Vicissitudes and Events befalling them The Original Mother and Nurse of the Quakers is England a Country once Famous for banishing and extirpating Heresie now the Seat and Centre of all manner of Errors The Quakers themselves Date their first Rise from the Forty Ninth Year of this present Century and 't was say they in the Fifty Second they began to increase to a considerable number from which time unto this day they and their Party have daily acquired more strength For while that Kingdom before the middle of this Century was engaged in an Intestine War occasioned by the Differences of Church-Government in that confused and dismal Juncture when both Church and State were miserably shatter'd and rent and Religion and Discipline were quite overturn'd innumerable multitudes of Men did on all hands separate from the Church and afterwards when their greatest Eye-sore and the imaginary Source of all their Evils the Episcopal Government of the Church was abolished and the Presbyterian Form of Church-Government which was what they so impatiently wish'd for and grounded all their hopes of Comfort and Peace upon was establish'd in its place yet even there were some whom nothing would satisfie that divided themselves into an innumerable Company of Sects and Factions of which this of the Quakers was one The first Ringleader Author and Propagater of Quakerism was one George Fox Some of that Party have not stood to give that Man after his Death the Title of The first and glorious Instrument of this Work and this Society the great and blessed Apostle So that as the Disciples and Followers of any Sect derive their Names from their Masters so might we call these Men Foxonians were it not unbecoming Christians to denominate themselves or others professing the Name of Christ from the Names of Men. I have many Accounts of George Fox in Writing in my hands partly dictated from his own Mouth to his Amanuensis a little before his Death partly obtain'd from his Friends and Followers and partly from others that were strangers both to George Fox and all his Society Which because they differ among themselves I shall only pick out what seems to be most probable and generally attested for it is difficult in such a case to distinguish between what is true what false George Fox was Born in the Year One Thousand Six Hundred and Twenty Four in a Village called Dreton in Leicestershire His Father Christopher Fox and his Mother Mary Lago were of no considerable Fortune but gain'd their Living by Weaving They lived devoutly and piously were of the Reformed Religion and great Zealots for the Presbyterian Party which then obtain'd in England And this their Zeal for Religion was accounted Hereditary to the Family especially on the Mother's side whose Ancestors had in the days of Queen Mary given Publick Testimony to their constant and unmoveable Zeal for the Truth and Purity of Religion not only in giving their Goods and Possessions to be confiscated and patiently undergoing the loss of the same but in yielding their Lives for a Sacrifice to the flames of devouring Fire preferring the undefiled and lasting Crown of Martyrdom to a sinful Life This George Fox while yet a Child discovered a singular Temper not coveting to Play with his Brethren or Equals nor giving himself to any of those things that take with Children but shunning their Company and disdaining their Childish Customs he loved to be much alone spoke but little or if at any time he chanc'd to speak both his Countenance and Speech bewray'd a sadness of Spirit his words were more Interrogatory shewing a great deal of Attention and Consideration and making many Observations unto all which was added Modesty in all his Actions and a diligent pursuit of the early Rudiments of Piety and Devotion so that even in his Infancy his Actions and Demeanor seemed to presignifie those Qualities of Mind which in progress of time he discover'd on the Publick Stage of the World Having spent his Infancy at home he was then sent to School to learn to Read Englâ—sh and to Write In which Study he succeeded as the other Country Boys and those of the meaner sort use to do having attained so much as that he could read Print pretty well but Writing he could read but little of neither could he write except very rudely And this was the only Piece of Learning the attain'd to all his Life long For neither then nor any time after when arriv'd at greater Maturity of Years did he ever apply himself to any Liberal Study So that he not only knew no other Language save his Mother-Tongue but even in that he was so little expert and so ill qualified either for speaking or writing all the whole course of his Life that what he understood perfectly well he could not explain or enlarge upon in any tolerable good English and far less could he deliver it in Writing in so much that he oft-times made use of Amanuenses and others who being well acquainted with his Thoughts and greater Masters of Language might put them into a better Dress And this I thought worth the Remarking because a great many Books are extant in George Fox's Name writ not only in terse English but also in