that country. 
 
218 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Cases of individual adherence to peace principles 
 at the loss of profit to themselves, are numerous both 
 in England and America, two of which may receive 
 allusion — one of them being William Allen, who as a 
 manufacturing chemist, courteously declined the ad- 
 vantageous offer, Alexander of Russia made him, of the 
 exclusive purveyorship of medicines for the Russian 
 Army ; another is that of F. T. King, of Baltimore, 
 who had concluded a good bargain for disposal of some 
 unsaleable goods, but when the would-be customer 
 happened to remark that they would answer his pur- 
 pose for an Army Contract connected with the Mexican 
 War, " Then," said Francis King, " there's no bargaiii 
 between us, for no goods of mine, however much I 
 may want to be rid of them, shall, knowingly, go to- 
 wards what, as war, is contrary to my conscientious 
 convictions." 
 
 Of German Friends various cases could be men- 
 tioned, of those who preferred to suffer whatever could 
 be inflicted of cruel imprisonment rather than violate 
 their conscientious scruples by learning military drill ; 
 but here, as in France, these penalties have been chiefly 
 avoided by the emigration of the young men Friends 
 to avoid conscription, which is a chief cause of the 
 great reduction of the Society in these countries. 
 
 The comparatively recent conflict between North 
 and South in America, brought Friends, as might be 
 expected, to a practical test of their anti-war principles. 
 In the Northern States, several of those in high positions 
 were either connected with the Society by descent, or 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 219 
 
 were too -well acquainted with the conscientious 
 character of its objections, to press for any other 
 assistance than what was willingly rendered in hos- 
 pital and ambulance service, and the more the public 
 felt that the war's existence arose from opposition to 
 Slavery, the less could they charge Friends with want 
 of patriotism, who they knew had always protested 
 against this as an iniquitous system. In the South it 
 was different, yet the Friends there proved even firmer 
 in the maintenance of peace principles than those of 
 the North, where, as in England, some of the wealthier 
 sort gave way, and some of their young men served in 
 the ranks. Down South there were remarkable pre- 
 servations. Whole villages of Friends were left un- 
 molested in the midst of desolations, and just as the 
 armies of Grant and Lee would have closed in deadly 
 struggle over lands studded with Friends' hamlets, 
 there came the Surrender and the final Peace. 
 
 As the strife had deepened, the South called every 
 available youth to their ranks, and some of the young 
 Friend farmers found their refusal to bear arms in- 
 volved cruelties, of which one case cannot be passed 
 without notice. The musket was strapped to a firmly 
 resisting youth, and he was kept walking by prick • of 
 bayonet till he dropped from fatigue. Much else av; a 
 tried to make of him a soldier, but all in vain, and a 
 court-martial condemned him to be shot. As he was 
 walked to the fatal spot, the firing party heard him say 
 with pious resignation, " Father, forgive them, for they 
 know not what they do," and when the officer gave the 
 
220 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 word, not a man would pull the trigger. Enraged at 
 -heir refusal he rode at the youth, floored him with a 
 blow from the flat of his sword, and tried to make his 
 horse finish the affair by trampling on him. But the 
 animal jumped hither and thither without touching the 
 prostrate form, and whilst he was thus urging his 
 charger the trumpet sounded for what proved the 
 sanguinary battle of Gettysburg, and that officer was 
 one of the first who fell. The Friend became a 
 prisoner of war to the Northern army, was recognised 
 as having been a non-combatant, and released. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 IXDUSTEIAL, COMMERCIAL, AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE. 
 
 "Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, inmeteyard, in 
 weight, or in measure. Just balances, just weights, a just ephah. 
 and a just hin shall ye have." — Lev. xix. 36. 
 
 rnHE necessary prominence given in any history of 
 Friends to incessant and far extended labours of 
 their first missionary preachers, should never cause 
 forgetf ulness of the characteristic quietness and indus- 
 try in outward callings, of those gathered by them to 
 depend for spiritual comfort in waiting upon the One 
 true Comforter of souls. 
 
 The fiercest persecution and most brutal treatment 
 produced, as we have seen, no resistance — and when 
 impounded like cattle in the County Gaols — those 
 who were handicraftsmen worked diligently at their 
 trades, and others like Samuel Bownas — though so 
 eminent as a preacher — learnt as he did, to make shoes 
 for their support during a long imprisonment. 
 
 So soon therefore as wiser counsels in Government 
 put an end to this harass of tender consciences, there 
 flowed into Trade and Commerce a stream of active, 
 intelligent and conscientious workers, anxious, above 
 all thoughts of gain, that strict integrity should be 
 observed in business dealings with their fellow men. 
 
 It was chiefly in the conduct of business affairs 
 
 '.) 
 
222 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 such conld be shown, as all avenues to Civic or 
 Government office remained closed in times such as 
 these, w hen by the Test and Corporation Acts, no Non- 
 conformist could be associated with any Corporation, 
 and all Government employments, even to those of a 
 country postmaster, were confined to such as would 
 take the Sacramental Bread and Wine according to the 
 Church of England. 
 
 Only by slow stages after the passing of the 
 Reform Bill have these social barriers been removed, 
 and only in recent years have University gates been 
 forced, so as to make educational honours at Cambridge 
 and Oxford open to all. Whilst such religious boj-- 
 cotting lasted, it had the inevitable tendency to direct 
 into the busy walks of Trade and Manufacture, a 
 superior class of mind that might not otherwise have 
 turned to them. 
 
 Another circumstance which contributed at this 
 period to swell the industrial life of our Towns, was the 
 large number of young and vigourous yeomanry, who 
 found that Friends' conscientious objection to tithes 
 made land-owners, under clerical influence, less willing 
 to grant fresh tenure of farms, although their parents 
 might be still holding under them, as were their 
 ancestors for many previous generations. 
 
 To this stream of active industrial life the Friend 
 brought enterprise and intelligence, and also a strict 
 integrity, shown by his avoiding the practice then 
 common of bargaining with every fresh customer, and 
 having, instead, a fixed price for his Avares. Also in a 
 
AMELIA OPIE. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 223 
 
 care that all goods sold in bulk were fully up to 
 quality of samples, thus making trade an honourable 
 and not a cozening pursuit. He conducted it also with 
 an enterprise, conspicuous among many other ways, by 
 his travelling for custom in a manner which is said to 
 have anticipated, if it did not originate, the fraternity 
 of commercial travellers. 
 
 Whilst diligent in business, a fervency of spirit 
 marked his conduct that best things might be kept 
 uppermost. His shop would be closed during busy 
 hours, to attend his mid-week meeting, and his time 
 would be freely given to his Monthly and Quarterly 
 Assembly, to serve on Committees and occasionally to 
 go up to London for the Yearly gathering. 
 
 Such conduct, though in a worldly view little 
 likely to ensure success, led nevertheless to that confi- 
 dence of customers and neighbours, which made 
 Friends' establishments generally rank among the most 
 prosperous in the cities and towns ; even to becomiDg 
 transformed from traders and shopkeepers into the 
 Bankers of the place. This is the origin of many a 
 leading and wealthy financial firm of the present day. 
 Neighbours, in times when banking facilities were little 
 known in provincial towns, would entrust these con- 
 scientious ones with their savings, or look to them for 
 some temporary loan, until such transactions in their 
 volume became the chief business of those, who had 
 thus carried their religion over and yet into all their 
 commercial operations. 
 
 Whilst some were thus transformed in character, 
 
224 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 others became enlarged in reputation ; such for example 
 raised the chemical firms of Allen and Hanbury, or 
 Corbyns, or of J. Bell & Son, as safe to be trusted at a 
 time when much careless dispensing of drugs prevailed. 
 Thus also the chemical factories of the Howards, the 
 originals of which concerns were Friends of a high 
 order of mind, eminent in their day not only as trades- 
 men, but as Ministers or Elders in the Society they 
 loved so dearly and served so well. 
 
 The Queen still has her damasks and table-linen 
 from a firm commenced by a Friend so particular in 
 having his goods up to quality that if in any fine 
 cambrics he had sold, the slightest flaw had been 
 found, he would change it with a " thank thee " for 
 having had his attention drawn to it. Industries of 
 all kinds prospered in their hands : the calicoes of a 
 Hoyle commanded the market, and the hats of a 
 Christy. Their cotton and weaving factories increased 
 in number, volume, and success, under generations of 
 Ashworths, Brights, Crewdsons, Priestmans, and a host 
 of others in Manchester, Liverpool, Bradford, Birming- 
 ham, or other provincial towns. 
 
 Friends have made themselves especially con- 
 spicuous in the tea and cocoa trades, and matches, 
 biscuits, starch, phosphorous powder blue, and various 
 other articles of food or daily use have become, under 
 their financial skill, the basis of gigantic commercial 
 undertakings. 
 
 The modern system of lacquering brasswork was 
 long in the hands of a trio of brother Friends ; Sterrys 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 225 
 
 and Sturges were largely in the oil trade, and with 
 Bome families of these was the manufacture of the only 
 wax candles that would bux'n without snuffing. 
 
 Some of the largest silversmiths, such as the Gold- 
 smith's Alliance, have had a similar origin. For clocks 
 Friend " Quare " had in the days William the Third 
 a high reputation, and modern times have recognised 
 the ingenuity of an Ogden or a Simmons in the samo 
 horological department. 
 
 On the Stock Exchange, in the Corn Market, in 
 Lloyds Marine, many have become prominent, of which 
 the Harris family in Mark Lane, Fester and Braithwaito 
 at Capel Court, or Jansons at Lloyds, may be taken as 
 typical instances. They have been some of the earliest 
 promoters of provincial and urban gas and water com- 
 panies, and have made efficient members of Boar?!s 
 of Health, and in conduct of local sanitary affairs or 
 improvements. In Insurance they have a life office oi 
 their own, which, under the name of the Fi-iends' Pro- 
 vident Institution, enjoys an exceptional reputation 
 for successful management. 
 
 Very early was a spirit of enterprise observable 
 amongst them as builders of ships, and opsners up of 
 trade especially from northern ports. It was a Friend 
 shipowner of Whitby, who first fostered the genius of 
 Captain Cook, who never after would sail on his 
 adventurous voyages in any vessel that had not 
 come from his Friend " Walker's" Whitby shipyard, 
 and a Friend Lucas was one of the first to follow 
 up this opening of a new Ocean by despatching whalers 
 
226 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 thither with the results of whose captures in oil he 
 contracted to lighten London's darkness. 
 
 None knew how to provide the farmers with an 
 enduring ploughshare until a blacksmith Friend so 
 made them of " chilled " iron as to lay the first stone 
 of the engineering works of the Ipswich Ransomes, and 
 until Friend Abraham had wrested the secret of casting 
 in iron from the Dutch, England had no such foun- 
 dries as he opened in Coalbrookdale. Nor were our 
 Ijorcelain manufacturers able to compete with foreign 
 rivals until Friend Cookworthy discovered for them 
 the china clay of Cornwall. 
 
