Part 2

[2] The following passage from an American life of George Fox, coming from a reliable Quaker source, corroborates this assertion. Speaking of the early Friends the writer says:--"Their belief in a divine communication between the soul of man and its Almighty Creator, through the medium of the Holy Spirit, by which the Christian may be 'led into all truth,' did not at all lessen their regard for the authority of the Holy Scriptures _as the test of doctrines_. They constantly professed their willingness that all their principles and practices should be tried by them; and that whatsoever any, who pretended to the guidance of the Spirit, either said or did which was contrary to their testimony, ought to be rejected as a Satanic delusion; and also, that 'what is not read therein nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an article of faith.'" Page 357.

[3] The reader will not mistake this for an assertion that Friends have surrendered the doctrine of the Divine guidance and indwelling. For a fuller discussion of the question see the close of the sketch of Barclay.

Since Macaulay so grossly caricatured Fox, it has been assumed that Penn and Barclay added to Fox's ideas whatever was meritorious in Quakerism. On the contrary, not only the theology of the society and its polity, but also its philanthropy and its enlightened views on religious liberty, must be ascribed to him as their chief exponent. If the Quakers object to call him their Founder, it is only because they wish to honour God, rather than the human instrument. They never hesitate to give him his due, nor do they falsify their own teachings by seeking to win favour for them by great names. There is no clearer testimony than that of Penn, that Fox's services received full recognition in the Society during his life-time. Indeed the position accorded him moved the envy of some, in spite of his own meekness and humble carriage.

Fox's personal spiritual experience may be regarded as the laying of the foundation-stone of Quakerism. Now let us turn to the rearing of the superstructure. Having learnt where to look for help and enlightenment, his heart soon found rest. His bodily strength returned, and his mind as well as his soul received a vast impulse. He seemed to have a sympathetic insight not only into the hearts of men, but also into the secrets of nature, so that at one time he questioned whether he ought not to practice medicine. To the end of his life he remained an ardent lover of nature and of science, so that his friend, William Penn, calls him "a divine and naturalist too, and all of God Almighty's making." But soon he settled down to his true life-work as an itinerant preacher of the gospel. His patrimony was sufficient to enable him to devote himself freely to the work. In his wanderings in search of light, he had made the acquaintance of many anxious seekers after truth. To these he naturally went in the joy and ardour of his heart, to tell them what God had taught him; and many of them received "the truth." His first convert was a woman, Elizabeth Hooton, who also became the first lady preacher in the new Society, and after much service died in the West Indies, whilst accompanying Fox and others on a preaching tour. Soon we find him preaching in ordinary congregations, and in the conferences common in that day, and gaining a name for spiritual discernment.

Though but a youth of 23 when he began to preach, there was a spiritual power attending his ministry that was remarkable. Macaulay speaks of his "chant" in preaching; many Welsh preachers now "chant" the gospel with great effect, and the recitative in Mrs. Fry's ministry was acknowledged to be wonderfully impressive. But it must not be supposed that it was deliberately chosen, it is probable that he fell into it unconsciously. The intensity of his emotion too added to the impression; his large frame quivered and shook with his strong feeling. Charles Lamb has given a vivid description of what he calls "The Foxian orgasm:" probably the description would accurately apply to Fox. We can judge from his Journal how keen and penetrating his appeals must have been, and how exultant his praises and thanksgivings.

Then again he preached, not metaphysics, nor formal theology, but a living, present Christ. He told his experience with pathos and power. No wonder that people wept and laughed for joy, for they felt it was true glad tidings that he brought. His word was literally "in power and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance," and many received it as the word of God to them. Soon his converts were numbered by hundreds. In 1647 he first began to preach publicly, and in that and the next year several "meetings" were gathered.

Any one who passes along the East Lancashire Railway from Colne to Burnley, must be struck by the towering grandeur of Pendle Hill; and if he climbs it, he will be rewarded by a glorious panorama. Whilst looking on this magnificent view, George Fox tells us he had a vision, in which he saw that this region would be the home of thousands of Quakers; and certainly nowhere did Quakerism find such a stronghold, and receive such sturdy helpers and gifted preachers. Alas! the glory has departed! Partly as the result of extensive emigration, many of the meeting-houses then so full of devout worshippers are now empty, whilst in some others a formal few, whom Fox would hardly acknowledge as his followers, meet in cold silence sabbath by sabbath.