Latin and interlarded with Sentences of many other Languages which are but little known to the Learned World the Names of the Interpreters or Methodizers being concealed Which whether it was an effect of great Simplicity in him or of his Ambition and Ostentation I shall not determine only it is plain that he had not the gift of Tongues George Fox having spent this part of his Life at School began then to look out for some way of Living and providing for the future part of his Life and accordingly concluded to betake himself to some Mechanick Trade that being necessary for the use and accommodation of Man could never be wanted and consquently never fail of answering the end he undertook it for such as making the Ornaments and cloathing of Humane Bodies Amongst which he chose to himself the Making of Shooes applying himself to that Art the remaining part of his Life in Nottingham the chief Town of the County of Nottingham bordering upon Leicestershire the place of his Nativity He being then a Young Man did behave himself Honestly and Modestly amongst Men walking devoutly towards God keeping close to that sense of Religion and Worship taught him by his Parents He dwelt much upon the Scriptures and when at leisure from the Exercise of his Trade as also when about it taking this advantage of his sedentary Work he Meditated upon ruminated in his Mind and recollected what he had read He had an Infallible Memory for retaining any thing he knew especially what he read in the Bible never slip'd out of his remembrance And having thus incessantly continued in the Study of the Scriptures from his Infancy to his latter end he became so exactly versed in them that there was no Remarkable Saying
Engaging and Obliging so great a Man and of promoting both his own and his Church's Interest and also inconsistent with himself who could not observe the same Measures with Superiour People that he did with those of an Inferior Rank When the Protector 's Domesticks told him that Fox had refused to stay he express'd himself after this manner It seems therefore that this People is a Sect which no fair means nor courteous dealings can gain whereas by these I have subjected all other Men to my self In this course of Fox's Life and Ministry which was properly nothing but a perpetual Pilgrimage he began now to publish Books in which he was more intent upon overturning the Religions of other Churches than in building up a new one or explaining and confirming those Doctrines that he press'd all Men to embrace He wrote also many Letters some to his Colleagues admonishing and stirring them up to their Duty others to those of a different Perswasion inviting and exhorting them to receive and entertain the Doctrines which he taught And he carefully dispersed both the Books and Letters which he likewise caused to be Printed through all the Counties of England But as Fox was constant and diligent in his Office so his Adherents and Disciples imitated their Master Preaching up and down with the greatest servour and alacrity converting great numbers of Men who not only associated themselves to them but also signalized their Courage and Constancy in the patient endurance of all manner of Labour Fatigue and Persecution it self that they might not seem to recede from the Example and Pattern of their Ring-leader Fox They met frequently together in every City or Town either in Houses in the Night-time or in the Fields Desart Places and Mountains where the top of some rising Ground served for a Pulpit to the Preacher Being therefore that they thus persisted in their irregular courses the Magistrates whose Duty it was to prevent them caused them to be Apprehended cast into Prison and kept there for some time In the mean time Cromwel the Protector by an Edict discharges the Quakers to Assemble or Congregate together Publickly having observed that to be the mind of all the Publick Churches but withal forbids either the Ecclesiasticks or any other Men to do the least Injury or harm to them while they committed nothing against the Government and Publick Constitution of the Kingdom and when any sollicited him to use greater Severity against the Quakers as Hugh Peters his Chaplain frequently did that Famous wrangler that thought he could not exercise his Function of the Ministry aright unless he filled all with Confusion and Disorder by his Tumultuous Complaints he returned this Answer That That Sect the less it was persecuted the sooner it would fall and decay of its own accord But this Order of the Protector had little or no Effect for their Adversaries never wanted occasion of Accusing them of this Crime and they themselves became daily more bold and resolute in celebrating these forbidden Assemblies Hence ensued many Miseries upon the Quakers and oft-times Bonds which they endured with the greatest Constancy imaginable of which I give you one Instance Fox continuing to disperse his Books and Letters and keeping Conventicles and Meetings notwithstanding the Protector 's Edict to the contrary choosing rather to undergo the greatest Miseries nay the loss of Life it self than to desert his Office or desist from