 Then in a time when housewives depended on 
 their own home-brewed ale, or their stock of ginger 
 or gooseberry wines, the Friends started establishments 
 with machinery and appliances on scientific principles, 
 learnt, it has been said, from the Dutch, which soon 
 made them known in all cities and towns as maltsters, 
 brewers, and importers, and also as dealers in the pro- 
 duce of foreign vineyards, a trade and manufacture pur- 
 sued with much evidence of what Dr. Johnson called 
 " the potentiality of growing rich," until the pre- 
 valence of total abstinence principles led to their 
 relinquishment. Remembrance now only points to 
 such firms as the Walkers, the Aliens of RatclifT, 
 the Hanburys & Buxtons of Spital fields, or the Bar- 
 clays and Perkins of Southwark, and in like manner 
 conspicuous amongst those thus engaged over England, 
 where also Friends would be found among the more 
 prosperous of local Woolstaplers, Millers, Fellmongers, 
 or workers of Tanneries. 
 
THE FRIENDS 
 
 227 
 
 Commercial Finance is indebted to Friends for 
 originating the modern system of Bill Discounting 
 through an Overend and a Richardson, two North 
 Country lads, who commenced the plan now universally 
 adopted, which, when associated with the Norwich 
 Gurneys, developed under their management into the 
 financial operations of an Overend, Gurney & Co. 
 
 It was a Friend, the Prime Minister of the day 
 selected for an attempt at extricating Indian Finances 
 from their confusion, which task, although it proved 
 too much for the constitution, would probably not have 
 been found beyond the ability of a James Wilson, who 
 lost his life in the toil it cost him. 
 
 The Railway System may almost be said to owe its 
 existence to their enterprise, for Friend Edward Pease 
 was the first to discover, and the most persistent in 
 fostering the railway genius of a George Stevenson ; 
 and, although this is no history of the Rail, it may be 
 permitted to narrate in what way he became acquainted 
 with, and to have such faith in, the future Constructor 
 of Railways. His business was that of a Woolstapler 
 at Darlington, where he had also become a Coal Owner, 
 and, with those thus associated with him, he had con- 
 ceived an idea of having a tramway from the Darlington 
 Pits to the Port of Stockton, some 40 miles distant, and 
 thus save the great charges made for carriage by canal 
 or road. For this purpose they formed a Company, 
 which, although it engaged some of the leading 
 Engineers, had failed in all endeavours for an Act of 
 Parliament. Matters being in this state, h^ was one 
 
228 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 morning disturbed from his writing by an announce- 
 ment that a stranger in his passage wished to see 
 him. This proved to be a tall man of burly appearance 
 in a furry cap with a rough shawl wound around his 
 neck, whose abrupt announcement of his business as 
 having " heard you wants a rail made and I be come 
 to do it," put the dignified courtesy of Edward Pease 
 to no little strain. With a suppressed smile, he sug- 
 gested that, although on the subject of his call he could 
 say nothing to him, he was welcome to some refresh- 
 ment in the kitchen after so long a walk, and thus, 
 would Edward Pease add, I returned to my pen ; but 
 my thoughts failed me ; the thread of the important 
 subject could not be recovered. I felt I must see 
 the stranger again, and into my kitchen I went 
 to find George — for it was none other than he — 
 making a most hearty meal off my bread and cheese, 
 and whilst slice after slice vanished, my talk with 
 him as I sat on the kitchen dresser, convinced me of 
 his being the man we wanted, and my brother directors 
 with whom an appointment was then made were, after 
 their first feelings of surprise, equally assured of the 
 same. Many and racy were the anecdotes Edward 
 Pease would tell of their after experience of George 
 Stephenson's sagacity and honesty, only one of which 
 can be here inserted, as it relates to the birth of the 
 Locomotive. No idea of this was entertained until 
 he had asked them to come and see a fire-horse he had 
 made, which would, he declared, answer better' than 
 the living animals they had intended to depend 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 229 
 
 upon for hauling their coal on the rail. So with a 
 brother director, Edward Pease found himself one 
 morning mounted behind this fiery charger, whilst its 
 Inventor ran alongside poking with a long rod at the 
 furnace bars to keep up steam, and there he acquired 
 such confidence in its future as to provide capital for 
 what became the great engine works of Stephenson 
 and Co., though he would naively add, that at that time 
 it couldn't go as far as George ran " with all his 
 poking." Edward Pease was become fully fifty years 
 old before he thus embarked on that railway enter- 
 prise which, during the more than forty years of his 
 after life, he saw develop to so wonderful an extent. 
 In humbly reviewing his own share in this, he would 
 acknowledge to the feeling that he was working not so 
 much for himself as for his fellow-men, and in solemn 
 tones would add, " in all my opportunities for railway 
 speculation I never sold a share— and in all my great 
 anxieties of Parliamentary contests I never missed 
 attending a mid-week meeting." 
 
 Well might Friends come to have a leading share 
 in fostering Railway undertakings. Well might the 
 first line opened from Stockton to Darlington be called 
 theirs. They were the backbone also of the Liverpool 
 and Manchester line ; it was Friend Ellis of Leicester who 
 started the now great Midland, and it was he who, as 
 its Chairman, gained for it the Bristol and Gloucester 
 by offering it a fixed rate of interest on his own responsi- 
 bility when the possession of this line had to be contested 
 with the Great Western in the " battle of the gauges." 
 
230 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 This master stroke of financial policy eventually 
 settled that predominance of the Narrow over the 
 Broad Guage, which has now worked out the latter's 
 recent extinction. Several Friends, such as his son, 
 Edward Shipley Ellis, and William Hutchinson, have 
 most ably filled the chair of this extensive undertaking, 
 and much does the vast North Eastern system owe to past 
 and present Managers of the same religious fraternity. 
 In the matter of rails. Friend Ransome devised the best 
 form of chair for holding them, and Charles May the 
 compressed oak trenails that pin them to the ties. 
 
 When the lines began working under a cumbrous 
 system of passenger-booking, continued from coaching 
 days, it was Friend Edmundson who devised the present 
 effective system of railway tickets, and likewise in- 
 vented the machine in general use for stamping them, 
 and it is Friend Bradshaw who still enliglitens the 
 Public as to train movements by his Time Tables. 
 
 The Legislative Councils of the Nation have, ever 
 since the passing of the Reform Bill and the acceptance 
 of Affirmation instead of Oath, had members of the 
 Society more or less numerous or prominent amongst 
 them, of whom the father of the present Sir Joseph 
 Pease was the first to take a seat, and John Bright to 
 become eminent as an orator and statesman. 
 
 This influence on daily life, far from being con- 
 fined to its material or industrial advantage, has been 
 felt also in Science, Literature and Art. 
 
 To John Dalton, whose livelihood was gained 
 chiefly as a teacher. Science is indebted for the know- 
 
BENJAMIN WLbl, IKEblDEM OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY. 
 (from the PAINTING BY GILBERT STUART). 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 231 
 
 ledge of the law of atomic proportions, and in Dr. 
 Thomas Young, who came to London when a lad, from 
 a west country home, in the plainest of Friendly attire, 
 there developed a philosopher, renowned not only for 
 his decipherment of hieroglyphics, but for a theory on 
 the subject of Light, that made Helmholtz declare, 
 " The greatest discovery I ever made was that of the 
 genius and writings of Thomas Young. I consider him 
 the greatest man of science that has appeared in the 
 history of this planet." 
 
 The application of an achromatic principle to the 
 lenses of the Microscope, which transformed it from a 
 mere philosophic toy to an instrument of indispensable 
 use to the medical faculty, is due to the sagacity of 
 Joseph Jackson Lister, whose leisure hours from trade 
 were largely devoted to scientific pursuits. 
 
 In medical and surgical practice, such names as 
 those of Doctors Fothergill, Lettsom, Pope, Hodgkin, 
 Peacock, or Wilson Fox as physicians, and Lister, 
 Hutchinson, Beck, or Godlee as surgeons are among the 
 foremost. 
 
 Little as Friends themselves have occasion forcourts 
 of litigation, there are those among them who, like 
 Phillips, Harrison, Hodgkin, Godlee, Braithwaite, have 
 been or are still known as " learned in the law," chiefly 
 as chamber counsel, whilst in a member of the ancient 
 Friend family of Frys, the Society has contributed 
 one of its ablest judges to the High Court of Appeal. 
 
 In Art it has given to the Royal Academy a 
 president in West, and to the Architects one in Water- 
 
232 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 house, whilst others have like Briggs been among its 
 Academicians. 
 
 To the Engineers it has contributed more of 
 workers than originators, yet it was through the 
 hydraulic inventions of the brothers Tangye that 
 Cleopatra's Needle was upraised, and through the skill 
 of a Dixon that it was poised on its pedestal by the 
 banks of the Thames. 
 
 In literature the pens of William and Mary Howitt 
 were seldom other than successfully employed through- 
 out their long lives. Mrs. Ellis was a well known 
 authoress, and a Seebohm by his " Oxford Reformers," 
 and Dr. T. Hodgkin by his " Italy and Her Invaders," 
 have taken good rank among our present historians. It 
 needs two huge octavo volumes for a Joseph Smith to 
 chronicle the works and their various editions which 
 Friends have produced, treating on many subjects 
 besides those of biography or doctrinals. 
 
 In poetry there has been a Wiffen with his trans- 
 lation of Tasso, a Hurnard of Lexden, a John Scott of 
 Amwell, an Amelia Opie with her Lyrics, a "William 
 Ball with his epigrammatic verse, and the ever " busy 
 bee," as Charles Lamb quizzically called his friend 
 Bernard Barton, whose melodious muse, though copious, 
 falls below that high rank Whittier's is universally 
 allowed to have reached. Mention should be made, too, 
 of *' Sketches of Rural Life " by the brothers Lucas, and 
 published volumes of poetry or prose, by Hunton, 
 Knight, Compton, Budge, Ball, Ashby, Sterry, and many 
 others, more or less connected with Friends, whose 
 
BERNARD BARTON. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 23'6 
 
 works await the addition of posterity's opinion to their 
 present acceptance. 
 
 Here it may be suitable to remark how many of 
 those who have attained or are now in positions of 
 eminence, have come by birth out of Friends' families 
 in more or less direct descent. Such was the case witli 
 Macaulay, whose mother was a Friend ; and "Walter Scott 
 had a similar though remoter relation to the Society ; 
 the same may be said of Lord Lyndhurst; General 
 Howard, of the American War ; and President Lincoln. 
 Of this stock came Dr. Tregelles, the Biblical Scholar ; 
 Dr. Birch, tutor to the Prince of Wales ; Dr. Pritchard, 
 author of " The Unity of the Human Race " ; Thos. 
 Rickman,the Architect and first "Discriminator" of the 
 Gothic Styles ; Dr. Birkbeck, Inventor of Mechanics' 
 Institutes ; Bolton, who brought the Steam Engine of 
 Watt into general use ; Galton, the Philosopher ; Sir T. 
 Fowell Buxton, the indomitable champion of the Slave ; 
 Sir Joseph Lister, discoverer of Antiseptic Surgery ; 
 Sir Henry Rawlinson, decipherer of Cuneiform Inscrip- 
 tions ; Wm. A. Miller, Chemical Professor ; Sir Samuel 
 Cunard, founder of Atlantic Steam Navigation ; Neul 
 Dow, Inventor of the Maine Liquor Law ; Birket Foster, 
 unrivalled as an illustrator ; Wm. Edward Forster, of 
 Education Acts' fame ; Sir John Barnard and Sir Robt. N. 
 Fowler, alike at different periods each member of 
 Parliament for the City of London and twice Lord 
 Mayor. All these are but some of the names that might 
 be given of those eminent in various ways who were 
 indebted for their origin or training to a membership 
 
234 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 in the Society of Friends, which, has also retained within 
 its fold the Bakers and Olivers, of Kew Gardens ; 
 William Miller, the successful engraver of Turner's 
 atmospheric effects ; Rendel Harris the learned dis- 
 coverer of ancient MSS. ; Francis Fry, the laborious 
 investigator of the Cranmer Bibles ; Robert "Were Fox, 
 the Falmouth scientist ; with other accomplished 
 members of the same family circle. 
 