Fox did not long work single-handed; in a few years, especially from this district on and about the Penine Range, a band of preachers gathered round him whom Quakers still delight to honour. In 1654 he tells us there were sixty preaching in all parts of England and Wales. Some of his helpers had been ministers, like Francis Howgill and John Audland. But it was not taken for granted that they would still preach, unless there was the manifest call. Thus Thomas Lawson, a clergyman at Ramside near Ulverston, a man of considerable learning, seems to have relinquished preaching when he was converted by Fox. He was a great botanist, and says Sewel, "one of the most skilful herbalists in England," so he seems to have gained his livelihood by this skill and by tuition. Yet the authoress of "The Fells of Swarthmoor Hall" calls him a man of fervid eloquence, so that it was not lack of gifts that kept him from preaching, but it must have been the persuasion that he was not called to the work. So in our own day, that master of eloquence, John Bright, though a man of strong religious feeling, never preaches, in spite of the freedom which Quakerism allows.

Besides clergymen and other ministers, the converts included magistrates, like Justice Hotham and Anthony Pearson, author of "The Great Case of Tithes;" and officers in the army like Col. West and Capt. Pursloe, besides gentlemen of substance and standing like I. Pennington, and scholars like Samuel Fisher and Thomas Lawson just mentioned. But among them all Fox stood chief, not only as the father of the fathers among them, but also in his firm and clear grasp of the truth, his entire devotion, his gifts of leadership, his many labours and sufferings, and his God-given success. "I notice," says a contemporary letter, "that in any company when George is present all the rest are silent;" and a joint letter by Edward Burrough and Francis Howgill says, "Oh but for one hour of his company! what a treasure it would be to us!" Even those who had held similar views before they met with him, often gained from him more clearness of view and fulness of knowledge.

The manner of conducting the Quaker "meetings for worship," was the result of practical conviction rather than of theory. They thought that for Christians to meet together in order to go through a stated form of service, was at once to cramp the outpouring of the heart to God, and to interfere with the Holy Spirit in his direction of the utterances of Christ's ministers. When they met in silence, each could speak to God what was in his heart, and each could hear in his spirit "what God the Lord would speak;" and if any one was "moved" to declare any truth, the way was clear. Thus Christ was owned practically as a present Lord, and the Holy Spirit trusted as a real and practical guide. They read in their New Testaments that when the saints met together, all the gifted might prophesy one by one as anything was revealed to them; and that each might contribute to the service his psalm of thanksgiving, or hymn of adoration, or edifying doctrine. It seemed to them that in the "apostacy" of the churches not only the rights of private Christians, but the claims of the Holy Spirit had been interfered with by the "one-man ministry." And probably none of them, whatever his gift of discernment, imagined in those days of burning zeal and abundant labours, that the time would come when their simple system would prove a rigid bond, which would leave half their meetings without ministry of any kind. Encouragement of a true ministry is as needful as discouragement of the spurious.

Very early in the history of the Society, the distinguishing views of Friends on the Sacraments were clearly enunciated. In 1656, Fox sent out a manifesto clearly stating his views, especially on the Lord's Supper. He thought the outward rites were simply adaptations of Jewish customs, temporary condescensions to the weakness of the converts from Judaism until the destruction of Jerusalem, and even during that period, optional, not obligatory. If the early Christians kept up the old custom of sipping the wine and breaking the bread, then they must do it in remembrance of Christ's death, and not of the deliverance from the bondage of Egypt. But he believed the outward rite Jewish in its style, and foreign to the pure spirituality of Christianity. So also with regard to Baptism.[4]

[4] The other leading "testimonies" of Friends were against all war, and against oaths, even in a court of justice.

There were two kinds of service which the devoted leader rendered to Christian truth--he preached it with zeal and unction, and he suffered for its sake. His sufferings were unquestionably often the result of his own unwisdom. Many Friends themselves now lament his want of a conciliatory spirit. He could not put himself in the place of others, so as to see how they viewed himself, his conduct and his claims. Thus he was constantly led to impute dishonest and impure motives to others if they did not agree with him. All but his own unpaid ministers were "priests" and "hirelings" and so on. But nothing can justify the treatment he received, often through the connivance, sometimes from the instigation, of clergymen and magistrates. Whitefield's hootings and peltings were nothing, in comparison with Fox's stonings, and brutal beatings, and horrible imprisonments. As Marsden says, "He rebuked sin with the authority of a prophet, and he met with a prophet's reward."

We must remember in extenuation of his admitted faults that he aimed to be a reformer, appealing afresh to first principles in conduct, and seeking to arouse others to feel their force. He purposely set himself against mere conventionalism, especially when it fostered pride or cloaked some rottenness in society. When persecuted, he never resorted to flattery or depended on wheedling, but appealed to conscience and to the humane or Christian feelings which ought to have been in the breast of the persecutor.