this his wonted Course is cast into Prison at Launceston in Cornwal and bound with Chains under which Affliction he continued for a long time as I shall afterwards shew designing now to treat in order not only of the Actions of Fox but of all the Society While he was thus conâ—ined and uncapable to do any Service to his Church one of his Friends and Relations who preferred the publick Good of his Sect and of his Friend in particular to his own Safety and Peace goes to the Protector while sitting in Council and desires of him that Fox might be exempted for his Captivity and Bondage and he himself put into his stead engaging himself to answer for his Crime as if he were guilty of it himself Though Cromwel denied the Request yet he could not cease to wonder and looking to the Council says Is there any of you would do so kind an Office to his Neighbour though it conduced never so much to his and the publick Advantage But neither did the Adversaries of the Quakers want Occasion of accusing and arraigning them for being guilty of raising Tumults and rebelling against the Civil Magistrate and Publick Government as this one Example can instance There was at that time a great many foolish silly Men who were great pretenders to Religion that used to raise their Spirits by wonderful Motions of their Bodies and antick Gestures calling it Piety and Sanctity But on the other hand there was also many turbulent and factious Spirits striving to innovate and confuse all things either upon a religious or civil Pretence and if any such kind of Crimes were committed against the Government by these turbulent Fellows the Quakers were accused as being the Authors or at least Abettors and conscious of the same But the Quakers did so enervate and nullifie this Calumny that all Judges pronounced them innocent It was true indeed nor did they deny it that many who professed to be of their Society were simple and foolish morose and impertinent and not so polished in their Temper and Conversation as their Doctrine and Profession required who made it their Business to run up and down the Streets and frequented Roads shouting and crying with a hideous Noise and Clamor exhorting the People to such Endeavours as they themselves knew nothing of and who oft-times committed many Incivilities and Impertinencies But they denied that this was peculiar to their Sect or Discipline for they who had Authority among them reproved and severely check'd such as were guilty of the like Enormities and threatned to expell them from their Society unless they amended their Ways of which more afterwards About this time many Converts of various Stations and Professions were added to this new Church and were afterwards invested with the Ministerial Function among them who became famous not only enlarging their own Credit and Reputation but that of their Sect both in the Island of Britain and in the United Provinces of Holland so that it shall not be improper in this place to give some account of them such as the designed Brevity of this Work may allow William Ames flourished at this time a Man of an acute Ingeny and indefatigable Industry both in Teaching Preaching and Writing and so much admired by these Men in this Country Holland that they do not stick to proclaim him a perfect Doctor He was born in Somersetshire near Bristol but was ill educated in his Infancy and Youth having applied himself to nothing that could be useful to humane Life So that being of a lazy
Temper and dissolute in his Life he betakes himself to the Soldiery that common Refuge for Sluggards and Covert to all manner of Wickedness joyning himself unto the King's Army which in those days was the most debauch'd and wicked Crew upon Earth He first serv'd therefore in the King's Army till the Death of King Charles I. Then he becomes a Marine Soldier under Prince Rupert in the Admiral 's own Ship in which were many Dutchmen by whose Converse he acquir'd Knowledge of that Language In the mean time he begins to return to his right Wits and repent of his by-past Actions and manner of Life But because he was not capable of exercising any other Trade for purchasing a Livelihood than that of being a Soldier though he now despis'd a Military Life as being liable to many Inconveniencies yet he continued in the same Condition of Life still even after his Mind was thus alter'd joyning himself to the Parliament's Army then in Ireland in which he was made Serjeant to a Company of Foot in one Ingoldsby's Regiment He preferred being in this Army than elsewhere because he thought there was many good Pious Men in it and Military Discipline better observ'd Moreover many in that Army both of Officers and Centinels were of the Sect called Baptists who do not differ from the Presbyterians save only in this one Point that they do not Baptize the Members of their Church till they give publick Confession of their Faith and engage for their own behaviour of whom Ames entertain'd very favourable Thoughts and having joyn'd himself to their Church became first an Elder and then a Minister in the same It happened that while Ames was residing at Waterford a Town in Munster