 Should it be asked whence came they, these 
 philanthropic tradesmen, these earnest seekers after 
 truth — the answer is to be found in the quiet and 
 intellectual homes where this goodness and this 
 force were nurtured ; homes founded by those who 
 have been drawn to one another by cords of purest 
 affection arising from unrestrained intercourse in 
 social circles into which no meretricious excitements 
 are allowed to enter ; homes where the marriage 
 pledge is sacred though no priest has sealed it ; where 
 children are regarded as born with capability for 
 salvation though never brought to the baptismal fount ; 
 where parents are reverenced as priests in their own 
 families, careful for all right culture and discouraging 
 no amusements or occupations but such as verge on 
 vanity or excess ; where wise restrictions are placed on 
 the reading of romances and dramatic literature, but a 
 welcome given to the healthful children's stories of an 
 Edgeworth, a Jane Taylor, Hack or Howitt. 
 
 Nowhere could the modern tastes for scientific 
 pursuits in Botany and Natural history have been 
 more fostered than amongst the young of these Friendly 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 235 
 
 homes, where the filling of cabinets with shells, eggs, 
 minerals, or fossils, the working of electrotypes, and 
 use of photographic apparatus, encouraged mental im- 
 provement of all kinds, amongst which a love for and 
 cultivation of the varied kinds of ferns a Newman had 
 shown to be so abundant, must not be forgotten. 
 
 Homes such as these, of true comfort and abundant 
 hospitality, with much coming and going of relatives 
 and guests, gave great opportunity for a free social 
 intercourse and intermingling at a social board with 
 those in different ranks and walk of life. 
 
 A religious atmosphere, rather than any rigidly 
 religious observances, marked the family training ; great 
 reverence was shown towaul the regularly read scrip- 
 tures, of which portions, as well as hymns, would be 
 committed to memory. Truth in all things was held 
 sacred. Extravagance in language, manners, or dress 
 was kept under, and although there might be little 
 spoken on doctrinal subjects to the young, they saw an 
 effective preaching of the Gospel in the loving con- 
 sistency of their parents' behaviour towards them. 
 
 Never also, for all this absence of theological train- 
 ing, has the Society lacked a succession in the Gospel 
 ministry, and as some allusion has been made to the 
 early age at which individuals have been called to 
 this service, an instance of an opposite character may 
 here be quoted from a recent interesting work "on 
 the Richardsons of Cleveland," of one whose training 
 was in that best of all schools — the trials and vicissi- 
 tudes of active life, — "A North Country Banker, 
 
236 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 clever and well read and prosperous, was suddenly 
 brought low by affliction in loss of property and a most 
 loving wife. His knowledge of the Bible was remark- 
 able, and his acquaintance with theological literature 
 ranged through difiEerent schools of thought from 
 Keble to Newton and Venn. In similar catholicity 
 had a familiarity been acquix-ed with English Clas- 
 sics ; a Shakespeare, a Milton and a New Testament 
 being generally associated as his pocket companions. 
 With all this varied culture, all this experience of the 
 joys and griefs of life, with keen, sympathetic and 
 quick perceptions, he was becoming fitted, during 
 sorrowful and somewhat lonely years, to minister to 
 his fellows. When after his second happy marriage 
 and with young children growing up around him, he. 
 first opened his mouth as a minister, it seemed as 
 though he spoke from the fullness of his heart and 
 mind the thoughts which had been maturing for years, 
 and his forcible mode of expression, enhanced by the 
 deep tones of his voice, riveted attention even of the 
 careless, while the marked absence of conventional 
 phrases added to the impression of originality in his 
 much valued discourses." 
 
 "All Friends," it has been said, "are known to one 
 another," and there is much truth in thus associating 
 with the Society a bond of fellowship that wants neither 
 the Signs nor the Oaths of Freemasonry for its recogni- 
 tion or maintenance. The frequent assembling together 
 for Society and Social ends furthers this, and it is ever 
 remembered when removals occur from one district to 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 237 
 
 another, for the leaving Friend to be supplied with 
 letters of recommendation to those of his fresh locality. 
 Social gatherings in households are frequently seasons 
 of religious intercourse (more often occurrent formerly 
 than is now possible in these rushing railway times) 
 which has been thus sweetly alluded to by Whittier : — 
 
 There sometimes Silence, it were liard to tell 
 
 Who owned it first, upon the circle fell. 
 
 Nor eye was raised, nor hand was stirred. 
 
 In that soul sabbath, till at last some word 
 
 Of tender counsel, or low prayer was heard. 
 
 Then guests who lingered but farewell to say. 
 
 And take Love's message, went their Homewara way. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 MISSIONS. 
 
 " Be faithful and spread the truth abroad . . as ye are 
 moved into Countries and Nations, that the sound of the trumpet 
 of the Lord of Hosts may be heard in the Nations and Islands." — 
 G. Fox. 
 
 TN missionary efEort, the Society has not, until 
 late years, taken much share through any definite 
 Organization for that object, but it has never ceased to 
 foster the concerns of those whom it felt were called 
 of the Lord to labour as gospel messengers among 
 Christian brethren or heathen in distant lands, of 
 which its early history has given us good evidence, 
 continued also throughout the present century. 
 
 In 1831 James Backhouse and G. W. "Walker were 
 engaged under its auspices for some fifteen years in 
 gospel service amongst the convict settlements, then 
 little visited, at the Cape and in Australia. A Thomay 
 Shillitoe had his Friends' cordial assistance throughout 
 extensive journeyings to Courts, and Cities, Prisons, 
 and Institutions on the Continent of Europe, where a 
 Stephen Grellett was likewise sustained in an earnest 
 gospel mission that took him to the Cabinets of 
 Statesmen, and audiences with Emperor and Kings, 
 even to imparting counsel on Spiritual truths in the 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 839 
 
 Vatican to the Pope himself. For Daniel Wheeler, in 
 1834, a special vessel was granted, that carried him 
 in this " Henry Freeling " throughout long voyages to 
 the Islands of the South Seas on his evangelistic 
 mission. Robert Lindsay and Frederick Mackie spent 
 years of extensive travel in the Cape, in India and 
 Australia. Russell JeflErey, Henry Hipsley, and 
 William Brewin travelled on a similar service in 1862 
 in India, especially to those parts of that large and 
 closely peopled country where missionary efforts were 
 in operation. Visits also in Gospel love have never 
 been wanting, either to Indians in their native 
 forests, or like John and Martha Yeardley, to dwellers 
 among the Isles of Greece. Others have thus gone to 
 the Valleys of Piedmont, the Steppes of Russia ; or 
 like Isaac Sharp to Finns and Esquimaux, amid the icy 
 cold of Labrador, or settlers on the warm Veldts of 
 Africa, to co-religionists throughout Australasia, and to 
 missionary brethren in Madagascar, Mexico, and India. 
 No period of the Society's history is without this warm 
 encouragement and support of varied individual effort 
 by those whom it believed divinely called to such 
 service. 
 
 It remained, however, for George Richardson, 
 when very aged and lying on his death-bed in 1859, to 
 be the means by a letter he wrote to his brethren 
 when assembled in their Yearly Meeting of awakening 
 in the Society a consciousness, that as a Community, 
 it ought to have its own share in missionary effort 
 in Heathen Lands. 
 
240 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 His appeal led eventually to the formation of a 
 Friends' Foreign Mission Association, under whose 
 auspices Joseph S. Sewell and also Louis and Sarah 
 Street, from America, became its first Missionaries to 
 Madagascar, where now it has a staff of some twenty 
 workers, with Meetings, Schools, printing Establish- 
 ment and Medical mission in the Capital of the Island, 
 and a large area of country, exclusively under its care, 
 influencing, more or less directly, some 40,000 natives. 
 
 INDIA. 
 
 Work in India was commenced by Rachel Metcalf 
 in 1867, who gave her life to the service, and was soon 
 joined by two American Friends, assisted from time to 
 time by various others from England, until now at 
 Hoshungabad, Sohagpur, and Sioni — which are places 
 some 40 miles apart — premises have been obtained or 
 built, such as bungalows, orphanage, mission and meet- 
 ing rooms, all in active use by some twenty workers, 
 who have gone out from England under a sense of 
 being called to this service of love. China is also 
 add«d to its mission field, where seven men and 
 women Friends are engaged in medical and general 
 mission work with much encouragement, and similar 
 cheer is attending labours of English and American 
 Friends in Japan. 
 
 TURKEY. 
 
 In the year 18C0, John Yeardley, who, with his 
 wife, had in years past travelled much on gospel 
 service among the Isles of Greece, felt that some 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 241 
 
 further service was called for from him in the East — 
 which, to one of his advanced years, was a great under- 
 taking. He was only able to reach Constantinople yet 
 here his service was the means of influencing some 
 Armenians ; especially G. Dobrasian (then a young 
 medical student), so as to prove the foundation for a 
 little group that now gather in profession with the 
 Society, and hold meetings for worship regularly, with 
 an attendance up to a hundred or more, comprising 
 members of various races, Armenians, Greeks, Turks 
 Persians, Jews. 
 
 SYRIA. 
 
 Friends' share in Syrian Missions commenced with 
 visits paid in the love of the gospel by Eli and Sybil 
 Jones, who held meetings after the manner of Friends, 
 in various places during their travels in Palestine, 
 and amongst those influenced by them was Theophilus 
 Waldmeier, a Swiss, who was engaged at that time 
 in Missionary School-work on Mount Lebanon under 
 Mrs. Mott. He also made the acquaintance of Stafford 
 Allen when travelling there, and found his own 
 views so much in accord with those of Friends that 
 he came to England and joined himself in member- 
 ship with them. Through the interest Hannah 
 Stafford Allen awakened in the cause, they were 
 willing to support him in opening a Mission of 
 their own on Mount Lebanon, and these eflEorts 
 under Theophilus Waldmeier (who is remembered 
 as once Missionary to King Theodore) have grown 
 from small beginnings into a large work on the 
 
242 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 valuable property of Ain Salaam, in Brumana, with 
 its training homes and schools, dispensary, and 
 substantial meeting house, well filled at times of 
 worship ; and its congregation have formed themselves 
 into a Monthly Meeting. Some twenty Friends have 
 gone out to conduct this varied and important work ; 
 a few of them at their own charges, but the chief 
 supplies come from voluntary subscriptions of some 
 £1,800 a year. The American Friends have a mission 
 centre of their own, with enbstantial buildings also, 
 some nine miles from Jerusalem, at Rama'Jah, where 
 Hulda Leighton and others sustain a most useful 
 Christian work. 
 