He proved to the full the power of passive endurance. Smitten on the one cheek, he literally turned the other. He believed that a large share of his work for the Master was in the testimony of suffering, and he was more anxious to be obedient than to avoid what seemed to him the pains and penalties of obedience. He would not walk out of prison unless he could do it not only honourably, but conscientiously, satisfied that he was not flinching from his appointed testimony. He truly gloried in afflictions for Christ's sake. While refusing to honour an unchristian statute by keeping it, he bore patiently and unresistingly the legal penalties, unshaken in his loyalty to the government and unsoured in his disposition towards mankind. But further, Fox clearly saw that endurance was sure to end in victory, and he inspired his friends with the same conviction. "The more they imprison me," he writes triumphantly, "the more the truth spreads." In the same spirit said William Penn at a later date, "I will weary out their malice. Neither great nor good things were ever attained without loss and hardship. The man that would reap and not labour must perish in disappointment." No wonder that men grew weary of punishing those who endured in this spirit. No wonder that the lofty conscientiousness of the Quakers was felt to be the salt which had a large share in counteracting the corruption of the Stuart reigns, and in preserving our civil and religious liberties. Says Orme in his Life of Baxter, "The heroic and persevering conduct of the Quakers in withstanding the interferences of government with the rights of conscience, by which they finally secured those peculiar privileges they so richly deserve to enjoy, entitles them to the veneration of all the friends of civil and religious liberty." And again he says, "Had there been more of the same determined spirit among others which the Friends displayed, the sufferings of all parties would sooner have come to an end. The government must have given way, as the spirit of the country would have been effectually roused. The conduct of the Quakers was infinitely to their honour."

Meanwhile Fox abounded in labours, sparing no exertions to make known the truth and to plead for righteousness. He sought a purer life as much as a purer faith. He went into public houses to plead for temperance, and into fairs to plead for uprightness and honesty, and into courts to plead for justice, as well as into churches to plead for spiritual religion. We must not forget that in those fermenting times it was no uncommon thing for questions and remarks to be thrown at the preacher during divine service, and it was considered quite in order for any one to address the people after the clergyman had finished his sermon. Thus when Fox was speaking in the Ulverston Church, Justice Sawrey cried, "Take him away," but Margaret Fell interposed, "Let him alone; why may not he speak _as well as any other_?" So that these interruptions were not considered so strange and disorderly then as they seem to us now. But public feeling was against the man and against the truths he preached, and to that public feeling he could not and would not yield. He could not take off his hat before the great, for that was an honour which he reserved for God alone. He felt bound to protest against all flattering titles and speeches, which, though the world counts them harmless civilities, seemed to his sober spirit and delicate conscience such as should neither be given nor received by the followers of the lowly Nazarene. His "thee and thou," and plain speaking, and sober dress, and keen rebukes, brought on him a perfect storm of anger and abuse. He felt that he stood in the forefront of the battle against worldliness, and bore the brunt of it; and he was meekly thankful for such an honourable post.

His first imprisonment was at Nottingham, for interrupting divine service; but he had his triumph, the very Sheriff was converted, and compelled by his new-found zeal to go forth into the market-place, and take up the imprisoned preacher's work. His second term soon followed at Derby, on a charge of blasphemy. He believed in the doctrine of perfection, and told those who opposed him that they pleaded for sin. The Derby Magistrates asked him if he was sanctified, and he answered, "Yes." "Then they asked me if I had no sin? I answered 'Christ my Saviour has taken away my sin and in Him there is no sin.' They asked how we knew that Christ did abide in us? I said, 'By His Spirit that he has given us.' They temptingly asked if any of us were Christ? I answered, 'Nay, we were nothing, Christ is all.'" Yet they found him guilty of blasphemy, confounding him with the fanatical, antinomian Ranters. But if he taught perfection, Oh! how he lived! Let those that reject his teaching excel, or at least equal, his living. In Derby, his jailer was converted, to strengthen and comfort him in his sufferings. Whilst in prison his busy pen poured forth many letters of advice to Friends, and "testimonies" against all forms of iniquity, including war and capital punishment.

Before he was 27, Fox had passed through more varied experience than many have in a long life-time. Honour and revilings, converts and imprisonments, love for the gospel's sake and cruel beatings by the mob, nearly ending in death--these had already been his portion. But his work was now bearing much fruit. In one twelve-months, 1650-1, he gained such staunch helpers as Richard Farnsworth, James Nayler, William Dewsbury, Justice Hotham, and Captain Purslow. Soon afterwards the Fells of Swarthmoor were led to Christ by his preaching and became the most devoted of adherents. Soon his followers could be numbered by thousands. It was not the strength of his arguments that gained them; the age was overdone with reasoning. Fox mocked their syllogisms with grim humour. There was a wonderful spiritual power about him. He spoke naturally, with simple, direct earnestness, and overwhelming vehemence, right to the conscience of the hearers. He made people both listen and understand him, and feel the power of the truth in a way which many did not like. He was a wonderful evangelist. What his cultured convert, Isaac Pennington, the Rutherford of Quakerism, said of Friends generally, is applicable to him. They might offend his taste and move him to contempt by their intellectual poverty, but they compelled him to respect their spiritual power and their deep acquaintance with the things of God.