Francis Howgil and Edward Burrough came into Ireland and to that same very Town in order to meet and converse with the Baptists whom they they thought of all Men the most accommodated and disposed for reception of their Religion and accordingly came into their Meetings and discours'd unto them of those Matters Ames gave great Ear to all their Discourses for his Mind was yet fluctuating and unsettled in his own Religion the Cares and Thoughts of his by-past Life afflicting and distracting his Mind and in a short time apostatizes from his own Church to the Quakers among whom he became a Preacher discharging that Function to the great Satisfaction and Contentment of that Party He wrote a Tractate entituled A true Declaration of the Witness of God in Man in which he relates and explains what Sense he had of the Divine Light within him from his Infancy to his Conversion and what Resistance he gave to the same Contemporary with him was Stephen Crisp an acute and polite Meeter who if he had added the Study of those Arts and Sciences call'd Liberal to the Promptness and Agility of his Wit he had given wonderful Specimens of Learning He lived in Colchester in Essex a Weaver by Trade he serv'd in the Parliament's Army some Years having abandoned his Trade not so much for love of a Military Post as for the Defence of his Liberty and Religion so that he did not suffer himself to be tainted with the Vices of Soldiers but lived honestly and devoutly at length wearied with Fatigue and Labour he returns again to his old Trade having professed himself a Baptist at which time James Parnel came to this Town he was the first of the Quakers that preached their Doctrine in this Place where he taught and disputed publickly Crisp and his Father hearing him and being moved with his Discourses turn Quakers but the Son becomes a Preacher He died at London in September 1694. Contemporary with them was Thomas Green in his youth a Coachman but now a Dealer in Merchandize at London and John Higgins a Cobler at Dover both Men of brisk Ingenies and much esteem'd by their Associates Also John Crosby a Gentleman of Bedfordshire and Justice of the Peace famous for all manner of Learning an eloquent neat and accurate Man both in his Discourses and Writings Also Josiah Coaly of Bristol a Gentleman who in his youth having come with his other Companions to a Quakers Meeting to ridicule and mock them was so taken with their Discourses that he forsook that Course and was afterwards so much affected and mov'd by the Counsel and Advice he received from two of their Preachers that he incorporated into their Family undertaking the same Office with them of teaching others while he was yet but twenty Years of Age It is said of him that in Prayer and Supplication he did it with so much Efficacy with such a Grace and Mode of Speech tho' without Affectation that he infinitely surpassed many of his Brethren He spent most part of his Life in Travels extending his Doctrine to several parts of the New-World resolutely encountering all Dangers even that of his Life it self Another Contemporary was Isaac Pennington the younger a Gentleman also of good Birth whose Father was Mayor of London and a Man of eminent Vertue civil and humane to all and much beloved of the Citizens had not he by his Consent embru'd his hands in the Blood of the King His Son had added to the Splendor and Nobility of his Birth a diligent Study of all Liberal Arts and was much exercised in Learning not that he might gain or live by it for he had whereupon to live with a handsome and magnificent Port but that he might adorn and beautifie himself and be capable to help and assist his Brethren He spent not his Youth as many do whose Fortunes and Expectations are lâ—rge and magnificent in Idleness and Debauchery or in pampering his Belly and living intemperately but in pursuing eagerly and diligently his Studies exercising his Ingeny with such Exercises as might be profitable both to himself and others He had wrote and published many Books full of Learning and Eloquence before the Name of a Quaker was so much as heard of After he became a Quaker he wrote several Theological Tractates in a grave plain Scriptural Style The last I shall mention that liv'd about this time was Charles Marshal of Bristol a noted Physician then at London These were the Men that have over-run all Britain and the Netherlands not as Emissaries but as Ringleaders and Heads of the Party I forbear to mention the Carews the Bailzies the Smiths and many others I have selected these not as the Periods and Order of Time conjoyn'd them but as they were noted and famous both among the Quakers and others But I cannot pass by Samuel Fisher whom they all extoll for the Credit and Pillar of their Church and never speak of but with the greatest Panegyricks a Man singularly learned and wonderfully eloquent because of his accurate Knowledge of the Greek and Latin Antiquities which stuck so to him even after he changed his Religion and Life that the Writings which he published since that time relish much of the same though I believe it