 HOME MISSIONS. 
 After this cursory glance at Friends' share in the 
 Foreign Mission Field, it has to be observed that 
 oimultaneous with the awakened activity in such dis- 
 tant service is observable the growth of Home 
 Missions amongst them, which, after existing in more 
 or less direct connection with educational efforts 
 in First-day and Adult Schools have of late years come 
 under the care of a Committee appointed by the Yearly 
 Meeting. 
 
 These originated through Sabbath School work 
 having awakened an interest on behalf of the Parents of 
 the children thus under Friends' care, and the response 
 found at Leeds and some other towns in efforts made for 
 their religious benefit induced thoseinLondontoengraft 
 Home Mission Work on the First-day Schools they had 
 long maintained in Spitalfields, for which some new 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 243 
 
 premises were built and had already been opened when a 
 visitation of cholera drew the sympathetic attention of 
 all England to this afflicted district, and the help that 
 poured in from all quarters led to these buildings 
 being called after good old Peter, the " Bedford Insti- 
 tute," inaugurating its subsequent career of manifold 
 usefulness. 
 
 About this time, 1865 to '70, some Friends had felt 
 it their duty to hold Meetings in the crowded districts 
 of the East End. A large tent obtained many years 
 before for Samuel Capper — when under religious 
 concern, to hold meetings in country places of our 
 Western Counties — was discovered stored away under 
 ;i London Meeting-House. This was now set up in a 
 disu,sed Burial Ground in Whitechapel, with such evi- 
 dent blessing that during another summer it was asked 
 for by an earnest promoter of such services (not him- 
 self a Friend), and he set "William Booth (then just 
 come to London seeking a sphere of labour) to conduct 
 gospel services in it which proved so successful that 
 this old tent became as a cradle, out of which his 
 future East End work developed into the enormous 
 proportions of the Salvation Army. 
 
 On William Booth obtaining permanent quarters, 
 Friends shifted the tent to another of their closed 
 Burial Grounds, near Bunhill Fields, where it also 
 attracted, during several summers in succession, various 
 zealous workers, both in and out of the Society, so that 
 when finally wrecked during a heavy storm Friends 
 replaced it by an iron room. In this grew up an Adult 
 
244 
 
 TKE FRIENDS. 
 
 School with other work of so much promise as to lead 
 to the erection at great cost of the fine permanent 
 Memorial Buildings in which all kinds of Mission 
 Work now find excellent accommodation on a site 
 close to where George Fox and other valiants in the 
 Lamb's army were laid to rest. 
 
 Scarce a town is there now of any importance 
 throughout England in which the Friends do not own, 
 or have under control, buildings for zealous workers, 
 drawn largely from the younger ranks of their mem- 
 bers, who are doing all they can to make England the 
 better by raising a sober, enlightened, and scripturally 
 instructed population. 
 
 These are worked by independent and local com- 
 mittees, but on the subject claiming the attention of 
 the Yearly Meeting, it appointed, in 1882, a large Com- 
 mittee of men and women Friends to act as might seem 
 best on its behalf in fostering these efforts, and as a 
 result, through funds raised by voluntary subscription, 
 there are some 40 workers who itinerate or settle for a 
 time in districts wherever a need for originating, re- 
 viving, or sustaining School and Mission work exists. 
 
 Thus this Home Mission Work, though a Society 
 organisation, has resulted from Schools, long previously 
 conducted among the wage-earning classes, which 
 themselves became federated under an Association, ot 
 which Joseph Storrs Fry, (who has ably served the 
 Yearly Meeting on fourteen occasions as its clerk,) has 
 been its much esteemed honorary secretary from tho 
 commencement. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 245 
 
 In the junior department of this school work 
 Friends have been followers rather than pioneers, but 
 with this difference that their Schools are for children 
 gathered promiscuously and not as with others, for 
 those whose parents belong to the congregations. 
 
 Their largely successful efforts in teaching an 
 older class, having had no previous example, their 
 origin claims our notice. 
 
 ADULT SCHOOLS. 
 
 These were commenced at Birmingham in 1845, 
 when Joseph Sturge invited a few young men Friends 
 to his house to discuss whether something could not 
 be done for the instruction and help of those who had 
 reached an age and position beyond the range of an 
 ordinary Sabbath School. It led to a School bein,:,' 
 commenced for men and grown up lads at the earl y 
 hour of 7.30 on a First-day morning, and the teache: j 
 agreed to meet to breakfast half-an-hour earlier, to 
 which repast so long as he lived this good man would 
 come to carve himself the cold ham he supplied. The 
 School grew rapidly in numbers and influence, so 
 much so that a similar work among young women 
 succeeded. Bristol, that long had had one for children, 
 followed the example of this one for Adults. So was 
 it with other places year after year, until through these 
 important accessions the number of attenders has in 
 1891 reached an aggregate of more than 23,000, with 
 some 800 teachers, at work in 90 different centres, and 
 all this is exclusive of the Junior First-day Schools 
 with their 12,000 teachers and 15,000 children. 
 
246 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 These varied and extensive efforts are as yet con- 
 ducted on an undenominational basis, so that when 
 fellowships have resulted such are but local in cha- 
 racter and without official connection with the Society. 
 In recent times, however, Home Mission efforts in 
 religious meetings have brought a steady accession ot 
 members, chiefly from a wage-earning class, which 
 has turned the current from a previous yearly declin- 
 ing — or at most stationary position — into one of mucli 
 hopefulness for the future, by the gain to the Society 
 of those who have not found themselves within it.s 
 ranks by accident of birth, but have entered them 
 through personal conviction and attachment to it.-s 
 principles. 
 
 This has a likeness to what we have seen ot 
 Society aggressiveness in its early days, when as now 
 youthful zeal led the van, encouraged and fostered by 
 elder counsels. 
 
 Friends have found that they themselves have a 
 work to do amongst the ignorant and poorer classes 
 besides subscribing funds, as has been so long their 
 wont, to assist others in these labours of love. 
 
 What they are thus doing for London in seven 
 distinct centres involves them in an annual expendi - 
 ture of more than £3,000, and includes Medical Mis- 
 sions, Labour Agencies, a Refuge, and a Forster Home 
 of somewhat of the Deaconness character. 
 
 The Home Mission Committee of the Yearly Meet- 
 ing raises and expends some £4,000 a year in fostering 
 local efforts over the country. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 247 
 
 The Foreign Mission Association has an annual 
 expenditure of £11,000 and sustains some 50 mission- 
 aries at their work, all of which annual outgoings are 
 independent of large amounts that from time to time 
 have been raised to build schools, orphanages, training 
 homes, hospital, medical mission, meeting premises, 
 residences for missionaries, &c. 
 
 Thus in their way, though small in comparison 
 wuth the missionary operations of other Christian 
 Bodies yet large in proportion to their own, are the 
 " Friends " of this day found helping on the advent 
 of that time when it shall be said, " the kingdoms of 
 the world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and 
 of His Christ." 
 
 10' 
 
CHAPTER XXVI n. 
 
 FBIEXDS AS AT PRESENT IN EUROPE AND 
 AUSTRALASIA. 
 
 IHE advantages offered in Pennsylvania of political 
 
 and religious freedom, proved so attractive to Friends 
 on the continent of Europe, harassed as they were by 
 army requirements and clerical claims, that a migration 
 ensued which eventually left none remaining of those 
 who had adopted their principles at the rise of the 
 Society. Yet there are still little communities of Friends 
 in Germany, France, and Norway, the origin of which 
 should not be omitted in our survey. Those in 
 Germany resulted from a religious visit in 1790 of 
 George Dillwyn and wife, Sarah Grubb* and her hus- 
 band, with some others who in the course of their 
 travels in Holland and Germany found in Westphalia 
 some spiritually earnest nersons who had very much 
 withdrawn from the state worship, and were prepared 
 to gather in silence and wait to feel the Lord of all 
 cpirits in His direct action on their souls. These were 
 further encouraged by a visit of some duration from 
 John Pemberton, an aged American Friend, who ended 
 his life amongst them, and also at a later period by 
 
 • She was the daugliter of William Tuke, and inherited 
 much of her father's force of cliaracter. She was said " to have 
 -combined the manners of a duchess with the piety of a saint." 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Stephen Grellet whose visit to them was accomplished 
 through manifold difficulties and dangers from conti- 
 nental wars then raging. These with various other aids 
 and visits from English and American Friends con- 
 tributed to a- settlement of the Society both at Prymont 
 and Minden, at each of which places it has a meeting- 
 house. Their original members as in England were 
 drawn from various classes, mechanics as well as trades- 
 men, and some of local rank, such as the Von Seebohm 
 family, one of whom, Benjamin Seebohm, settled in 
 England, and became widely known for specially valued 
 gospel services in England and America in furtherance 
 of Friends' views of gospel truth. He was early brough t 
 into this usefulness through Stephen Grellet having 
 enlisted him as his interpreter at the meetings he held. 
 Some of these were large, and on the first occasion the 
 call to such a service was so unexpected that fear pre- 
 vailed, till Stephen, putting his ' hand on the lad's 
 shoulder, gave him such courage, that, young as he 
 was, he succeeded to admiration in transmitting to the 
 assembly the counsel that flowed from the earnest 
 evangelist. 
 
 Many of the German Friends have not shrunk 
 from much trial and sufilering in maintainiug a testi- 
 mony against war — but their families have largely 
 availed themselves of the opportunity given by emigra- 
 tion to avoid military service, consequently the num- 
 bers remaining are few. Most of these are living in 
 Minden, where Louis Rasche is chief representative of 
 • he family of that name which in former time welcomed 
 
250 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 Sarah Grnbb and George Dill wyn on their travels thither. 
 