Then again the new Society was a real brotherhood. The members stood shoulder to shoulder as fellow servants of the one Master. Their only emulation was which should do most and suffer most cheerfully. Their great question was "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? Where wilt Thou have me to go?" The Jesuit was ready to go at an hour's notice wherever the Pope sent him. The Quaker was as ready in his obedience to the voice within. Not only Great Britain, but Italy, Turkey, Syria, and Egypt heard the truth before 1662. John Stubbs, "a remarkable Oriental scholar," and Henry Fell, who was also "well versed in Arabic and Hebrew," set out for the land of Prester John, but were stopped by the English Consul at Alexandria. Their leader was chief simply through gifts and devotedness. So strongly were Friends attached to him that when he was in Launceston gaol, one of them went to Cromwell and offered to lie in prison in his stead; which made the Protector turn to those around him and ask, "Which of you would do as much for me if I were in the same condition?" And Fox showed himself worthy of such devotion by always seeking the post of danger and the most arduous work. Urgent he might be, for he was tremendously in earnest, but to speak as Hepworth Dixon does of his "imperious instincts" simply shows ignorance of the man.

For centuries no such zealous and noble-spirited evangelism had been seen. No wonder that it won its way. Many who had been rich, like Isaac Pennington, were content to become poor by fines and distraints for "the truth's sake." Most nobly did they help each other. If they did not insist on community of goods as a theory, they carried out the spirit of it in practice.

There are two marked stages in Fox's work; first the Evangelistic Stage, and then the Organising Stage, which was, of course, overlapt by the other. Let us trace the salient points in his evangelistic work. In 1654 he was brought before Cromwell, and made a good impression on that keen judge of men. His sincerity stood testing, his zeal for God was manifestly genuine, and the grand, though not faultless Protector, learnt heartily to respect him. As he was turning to leave him, Cromwell caught him by the hand and said, "Come again to my house, for if thou and I were but an hour of a day together, we should be nearer one to the other." Next year he visited him again, to lay before him the ill-treatment to which Friends were subjected.

The meetings now gathered, wherever "the man in leather breeches" went were immense. At one in Bristol, he tells us, 10,000 people were present, and often 2000 or 3000 are mentioned as collecting to hear him. The energetic evangelist often had periods of grudged but not useless interruption of his labours by imprisonment. Indeed, as Mr. W. E. Forster says, he "would have been qualified to draw up a report of the state of the gaols of the Island, so universal and experimental was his acquaintance with them." But his imprisonments did not make him cease from labour. He wrote innumerable letters and tracts, and he preached the gospel to those that came to see him with such effect, that one of Cromwell's Chaplains said they could not do him a greater service for spreading his principles in Cornwall, than to imprison him in Launceston gaol.

In 1656 occurred the sad episode of James Nayler's fall. He had been one of the most popular of the Quaker preachers, and had enjoyed the warm friendship of Fox and other leaders. But extravagant praise turned his head so far that he listened to blasphemous songs and invocations addressed to him by excited women, allowed them to kneel before him, and even to welcome him to Bristol with a horrible parody of our Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem. These miserable proceedings he did not like, but he excused them as honors done, not to him, but to Christ his Lord. The way in which Fox and other Friends acted in this matter was most praiseworthy. Many of the enthusiasts who misled Nayler were not truly Friends at all, and yet the Society was credited with fanaticism on account of their proceedings. Their enemies exulted in a clear case against them, and the religious world seemed justified in regarding them with suspicion. But in spite of all this, the Friends clung to the deluded man, and tried every means to open his eyes. George Fox visited him in Exeter gaol, and used every power of reason and persuasion, and at last finding he could do nothing with him, sadly gave him to understand that their friendship was at an end, and that Friends could no longer regard him as one of them. Yet still they visited him, and tried hard to gain the Protector and Parliament to their humane view of the right way of dealing with the case, and they had their reward. The cloud that obscured his mental vision passed away, and he deeply and truly repented of his sad error. He published a full recantation, took upon himself the whole blame, absolving the Society from all share; and endeavoured in every way to undo the mischief he had done. But whilst their love and gentleness had thus conquered, the barbarous spirit of the age had vindicated orthodoxy, by passing and executing the horrible sentence of branding and tongue boring. And it is sad to think, that the man who endured this torture was already a repentant man, won by love, not by severity, to confess and renounce his sin. The Quakers at once received him into full confidence and esteem, and helped him, in truly Christian fashion, to bear the results of his fall. Thus early in their history, in the midst of an age of much persecution and bigotry, were established those habits of loving Christian discipline, which have so nobly distinguished the Society ever since. But the reclaimed wanderer was not long allowed to continue his resumed preaching. In the summer of 1660 he was taken ill, and died in his 44th year.