Burroughs was now the first Man that introduced these Opinions into Scotland who a little while after was followed by Alexander Parker who before he took upon him this new Function exercised the Trade of a Butcher which came to pass in the Year fifty four but by the Means of these Guides and Teachers there appeared a greater Concourse of People in Scotland that espoused the Quakers Cause and consequently frequenter Meetings of them whom when the Nobility and Magistrates who from the disposition and usage of the Nation do not easily admit of a strange Religion opposed them they did the more firmly and intensly hold to it until at length a Persecution ensued and that Persons were ordered into their Houses to disturb their Meetings and hale the Men to Prisons and some they detained and handled severely for a long time but for Brevity's sake I shall add no more hereof But of Fox I have this further to say in the year fifty seven he lived in Cumberland upon the Borders of Scotland and so went thither who though he were ignorant of the Tongue yet knowing and confiding in his Companions which he took along with him and whom he was about to meet with there he made use of them for his Interpreters this man with his Friends have frequent Conferences in Houses about the Unity of Religion often preaches amongst them and goes about all Places seeking to find out or to make known if he could more of his Mind The which he endeavoured to effect with much Labour and Toyl yet he failed of his purpose for when he sometimes sent out his Messengers to invite Men to hear him Preach and appointed both Time and Place for that purpose it so happened now and then that there was not one Man came near him Besides this he made it his business here and there in the Streets where he found a concourse of People to allure Men to him but with the like success Fox also with a few Followers directed his Course to the Highlanders of Scotland who are Men of rude and unpolished Natures which when they came to hear they came down from the Hills to meet them and drove them back with their Weapons Upon this Fox goes to Edinburgh the Capital City of the Kingdom which when the Council came to know who were not ignorant of Fox's Methods and foreseeing he would not be wanting there also to play his usual and giddy Pranks they cite him to appear before them and gently require him if he had no Business in those Parts thence to depart Fox withdraws but very slowly visiting in the mean time other Towns and Places and trying to bring over Men to his Party but as I said to no effect Fox and his Companions during the time of his sojourning in Scotland endeavoured both by Libels which Fox together with his Followers and Associates wrote and by their Railleries to render the Doctrine and Articles of Faith of the Scotish Church as odious and hateful to Men as possibly they could Wherein they so demeaned themselves that the Scots thought nothing enough to be said concerning the Impudence Revilings and Cheats of those Men for they charged the Ministers of that Church and perswaded their Followers that that Church taught such Articles of Faith particularly concerning Divine Election and Reprobation and the Providence of God concerning the sins of Men according to their ungrounded Opinions and fardled Consequences as that Church not only never taught but such also as she abhorred Moreover as the Scots as well as the English and also divers of the Reformed Churches called the Lord's Day whereon Christians abstaining from their daily Labours give up themselves to the Worship of God as 't is vulgarly phrased the Sabbath-day or day of Rest according to the Appellation of the Ancient Sabbath of the Jews and seeing it did manifestly appear that all the Scotch Churches did strictly observe that day and during the whole time abstained from their Labours and demeaned themselves as reverently and decently as they could Fox and his Companions wrote and preach'd every where that the Scots did wickedly Profane the Sabbath-day by keeping of Fairs and doing of many other momentous things appertaining to their daily Labour and Business the which when they were enforced to explain themselves they did it in this manner That the Scots did those Works on the last day of the Week but that that day was truly the Sabbath-day according to God's Command delivered to the Jews Moreover Fox had this up in the whole course of his Ministry and Peregrination even to this time in what place at what time and part soever of the day he sate any where and discoursed with Men of his own Sect though there were but two or three present and that they only saluted one another this he called to have had to have found an Assembly as it were of Men for the Professing of their Religion and that the number of their People had so much increased But if there were any of his Auditors who did not cry out against them but were attentive to what was delivered and took any thing under consideration them he called convinced Persons and Associates and when it happened that at any time he met with some who prest him with some ingenious and sharp Answer or Question or Argument when he was not able to make Answer