 NORWAY AND DENMARK. 
 There is a Society of Friends in Norway which 
 had its origin under the following circumstances : — 
 In the year 1814 the Friends living at Rochester re- 
 ceived a letter from one of the Norwegian prisoners in 
 a ship of war then lying off Chatham that induced them 
 to pay a visit to the vessel. They found that amongst a 
 number of these captives taken during the war between 
 Denmark and England, were several young men who 
 were in the habit of sitting down together to wait upon 
 the Lord, and to feel his power arise in their hearts 
 which was to them a great preservation from the low- 
 life led by others, and more profitable than uniting in 
 any formal religious service. The leader amongst 
 them was a young Norwegian, the son of a carpenter, 
 who had enlisted on board a Danish Privateer, that had 
 been captured at sea by one of the English cruisers. In 
 his affliction great heart sorrow and repentance ensued, 
 and, though very ignorant as to Scripture truth, he 
 felt the Lord to be near to his spirit, and was surprised 
 on meeting with a copy, in Danish, of Barclay's 
 Apology to find there was a people who owned to a 
 similar experience. It led him to write that letter which 
 he had composed by the aid of a dictionary to the 
 Friends at Rochester. Some of these came to the ships, 
 and until the Peace liberated them they held meetings 
 on board that increased until .^»0 of the prisoners used to 
 be present three times a week. These, on liberation, 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 251 
 
 dispersed to their various localities, and not many years 
 after Wm. Allen and Stephen Grellet paid them a visit. 
 Thomas Shillitoe spent a long time in going amongst 
 them and encouraging the settlement of meetings, 
 which service after some 24 years was further promoted 
 by three Friends, E. 0. Tregelles, John Budge, and 
 Isaac Sharp, who went there several times. 
 
 Their number at present is about 140, and though 
 small groups are located in various parts, the greater 
 number live at Stavanger, where they have a school 
 attended by about 20 children. One or two, such as the 
 late Endre Dahl, have been successful in trade, but for 
 the most part they are hardy sons of toil, fervent in 
 spirit and greatly cheered by the visits which are sure 
 to be annually paid them by one or more English and 
 American Friends. Here as elsewhere on the continent, 
 the exactions and restrictions of a State Church and 
 Military Service makes the freedoin obtainable in the 
 Western World a superior attraction to the circum- 
 stances of home life, and as facilities increase year by 
 year, the young leave more freely whilst the decease 
 of the elders tends further to diminish this branch of 
 the Society. There are Friends also in Denmark at 
 various places, but not promising much for develop- 
 ment or even of a permanence, as their numbers are 
 too few in any one place for much of successful 
 organization. It is interesting to note that the Danish 
 edition of Barclay before referred to was the work of 
 a Lutheran minister from that country as far back as 
 1738, who resigned his post of missionary to Danish 
 
252 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 sailors on becoming a Friend, for whose principles he 
 also suffered imprisonment. 
 
 Several of the Norwegian Friends lived long lives 
 of faithful dedication, such as Elias Tested and Endre 
 Dahl, and one of the earliest of their number thus ex- 
 pressed himself when a prisoner on our men-of-war 
 " I am convinced by His Spirit that there is a great 
 secret in the word, which no human creature with hu- 
 own natural powers merely can discover, yet it is 
 opened to those whom the Almighty knows will bo 
 faithful and preserve it in honour, and as it is what 
 cannot be bought with money as other things can, my 
 wish is to preserve His work in a clean heart." And 
 in another letter was shown the Power he trusted in 
 for this. " Surely Satan may bite the heel, but as soon 
 as the Spirit of God draws near to me I can fully resist 
 him." 
 
 FRANCE. 
 
 Between England and France, through long cen- 
 turies of international jealousies and wars, little com- 
 munity of interest on religious subjects existed — om 
 country becoming more a refuge for the oppressed in 
 politics and religion than able to exert any influence 
 in promulgation of Scripture Truth. 
 
 Nevertheless, the Society is not without it3 repi e 
 sentatives on the soil of France, for in the Southern 
 districts an interesting little community of Friend.? 
 has existed there for about a hundred years. 
 
 It arose through earnest-minded Frenchmen, 
 shocked at the results of the wars waged amongst theu^ 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 253 
 
 ■ n the name of religion, having had their attention 
 arrested in 1785, by some English Friends, Joseph Fox 
 and Co., of Falmouth, who had advertised for any that 
 might have sustained losses from a vessel of theirs, hav- 
 ing, unauthorised, acted as a privateer. Such conduct 
 towards reputed enemies seemed to these Frenchmen 
 so truly Christian as to make them desirous of learning 
 more of the principles that could prompt and 
 sustain such noble conduct. It led to a corres- 
 pondence, aQd was followed by a visit to England 
 of one of their number, De Marsillac, of noble 
 birth, who informed Friends that for 60 or 70 years 
 there had existed in these southern parts of France a 
 Protestant community, who held similar views to theirs 
 on worship, ministry, and the unlawfulness of war. 
 When peace made the country accessible, a deputation of 
 Friends visited this little community in 1817, and ever 
 since from time to time English and American 
 ministers have had good service in these parts, and 
 a A aluable company of earnest-minded French Friends 
 resulted with their head quarters at Cogenies . and 
 Nismes, and at tie fortaer are nice Meeting House 
 premises. Amongst these, natural losses by nature's 
 decay have not been replaced by family successions, 
 chiefly through emigration of their young men to 
 avoid the pressure of conscription, and consequently 
 the numbers at present residing there are but as a 
 remnant. 
 
 The chief family has befen that of the Majolier, and 
 of one of these it is related, that a wolf unexpectedly 
 
251 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 appeared close to him in liis vineyard ; he felt him- 
 self in great danger, but had an assurance that as he 
 kept his eye fixed on the intruder he would be in 
 safety, and thus walking slowly backward, with eyes 
 fixed on the voracious beast, he reached shelter unhurt. 
 This used to be told by his grand-daughter, who was 
 brought over, when but a girl, to England by some 
 Friends, in whose family she lived for many years, and 
 then returned to her home at Nismes. On her marriage 
 some time after to Robert Alsop, they became some of 
 the most widely-known Friends for religious service at 
 home and abroad ; welcome in all social circles, and 
 loved the more the better they were known. Christine 
 Alsop was in herself a remarkable example of English 
 solidity blended with French vivacity — in a harmony 
 of attractiveness and strength. 
 
 Although Stephen Grellet w?)s not of this group 
 his career presents a yet more remarkable instance of 
 a character in which the courtesy of a French nobleman 
 influenced by contact with English speaking races both 
 in America and England became manifest in the ranks 
 of spiritual warfare. He never lost the manners of the 
 ]>olished gentleman in the consistent Friend, but held 
 them in such combination as to win many cultivated 
 minds to the cause of philanthropy and religion. It 
 was his having searched into the condition of Newgate 
 as already mentioned, that stirred the saintly zeal of 
 Elizabeth Fry to those visits which led to its reforma- 
 tion, and by his love for " dear Stephen " was William 
 Allen led into many a companionship of distant service 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 255 
 
 for their Master in Russia and various other parts of 
 Europe and Asia. 
 
 AUSTRALASIA. 
 
 Friends are represented in Australasia by settle 
 ments of their members in Queensland, New South 
 Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, and Auck- 
 land, in New Zealand, amounting in the aggregate to 
 about a thousand members. 
 
 Those in Tasmania and New South Wales arose 
 through the visits of James Backhouse and G. W. 
 Walker, in 1834, whose self-denying labours, during 
 several years, attracted little groups in each place to 
 adopt Friends' mode of worship, which has been 
 maintained by their descendants and others who have 
 joined them. In Tasmania the families of the Mathers 
 and the Cottons have formed the nucleus ; and a high 
 school for Friends and others, opened at Hobart of late 
 years, is pursuing a prosperous career under the head- 
 mastership of Samuel Clemes and a managing com- 
 mittee of resident Friends. In Sydney an Adult School 
 conducted at the Meeting House is proving a source of 
 much usefulness. 
 
 The Friends in South Australia reside chiefly in 
 Adelaide, or at Mount Barker, a township in its neigh- 
 bourhood. Most of them came out on the formation 
 of the colony, in or about 1836, many of them from the 
 South Coast towns of England ; Mays and Saunders, 
 Phillips and Colemans, being chiefly represented. 
 
 Melbourne is the principal centre for the Societ? 
 
256 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 in Victoria, -where it has commodiotis premises in a 
 good thoroughfare, erected in 1859, used by some tw o 
 hundred Friends of various circumstances in life, witl; 
 families growing up around them. It has, like Tasmania, 
 its own Yearly Meeting. 
 
 The Meeting House at Brisbane, opened in 1866, is 
 not largely attended, but there are amongst them some 
 earnest workers, which may also be said of Rockhamj)- 
 ton. The numbers in both places are few, the premises 
 small, but an influence for good is being exerted on 
 those around them. 
 
 In New Zealand there are on the whole a con- 
 siderable number of residents (nearly 200) more or less 
 connected with the Society, but only in Auckland are 
 these situated in sufficient number to have a Meeting 
 House. In other places, such as Dunedin, the few 
 meet at one another's houses, and at Wellington, Thomas 
 Mason, an old and successful settler in the Hut Valley, 
 has long held a meeting at his own residence. 
 
CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 FRIENDS OF ENGLAND, IRELAND, NORTH AMERICA, 
 AND CANADA IN CONFERENCE ASSEMBLED. 
 
 T^THEN Richard Baxter alluded to "Friends" as a 
 
 divided people wanting in any element of per- 
 manence, he little expected that the Community he 
 thus affected to despise would two centuries afterwards 
 have become so spread and remained so united as to 
 assemble in Conference through deputies from no less 
 than twelve independent yet corresponding Yearly 
 Meetings in a far distant and at that time unimagined 
 City of the Western World. 
 
 English, Irish, Canadian, and American were thus 
 represented by ninety-five Delegates of men and 
 women Friends, and the husbands of wife delegates 
 and wives of husbands were admitted to be present, 
 though not allowed to take part in the Sittings of this 
 Conference which assembled in the City of Richmond, 
 Indiana, in September, 18S7, and lasted throughout 
 four successive days. Under regulations as to length of 
 time for each speaker, were discussed such subjects as 
 Union in Foreign Mission Work ; the Mission of the 
 Society of Friends, and what is its Message to the World ; 
 Meetings for Worship, and the method of conducting 
 them ; the relation of the Ministry to the Church, and of 
 
258 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 the Church to the Ministry, and how best for the Minis- 
 try to be sustained. These and other similar matters 
 engaged the attention of the Conference throughout 
 eleven sittings, and the proceedings are reported in a 
 published volume of more than 300 pages. Record is 
 made of the feeling of thankfulness for the unity and 
 brotherly condescension that had prevailed throughout 
 in the face of a very free expression of opinion. 
 
 An important act of the Conference was the pre- 
 paration of a " Declaration of some of the Fundamental 
 Principles of Christian Truth as held by the religious 
 Society of Friends," dra^vn (as expressed by J. B. 
 Braithwaite, Chairman of the Committee appointed for 
 the purpose) from documents that had passed the 
 various Yearly Meetings. 
 
 Thus accredited, it may be taken, not only as 
 the latest but most comprehensive statement of the 
 kind, amounting almost to a Treatise, which must 
 necessarily be presented here in a very abbreviated 
 form. 
 