again or resolve the Question or enervate their Arguments he went his ways or thus put off the matter That it was a weighty and dangerous Disquisition that there were some Persons who made it their business to wrangle that it was a thing he did not care for and that he was very unwilling to Discourse with such Men And whereas there were not a few of the number of those that joyned with Fox and the Quakers who were part of that vast multitude that dissented from the Publick Church of England and such also as exercised the Functions of Preachers and that some of these Men were of scandalous Lives Tiplers and Alehouse-keepers Fox when he acquainted his Party with his Progresses among Men all these without any distinction did he call by one and the same name of Professors Presbyters Teachers and by such other names as were commonly used to be given to the Members and Ministers of the Publick Church thereby drawing no small Envy and Scandal upon that Church And all this Fox hath carefully set down in his journal-Journal-Books and wrote to his Friends who believed approved and published it all Moreover Fox as often as he made mention of any business that was transacted conjoyntly by himself and Friends if any thing was well managed therein there was no Name so much celebrated as his own and he was more especially a great Publisher of his own Affairs but these things I shall not pursue at large nor the History of Fox as studying brevity the Order both of the Thing and the Time requires that I should shew more
but he was forthwith and without any delay in the presence of all that were there according to the Military Practice of some Men so beaten and kick'd by the Colonel himself because he ought above any other to have desisted from such doings and practices as he had then taken upon him that he made him bleed and then was sent back to his old Prison and tyed Neck and Heels there But as there were many of Ames's fellow Soldiers and also other Soldiers who by little and little became of the Quakers Sect several of them having taken Counsel together and allotted their Work did either use their babling Interruptions in the Publick Assemblies while they were at Prayer or Preaching or fell a Trembling there or shewed some such idle and foolish Prank this Example was followed by many others both of the one and of the other Sex wherefore they were ever and anon one after another fined driven to Prisons and in some places miserably harrassed some of them were severely lashed but the Soldiers more than any until the Year Fifty Six when Colonel Ingoldsby the Governour commanded all upon a very severe Penalty to give no manner of Entertainment to any Quaker whatsoever and not suffer them to come within their Doors and that whoever did to the contrary should be expelled out of the City But it was to no purpose some indeed were driven away but their Number did even then and by that means increase and so by degrees came to hold their Assemblies Officers were sent to break open their Doors and to interrupt and disturb them some they fined others were banished but yet for all this they increased and multiplyed more and more this happened at Limerick Cork Waterford Kingsale and other places And thus did this Sect of the Quakers about the time of their rise and first Progress struggle in the time of the Common-wealth under the two Cromwels Father and Son Protectors under the many Afflictions they were put to by their Enemies and to the great hazzard both of their Religion and People The End of the First Book BOOK II. PART I. The Contents of the Second BOOK THE Endeavours of the Quakers upon the King's Restauration G. Keith R. Barclay The Quakers vain hopes concerning the King The Oath of Allegiance an inexplicable Snare to these Men. Tythes also The Cruelty of Keepers towards them Instances The King and Parliament's Disposition towards them A Letter of Fox the Younger to the King Fox his Book of many Languages concerning the Pronoun Thou Several Laws against the Quakers Hence their various Tryals Hubberthorn Burroughs and Howgil die in Prison A vain Suspicion that the Quakers cherished Popery Their Persecution at London The fall of Priscilla Mo The Burials of the Quakers The Persecuting of them at Colchester A Council held concerning Transplanting of the Quakers into the American Islands This transacted and handled several times The various and strange haps and Adventures of such as suffered this Penalty The Ecclesiastical Court The Law De Excommunicato capiendo Several Examples made upon their refusing to pay Tythes The Death of Fisher in Prison Fox's Three Years Imprisonment The Prophecy of a certain Quaker concerning the Burning of London The Troubles of the Quakers in Scotland and Ireland Keith's Doctrine of Christ being in Man Helmont concerning the Revolution of Souls rejected by the Quakers William Pen's turning Quaker A full Description thereof His singular Opinion concerning a Toleration of all Religions The Ecclefiastical state of the Quakers The Order of their Teachers A Meeting of their Teachers together Synods Liturgies or Sacred Duties How they observe the Lord's Day