 It refers throughout its couri3e to not less than 147 
 passages of scripture in support of its statements which 
 are ranged under these sixteen heads : — Of God — the 
 Lord Jesus Christ— the Holy Spirit— the Holy Scrip- 
 tures — Man's Creation and Fall — Justification and 
 Sanctification — the Resurrection and Final Judgment — 
 Baptism— the Supper of the Lord — Public "Worship — 
 Prayer and Praise — Liberty of Conscience in its Rela- 
 tion to Civil Government — Marriage— Peace — Oaths — 
 the First Day of the Week. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 259 
 
 The first clause is as follows : — 
 
 We believe in one Holy, Almighty, Allwise, and 
 everlasting God, the Father, the Creator, and Preserver 
 of all things, and in Jesus Christ His only Son our Lord, 
 by -whom all things were made and by whom all things 
 consist ; and in one Holy Spirit, proceeding from the 
 Father and the Son, the Reprover of the World, the 
 Witness for Christ, and the Teacher, Guide, and Sancti- 
 fier of the people of God, and that these three are one 
 in the Eternal Godhead, to whom be honour, praise, and 
 thanksgiving now and for ever. Amen. 
 
 The testimony to the Lord Jesus Christ is very 
 full and will be found explicit as to His being true God 
 and perfect man, in whom alone we have redemption 
 and remission of sins by virtue of His most satisfactory 
 sacrifice, who, having shown Himself alive after His pas- 
 sion hath ascended into Heaven. He is the one Mediator 
 of the new and everlasting covenant, able to save to the 
 uttermost them that come unto God by Him ; the head of 
 the true church, all its members made one in Him. In 
 their hearts He dwells by faith and gives them of His 
 peace. His will is their law, and in Him they enjoy 
 the true liberty, a freedom from the bondage of sin. 
 
 The Holy Spirit coming in the name and with the 
 authority of the risen and ascended Saviour takes the 
 things of Christ and shews them as a realized posses- 
 sion to the believing soul, and is the seal of recon- 
 ciliation to the believer in Jesus, the witness to his 
 adoption into the family of the redeemed. 
 
 No principle of spiritual light, life, or holiness is 
 
260 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 owned as inherent by nature in the mind or heart, but 
 a capacity to receive the influence of the Hohj Spirit 
 of God without whose quickening and illumination, 
 neither conscience or reason discern aright of the deep 
 things of God and Christ. 
 
 The Holy So^ijJtwes are regarded as the only 
 divinely authorised record of the doctrines which we 
 are bound as Christians to accept, and of the moral 
 principles which are to regulate our actions, and what- 
 ever anyone says or does contrary to the Scriptures, 
 though under profession of the immediate guidance of 
 the Holy Spirit, must be reckoned and accounted a 
 mere delusion. The great Inspirer of Scripture is ever 
 its true Interpreter, not by superseding our under- 
 standings but by enlightening them that the humble 
 disciple may discern the unity, many sidedness, and 
 harmony of its testimony to Christ. 
 
 Man created capable of holding communion with 
 his Maker, free to obey or disobey the divine law, fell 
 into transgression under the temptation of Satan, and 
 all mankind as partakers of his nature are involved in 
 the consequences. To every member of every suc- 
 cessive generation the words " ye must be born again " 
 are applicable, yet is not sin imputed where there has 
 been no sufficient capacity to understand the divine 
 law, and thus infants are saved through the redemption 
 which is in Christ Jesus. 
 
 Justification is of God's free grace, who, upon re- 
 pentance and faith, pardons our sins. Sanctification is 
 experienced, as the pardoned sinner through faith in 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 261 
 
 Christ is clothed with a measure of His righteousnest;, 
 sufBcient to deliver from the power as well as from 
 the guilt of sin, yet is he still liable to temptation, and 
 able only to follow holiness through constant depend- 
 ence upon his Saviour. 
 
 Not only is a resurrection in Christ from a sinful 
 state believed in here, but a rising and ascending into 
 glory with Him hereafter, that when he at last appears 
 we may appear with Him in glory at the final Judg- 
 ment, when the wicked shall be separated from those 
 that are justified. 
 
 One Baptism is believed in, even that whereby all 
 believers are baptised in the one spirit into the one 
 body ; not an outward but a spiritual experience, 
 transforming the heart and settling the soul upon 
 Christ. 
 
 The Siqjper of the Lord needs no ritual or priestly 
 intervention. They truly partake who rest upon the 
 sufferings and death of their Lord as their only hope, 
 and to whom the indwelling Spirit gives to drink of 
 the fulness that is in Christ. It is this inward and 
 spiritual partaking that is believed in as the true 
 Supper of the Lord. 
 
 Worship is the adoring response of the heart and 
 minds to the influence of the Spirit of God. It stands 
 neither in forms nor in the formal disuse of forms ; it 
 may be without words as well as with them, but it 
 must be in spirit and in truth. 
 
 Preaching is believed to be divinely appointed as 
 one of the chief means for the awakening and con- 
 
262 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 version of sinners, and for the comfort and edification 
 of believers, the gift and qualification to exercise it 
 derived immediately from the Great Head of the 
 Church, and bestowed on women as well as men. 
 The church cannot confer, but it is its duty to recog- 
 nise and foster, and while the gospel should never be 
 preached for money, it is the duty of the church to 
 make such provision that it shall never be hindered 
 for want of it. 
 
 Prayer is the outcome of our sense of need. It is 
 not confined to the closet. "When uttered in response 
 to the promptings of the Holy Spirit it becomes an 
 important part of public worship. Individuals, families, 
 or congregations, accepting all they receive as their 
 Father's pure bounty, will be still 2Ji'(iising Him. 
 
 It is the duty of Christians to obey the enactments 
 of civil government, except those which interfere with 
 our allegiance to God, whose worship ought in every 
 act to be free, and in matters of religious doctrine and 
 worship the conscience is accountable only to God. 
 
 Marriage is a solemn engagement for life, not a 
 mere civil contract, and should be entered upon dis- 
 creetly, soberly, and in the fear of the Lord. 
 
 War is incompatible with love and the forgiveness 
 of injuries. 
 
 Oaths, profane or judicial, are to be avoided as 
 contrary to the command of our Lord, Swear not at 
 all. 
 
 The First day of the iveclc being a release granted 
 from business should be diligently improved as a time 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 263 
 
 for public worship, scripture reading to assembled 
 households, private retirement, and devotional engage- 
 ments. 
 
 This Declaration, of which the preceding can 
 scarcely be termed even an abstract, closes with an 
 earnest exhortation that, " Life from Christ, life in 
 Christ, must ever be the basis of life for Christ. 
 For this we have been created and redeemed, and 
 by this alone can the longings of our immortal souls 
 be satisfied." 
 
 Note. — Tlie representations of this Richmond Conference did 
 not involve the various Yearly Meetings in any acceptance of its 
 Conclusions, and as to this Declaration, whilst some have adopted 
 it, others (like London Yearly Meeting, which had not felt the 
 need for further declarations of its belief) have refrained from 
 expressing a judgment ; though, as to the Conference itself, it 
 could trust " that the results of its deliberations will be promotive 
 of the welfare of the Society." 
 
CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 COXCLUSION. 
 
 'NWORTHY would it be of a religious society if 
 
 these views of the nature and history of "The 
 Friends" were offered with any other object than a 
 desire to make apparent that principle of life which 
 has proved 2)reservative of it amid circumstances of the 
 f^ravest peril from within and without, and endued it 
 with a Jlexihility capable of adjustments to meet social 
 changes throughout seven generations. 
 
 That principle may be described in the declaration 
 of an apostle " that the grace of God in our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christ hath appeared unto all men, 
 teaching them that denying ungodliness and worldly 
 lusts they should live soberly, righteously, and godly 
 in this present world looking for the appearing of the 
 great God our Saviour, who shall change our vile body 
 so that it shall be like unto His glorious body accord- 
 ing to the working, whereby He is able to subdue all 
 things unto Himself. 
 
 The appearing thus described has to the " Friend " 
 a threefold aspect of Past, Present, and Future, united 
 with a special sense of the Present blessings opened to 
 the believing soul by the Lord's great work in the i)ast, 
 whereby He now enters by His spirit into the willing 
 heart as into His temple of old. It is for this, His 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 265 
 
 spiritual appearance the Friend worshipfally waits, 
 nd in its realization finds strength in the present, hope 
 for the future. 
 
 This consciousness of the Lord's presence in the 
 heart is attended not only with a sense of sins forgiven, 
 but also of His divine power to save from sin and over- 
 come in the hour of temptation, even by that power 
 whereby He is found to subdue all things in the be- 
 liever's heart unto Himself. 
 
 The Friend has called this blessedness by various 
 biblical terms of Light, Life, and Seed, and felt its free- 
 dom for all men without limitation of Race, Colour, or 
 Creed, with an absolute independence of ritual or cere- 
 monial observance of any kind. 
 
 He claims the holy scriptures as witnessing to this, 
 and to their being in themselves a divinely appointed 
 guide for obtaining this blessing. 
 
 He regards no church arrangements— however 
 ancient — as any other than helps to, as distinct from 
 repositories of, this divine grace. For his trust ie in 
 the Lord alone, of whose life-giving virtue he is, he 
 believes, as much a partaker as were those whose 
 fleshly ailments He healed in the days of His ap- 
 pearance as man to men. 
 
 Such are the blessings the Friend conceives were 
 opened to all by His '■'■finished " work which effected 
 an unification with all men, who, left to themselves, 
 have no true life. Thus is made possible to the 
 believer an inward healing of spirit, and an infelt 
 power over sin, through partaking by faith of His 
 
266 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 resurrection life. A direct access is recognised as 
 having been thereby opened for every spirit unto the 
 Lord of all spirits, that the Lord Himself may be known 
 as the True Minister of the Sanctuary, that teacheth 
 as never man can teach, and teacheth also one to 
 minister unto another with a divine anointing no 
 human training or consecration can confer. 
 
 Thus truly looking " unto Jesus " in all His blessed 
 offices, the Friend in his worship is not dependent on 
 any human arrangements or human ministry, and yet 
 never throughout the two centuries of his chequered 
 course has he been without a stream of ministry in a 
 true apostolic succession, founded on the same qualifi- 
 cations as enabled fishermen and sons of toil, in 
 primitive times, to become witnesses of Gospel bless- 
 ings in a risen and ever pi-esent Saviour. 
 
 No other church, it has been said, has had more 
 ministers amongst them, in proportion to their num- 
 bers, than " the Friends," a result wholly independent 
 of any outward inducements, and often entailing much 
 l)ersonaI sacrifice in worldly advancement, ease, or 
 comfort. Whilst with others a submission to some rite 
 or ceremony becomes imperative for entrance into the 
 covenanted blessings of the Gospel, no such restriction 
 obtains with one who, like the Friend, believes in our 
 Lord having by his voluntary death so united Himself 
 to mankind as to have made all men, in virtue of birth, 
 free to partake of the fountain of spiritual life, opened 
 for us in him. 
 
 Whilst with so many others there is a belief in a 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 267 
 
 divinely appointed organization as tlie root of a Christ- 
 ian's privilege, with the Friend all organization is the 
 fruit of his faith in the ever present guidance of his 
 living, loving Lord and Saviour, that such means as 
 will truly serve the Society's welfare may be changed 
 or adopted as altered circumstances require. 
 
 Through this dependence great changes in arrange- 
 ments have been safely effected, with a flexibility far 
 removed from dogmatic adherence to custom or pre- 
 cedent. 
 
 " I like this word flexibility " said David Updegraff 
 at the Richmond Conference (himself a descendant of 
 those emigrating Germans who first protested against 
 slavery), "it is a true, good, blessed word, and it belongs 
 to the Society of Friends, and if it had not been for the 
 flexibility that God has given us by the presence of 
 His Spirit and the power of His truth, we should have 
 been broken into a thousand fragments long ago. But 
 we have stood the storms of many a conflict, and passed 
 through them in love and Christian charity. 
 
 As to outward life, the Friend whilst bearing his 
 share in all legally imposed contributions to a State 
 ministry, has not availed himself of its service, he has 
 not brought his children to the >S'^a^e-provided font for 
 assumed deliverance from original sin ; nor submitted 
 to the touch of an Episcopal hand that he might come 
 for spiritual nourishment to the State's altar ; his 
 daughters have been content to take their husbands' 
 pledge in marriage without any State ofBcial's aid ; nor 
 has such been sought for under other circumstances of 
 
;268 
 
 THE FRIEXDS. 
 
 life, or in the hour of approaching death, having felt 
 satisfied in committal of dust to dust, without any State- 
 sanctioned requiem at the tomb. 
 
 The Friend has provided his own burial grounds, 
 built his own meeting-houses, kept his own registries 
 of marriages, births, and burials, maintained his own 
 poor, and educated their offspring, without any lessen- 
 ing of his contribution to the public establishments, 
 and without seeking their aid. 
 
 For with all this independence no exclusiveness 
 has resulted, either in withholding sympathy, or shar- 
 ing by personal effort, in whatever might promise to 
 foster good, resist evil, or redress wrongs. " Almost 
 every crusade " (to use the words of George Gillett at 
 the Richmond Conference) " for relieving the sin and 
 suffering of the world has had for its j)ioneers members 
 of the Society of Friends, and has been sustained by 
 the gifts and self denying work of its members, who 
 have gone out to work in the service and love of Him 
 who has redeemed them." 
 
 The Friend is one who has endeavoured to live at 
 peace with all men, to seek for the good of all, and love 
 the good in all. 
 
 Thus it is rare for his name to appear in lawsuits, 
 for differences with his brethren are the subject of ad- 
 justment by arbitration rather than litigation. Seldom 
 have the officers of justice had to seek his dwelling on 
 a criminal charge, and the few sad instances that have 
 occurred, owe much of their notoriety to their in- 
 frequency. 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 269 
 
 Surely the followers of this principle of life in 
 Christ Jesus our Saviour have manifested His presence 
 and power in an outward conduct in life, both varied 
 and prolonged, and have shown how — through divine 
 assistance — there may be a "living holily, justly, and 
 unblamably," amid the activities and trials incident to 
 a thorough participation in social, commercial and 
 industrial life. 
 
 " In busy lane or crowded mart 
 Plying their daily tasks with busier feet, 
 Because their inmost souls a holy strain repeat." 
 
 Any fresh sense of this arising from a review of 
 their history and organization will, it may be hoped, 
 Btir all to come more and more into that personal 
 realization of the present appearing in the heart "of 
 the great God our Saviour," whereby a consciousness 
 arises of power for good and power against evil, not of 
 inan, nor of submission to man-administered Cere- 
 monial, however ancient, nor of faith in man's elabor- 
 ated creeds. 
 
 In closing this imperfect review it may be allow- 
 able to revert to the scene with which it commenced, 
 and stand as it were beside the solitary traveller on 
 that Lancashire Mount of observation. What he saw 
 in prospective gaze — of a great people, white in their 
 raiment, a prepared people — we now see in retro- 
 spective glance to have been realised in the benefi- 
 cent course of the Society. 
 
 From Pendle Hill to a Richmond of the Americaii 
 Prairies is as far as the East is from the West, and so 
 
270 
 
 THE FRIENDS. 
 
 far throughout two centuries and more of time, has the 
 Community which that Leicestershire shepherd was 
 commissioned to inaugurate, flowed in its beneficent 
 coarse. 
 
 It burst forth like a .Jordan at once, a full and 
 rushing river that no rocks of persecution could stay, 
 nor has its wide expansion over level ground arrested 
 its living impulse, but rather self-reformation has sent 
 it onward in fertilising channels of many sided 
 philanthropy, until now its share in modern Christian 
 effort keeps it from being lost in fruitless admiration 
 of a past career. 
 
 Happily the present Generation is yielding proof 
 of this in Word and Deed, and one who is himself an 
 earnest worker, and whose ancestry is from the region 
 George Fox thus overlooked, has claimed that Friends 
 are possessed of six special weapons that qualify them 
 in a particular way for the evangelisation of the 
 masses. 
 
 1. Their belief that God has a witness for Himself 
 in the soul of every human being. 
 
 2. Their belief in the immediate and direct 
 guidance of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 3. Their belief that Salvation may be obtained 
 through Christ alone. 
 
 4. Their disuse of outward Rites and Ceremonies. 
 
 5. The absence of a paid ministry. 
 
 6. Their democratic form of Church Government. 
 May all these efforts be conducted on the basis 
 
 of the Divine injunction, " One is your Master, even 
 
THE FRIENDS. 
 
 271 
 
 Christ, and all ye are brethren," with the aim and result 
 of yet bringing a "prepared," people, able themselves 
 to say, "We were ccthing, Christ is all." For — as 
 the Yearly Meeting has expressed it — "Union with 
 Him is Life, Separation from Him is Death. 
 
i'NDEX. 
 
 Aberdeen, Friends in, 72. 
 Aborigines' Protection Society, 
 192. 
 
 Ackworth School, 171-174. 
 Adult Schools, Commencement of, 
 245 
 
 "Advices," 165. 
 Aldam, Thomas, 28, 38 
 Allen, Stafford, 241. 
 Allen, William, 189, 218. 
 Alsop, Christine, 254. 
 Ames, William, 34, 94, 95. 
 Amsterdam, Friends' Meeting in, 
 97. 
 
 "Apology," Barclay's, 75. 
 Arbitration, 216. 
 Armistead, William, 13G. 
 Annstrong, William, 137. 
 Arscott, Ale.xander, 40. 
 Art, Friends and, 231. 
 Atkinson, Aaron, 135. 
 Andland, John, 34. 
 Austin, Ann, 45. 
 Australasia, Friends in, 2G5. 
 
 Backhouse, James, 238, 255. 
 Bangs, Benjamin, 40. 
 Banister, Mary, 136. 
 Baptism, Friends' belief about, 
 
 261. 
 Barbadoes, 97. 
 Barclay, Christiana, 45. 
 Barclay, David, 73. 
 Barclay, Robert, 75. 
 Barclay's "Apology," 75, 2.50. 
 Barnardiston, Giles, 35. 
 Barrow, Robert, 135. 
 Barry, John Thomas, 192 
 Benizet, Anthony, 198, 2C(i. 
 Bedford, Peter, 190. 
 Births, Marriages, and Deaths, 
 
 14G. 
 
 Boston Persecutions, The, 107. 
 Bownas, Samuel, 136. 
 Braddock, Thomas, 88. 
 Brewin, William, 239. 
 Bright, John, 195. 
 Brisbane, Friends in, 356. 
 British and Foreign Bible Society, 
 194. 
 
 Bri tish and Foreign School Soci ety, 
 189. 
 
 Brumana, Missions at, 242. 
 BunhiU Fields, Work in, 243. 
 Bunyan, John, 67. 
 Burial of George Fox, 143. 
 Burnyeat, John, 28, 37. 
 Burrough, Edward, 28, 29, 30, 52, 
 
 83, 84. 
 Buttery, Isabel, 45. 
 Buxton, Anna, 185. 
 Buxton. Sir Thomas Fowell, 188. 
 
 Callovi'hill, Hannah, marries 
 
 William Penn, 131. 
 Camm, John, 35. 
 Capital Punishment, Friends and, 
 
 89, 192. 
 Capper, Samuel, 243. 
 Carver, Richard, 65. 
 Caton, William, 36. 
 Character Sketches of Early 
 
 Friends, 28. 
 Charles II., Accession of, 46. 
 Children, 163, 167. 
 China, Friends' Mission in, 240. 
 Churchman, John, 138. 
 Clark, Mary, 109. 
 Clarkson, Thomas, 188. 
 Clergy, 2,000 dispossessed, 46. 
 Clibborn, John. 87. 
 Coale, Josiah, 36. 
 Cromwell, George Fox's interview 
 
 with, 33. 
 
274 
 
 I1?DEX. 
 
 Dahl, Endro, 251, 252. 
 
 Ualton, John, 230. 
 
 Deaths of Friends in Prisons, 65. 
 
 Declaration of Allegiance and 
 Fidelity, 144. 
 
 Declaration of Faith by Friends 
 in Barbadoes, 98. 
 
 Declaration of Faith at the Rich- 
 mond Conference, 25S-2G3. 
 
 Devonshire House Premises, The, 
 154. 
 
 Dewsbury, William, 35, 51. 
 Dickenson, James, 40, 137. 
 Dillwyn, George, 139. 
 Direct access to God open to all, 
 26G. 
 
 Directory, The, 14, 25. 
 Discipline, Origin of Friends', 55, 
 145-147. 
 
 Distinctive characteristics, 271. 
 Dobbs, John, 89. 
 Doctrine, 1,59, 258-263. 
 Downer, Ann, 45. 
 Dyer, Mary, 109. 
 
 East End of London, Friends' 
 
 work in, 243. 
 Edmundson, William, 82, 86. 
 Education, 169, 189. 
 Elders, 57. 
 JOllerton, Mary 136. 
 JOlIis, Lewis, 44. 
 Ellis, William, 135. 
 ]Clhvood, Thomas, 51. 
 Eminent Men connected with 
 
 Friends, 233. 
 Emlen, Samuel, 138. 
 ]''.ngineers among Friends, 232. 
 E-taugh, John, 136. 
 
 l-aith. Declaration of, 258-2G3. 
 I'-amsworth, Richard, 28. 
 Farrington, Abraham, 138. 
 Fell, Judge, 5, 8. 
 Fell, Margaret, 5-7, 140, 141. 
 Fifth Monarchy Men, 47. 
 First Preaching Friends, Nan 
 
 of, 28. 
 Fisher, Mary, 45, 108. 
 Viahm, Samuel, 36. 
 
 Flexibility, 267. 
 
 Foreign Service, 92. 
 
 Forster, Josiah, 185. 
 
 Forster, William, 184. 
 
 Forster, William Edward, 195. 
 
 Fothergill, Dr. John, 171. 
 
 Fothergill, John, 136. 
 
 Fox, George, 1, 8, 10, 11, 14-19, SS, 
 
 56, 85, 99, 113, 114, 140-143. 
 France. Friends in, 252. 
 Friends' Foreign Mission Associ« 
 
 ation, 240, 245. 
 Fry, Elizabeth, 191. 
 
 Gaols, 4,230 Friends in, 51. 
 
 Condition of, 51. 
 
 Gbouge I., Accession of, 69. 
 Germany, Friends in, 94, 240. 
 Gill, Roger, 135 
 Graham, James, 137. 
 Grellett, Stephen, 238, 249, 254, 
 Grubb, Sarah, 240. 
 Gurney, Josejih John, 183. 
 Gurney, Priscilla, 188. 
 
 Hale, Sir Matthew, 142. 
 
 Halhead, Miles, 39. 
 
 Hat, Non-removal of, 23. 
 
 Henderson, Patrick, 136. 
 I Hicks, Elias, 177. 
 I Hicksite and Orthodox, 179. 
 
 Hipsley, Henry, 239. 
 
 Hobart Friends' School, 25.5. 
 
 Hodgkin, Dr. Thomas, 192. 
 
 Holland, Friends in, 94. 
 
 Geo. Fox in, 96. 
 
 Holy Spirit, Friends' belief about 
 the, 2.59. 
 
 Home Life of Friends, 234-236. 
 
 Home Mission Work, 242, 244. 
 
 Home Mission Committee, 246. 
 
 Hooton, Elizabeth, 45. 
 
 Howgill, Francis, 28, 36, 83. 
 
 Hubberthorn, Richard, 39, 53. 
 
 Hunt, William. 45. 
 
 India, Friends' Mission in, 2^. 
 Indians, Treatment of, by I-3nn. 
 126-8. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 275 
 
 Industrial Pursuits of Friends, 
 221. 
 
 Insane, Treatment of, by Friends, 
 
 207, 209. 
 Ireland, Early Friends in, 82. 
 
 Modern Friends in, 90, 
 
 214. 
 
 Persecutions in, 85. 
 
 Jacob, Elizabeth, 90. 
 Jaffray, Alexander, 72. 
 Jaffray, Andrew, 78. 
 Jamaica, 99. 
 Jamks II., C7. 
 Jeffrey, Russell, 239. 
 Journal of George Fo.x, 99. 
 Justitication, Doctrine of, 360. 
 
 Keith, George, 77. 
 King, F. T., 218. 
 
 Lancaster, Joseph, 189. 
 
 Langdale, Josiah, 135. 
 
 Langworth, Roger, 135. 
 
 Latey, Gilbert, 60. 
 
 Law Proceedings, Friends' objec- 
 tion to, 146. 
 
 Lay, Benjamin, 199. 
 
 Lectures as a means of Religious 
 Instruction, 31. 
 
 Leddra, William, 110. 
 
 Legal Profession, Friends in the, 
 231. 
 
 Lightfoot, ISIichael, 138. 
 Lindsay, Robert, 23'.». 
 Literature, Friends iiromineE.'i in, 
 232. 
 
 Liturgy forbidden, 31. 
 Liturgy restored, 46. 
 Living Rooms in Meeting Houses, 
 01. 
 
 Livingston, Patrick, 70. 
 
 Lloyds, The, in Pennsylvania, 13S 
 
 Lodge, Robert, 37. 
 
 Loe, Thomas, 37, 119. 
 
 Logan, James, 139. 
 
 London, Distress of, after the 
 
 Fire, etc., 53. 
 Lord's Supper, Friends' Belief 
 
 about The, 261. 
 
 ' Macliie, Frederick, 239. 
 Majoliers, The, 253. 
 
 Remarkable family 
 
 story, 254. 
 Marriage, 146, 167, 262. 
 Martin, James, 135. 
 ^Ia.s.sachussetts, First Friends ir, 
 102. 
 
 Persecutions in, 
 
 102, lOG-110. 
 Mead, William, 110. 
 Medical Profession, Friends in 
 
 the, 231. 
 
 Meeting Houses, Establishment 
 of, 59. 
 
 ■ Wrecking of, 59. 
 
 Planfordffeating 
 
 law respecting, 60. 
 
 Care of, 147. 
 
 Meetings, Severe Restrictions on, 
 48. 
 
 Melbourne, Friends in, 256. 
 Ministry, 147, 101, 185, 235,261,260. 
 
 Instance of valued, 23(;. 
 
 " Minutes and Advices of the 
 
 Yearly Meeting," 151. 
 Missionaries among Early Frion ds, 
 
 92. 
 
 Missions, 238. 
 
 Monitorial System in Schools, 189. 
 Monthly Meeting, The, 55, 57. 
 Morris, Sarah, 138. 
 Morris, Susanna, 138. 
 Murray, Lindley, 170. 
 
 ! Nayler, James, 41. 
 
 Newgate, Early Friends in, 6i 
 1 Newland, George, 44. 
 
 Nicholson, Joseph, 110. 
 j " No Cross, No Crown," 120. 
 
 Norton, Humphrey, 109. 
 I Norway and Denmark, Friends 
 in, 250. 
 
 Norwegian inquirer. Story of a, 
 2.50. 
 
 Oaths, 24, 2G2. 
 Oath of Allegiance, 49, 65. 
 Occupations of Early Friends, 28 
 " Order of Release," 05. 
 Organization of the Society, 53. 
 See Di'cipJine, 
 
276 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Overton, Samuel. 40. 
 
 Parents. Counsel to, 1G3. 
 Parker, Alexander, 28, 37. 
 Parnel, James, 43. 
 Pastorius, 9G. 
 
 Peace Principles of Friends, 211- 
 220. 
 
 Pemberton, Israel, 137. 
 Penn, Admiral, 110, IIS, 121. 
 Penn, Guli, Death of, 131. 
 Penn, William, 116-133. 
 Peningtons, The, 122. 
 Pennsylvania, 116, 117, 123, 124, 
 129. 133. 
 
 Pennsylvania, MinisteringFriends 
 
 in, 13.5-139. 
 Personal Ajipearance of George 
 
 Fox, 17. 
 Philadeli)hia, 124. 133. 
 Philanthropy, Friends and, 187. 
 Phillips, William, 188. 
 Poor, Friends'careof their,147>lT3 
 Portrait of GeorgeFox byLely, 17. 
 Prayer, 262. 
 Preaching, 261. 
 
 Quaker, Origin of the name, 14. 
 Quarterly Meetings, Growth of.57. 
 "Queries," The, 152. 
 
 Railways, Friends and, 227. 
 Keligious state of England in 
 
 George Fox's umc, 13. 
 Remarkal'l'' .1 !><•.. v.tv of George 
 
 Fox's r. in;,in^. 1 i:;. 
 Reproacliful inilmt <jf early 
 
 Friends explained, 40, 111. 
 Restoratic'n, The, 40. 
 Retreat, Tiie York, 20^. 
 Richardson, George, 239. 
 Riehard.son, John, 130. 
 Richmond Conference, The. 257. 
 without 
 
 Authority. 263. 
 Robinson, William, 109. 
 Rous, John, 108. 
 
 Kall eld, John, 136. 
 Salthouse, 'i homa.s, 39. 
 Savery, William, 1<S, 
 
 Scarborough Castle, George I'ox 
 in, 72. 
 
 Science, Friends and, 230. 
 Schism, Case of, in London, 180. 
 Schools, Particulars of Friends', 
 174. 
 
 Scotch Presbyterianism, 80. 
 
 Scotland, Early Friends in, 72. 
 
 Emigration of Frienda 
 
 from, 81. 
 
 Fewness of Friends in, 
 
 explained, 81. 
 
 Secession, The First, 175. 
 
 The Hicksite, 176. 
 
 of 1836, 182. 
 
 Sects, Confusion of, under Crom- 
 well, 32. 
 
 Settlements, Early American, 
 
 101, 102. 
 Sewel's History, 97. 
 Sewell, Joseph S., 240. 
 Sharp, Isaac, 239. 
 Shilhtoe, Thomas, 23-!. 
 Simplicity of Life enjoined, 1G3. 
 Slavery, Friends and, 188, 190, 200. 
 
 Associationfor Abolition 
 
 of, 201. 
 
 Appeal of the Yearly 
 
 Meeting respecting, 
 202. 
 
 Speech, Peculiarity of Friends', 2;> 
 Spitalfields, Work in, 243. 
 
 I Springett, Sir W., 122. 
 Stanton, Daniel, 1.38. 
 
 j State of England, 31. 
 
 I Statistics of Early Friends in 
 
 j London, 29. 
 
 I of Early Friends in 
 
 j Prisons, 51. 
 
 ! of Deaths of Friends in 
 
 Prisons, 51, 52. 
 
 I of Persecutions, 65, 85. 
 
 I oi" American Friends, 
 
 100. 
 
 of AdulD Schools, 215 
 
 Stevenson, Marmaduke, 109. 
 
 George, 227-229. 
 
 Story, Christopher, 40. 
 
 Story of George Fox, 114. 
 
 Stubbs, John, 36. 
 
 Sufferings of Friends under Charl s 
 
 I — in Ireland, 8."i 
 
INDEX. 
 
 277 
 
 Sunimarv of the Friend's faitli 
 
 and character, 2G4. 
 Swarthuiore Hall, 5. 
 Syria, Friends in, 241. 
 
 Taylor, Christopher, 38. 
 Taylor, Thomas, 38. 
 Temperance Movement, The, 193. 
 Thompson, Thomas, 135. 
 Tested, Elias, 252. 
 Transportations of Friends, 05. 
 Treaty, Penn's, 128. 
 Trotter, Benjamin, 138. 
 Tuke, Samuel, 185. 
 Turkey, Friends' work in, 240. 
 Turner, John, 137. 
 Turner, Thomas, 136. 
 Tyler, Jonathan, 135. 
 
 United States Constitution, 
 Friends' Influence on, ]'J5. 
 
 Waldemier, Theophilus, 241. 
 Waldenfield, 39. 
 Walker, G. W., 238, 255. 
 Wain, Nicholas, 139. 
 War, Friends' Testimony against, 
 211-220, 2G2. 
 George Fox's Feeling about 
 
 William Penn and, 213. 
 
 Friends' Philanthropic Part 
 
 in, 215. 
 
 The American, 218. 
 
 Heroic Testimony against, 
 
 219. 
 
 Warden, ^alph, 135. 
 Wenlock, CJOristison, 110. 
 West Indies, Friends in, 97. 
 Wheeler, Daniel, 239. 
 White, Joseph, 138. 
 Whitehead, George, 28, 03, C4, G6, 
 
 67, G8, 69, 70. 
 Widders, Robert, 28. 
 Wilkinson, Samuel, 13G. 
 William and Mart, Accession of. 
 
 G3. 
 
 Williams, Roger, 102. 
 Women Friends, Early, 45, !)7. 
 
 Influence of, 150. 
 
 — Provided with a 
 
 Meeting House, 155. 
 "Woodhouse," Voyage of the, 
 
 103-105. 
 
 Woolman, John, 138, 198, 200. 
 Worship, 160, 261. 
 
 Yeardley, John and Martha, 23'J, 
 240. 
 
 Yearly Meeting, Manner of Con- 
 ducting, 148. 
 Young Friends, Service of, 45, 167. 
 Young, Thomas, 231. 
 
LONDON : 
 
 Milton Smith & Co , Ltd , Devonshire Strejt, Bishopsgate, E C. 
 1897. 
 
Date Due 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 — 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 PRINTED 
 
 IN U. S. A.