Their Complaint concerning the Protestants study of Divinity Their Opinion concerning a knowledge of Languages and Philosophy Of the Sallary of the Ministers of God's Word What the Call of Ministers is among them Their Discipline Their Solemnizing of Marriages Keith's Imprisonment Pen's Imprisonment at London Solomon Eccles's Fooleries and mad Pranks in several places Fox's Marriage A great Persecution of the Quakers throughout England accompanied with the greatest baseness Green's Fall Pen again and Mead with him Imprisoned at London They are Tryed Pen's Speech to the Judges A great Persecution in Southwark The notable Zeal of these Men in keeping their Assemblies A short respite from the Persecution G. Fox goes to the English Colonies in America His Imprisonment in Worcester and what was done at that time He writes several Letters more elaborately than profitably A Conference between the Quakers and Baptists R. Barclay's Apology for the Christian Theology variously received A Comparison between the Quietists and Quakers Several Persecutions of the Quakers in England The Assaulting of them in Scotland All manner of Slanders put upon the Quakers Doctrine and Life The Persecution of Bristol Of London The Quakers state under King James the Second W. Pen's Diligence for the Quakers The Quakers Affairs under King William Pen's Default Freedom and Liberty given to the Quakers by the Parliament Pen's second Default The Death of Fox The great Book written by him A Description of Fox The great Dissention between the Quakers themselves The present state of them I Have brought down the History of the Quakers to the Time of King Charles II. in whose Reign and even in the very beginning thereof as great changes happened not only in the State every thing being abrogated and taken away that had been Obstacles to the Kingly Power and Dignity or that might be so for the future but also in the Ecclesiastical Constitution for that Equality and Conjunction that ought to be between the Brethren Friends and Disciples of Christ was taken away whilst the Government thereof reverted to a few and for the most part to the King himself so there was among those Persons who were not dissatisfied with the Name Splendor and Authority of a King but with that turn in the Church no small commotion of Mind no light Care and Diligence not only that they might defend their own Churches with the Orders and Constitutions of them lest they should suffer any damage any other way but also that they might further vindicate all their Practices from the Envy of their Adversaries confirm and trim up the same and recommend them unto others Therefore this Study and Concern also seemed to be among all Persons who had as well departed from that same pitch of Religion as from that publick Religion in the very same manner did George Fox and his Colleagues and all of that Herd even every one according to his Place and Station diligently and industriously apply themselves to this Affair wherefore Fox according to his wonted manner began his Peregrination in England to visit his Friends to Preach amongst them but did not take upon him as formerly to talk in the Publick Churches Markets and Streets and there to stir up the People and seeing that he had before this attempted many things more earnestly than successfully he took diligent heed
Freedom unless they would comply with the wills and terms of such as were in Authority over them and would agree to pay Money for to be suffered to depart Of which Number there was not one to be found that would do so though the King being not long after asked and urged by some That he should not suffer any such thing which did so much wrong to his Subjects when there did appear no such Fact no not so much as an Attempt or Endeavour in them to do that for which these Men were so much accused and whereby so much infamy was cast upon them but that he should by reason of his Royal Word given them use them kindly he did at length Answer That he would be Gracious and Merciful to the Quakers provided they did nothing that was against the King's Honour and Safety and did again give his Royal Word for it It 's indeed manifest that Richard Hubberthorn one of the chief Quakers was at this time admitted to talk with the King in the presence of some Noblemen in which Conference when the King with some of his Courtiers asked Hubberthorn several close Questions concerning the Doctrine and Religion of the Quakers and that he made Answer to every thing that was asked the King and those same Persons that had Interrogated him said ever and anon It is so indeed as thou sayest and turning themselves about or to one another they said He offers nothing but the Truth And when the King proceeded to speak among other things he used these words to Hubberthorn I do assure thee that none of you shall suffer any thing for your Opinions and Religion provided ye live Peaceably you have the Word and Promise of a King for it and I will take care by a Proclamation to prevent any further Prosecution of you But seeing there were some Men who put an ill Construction upon this Conference Hubberthorn himself did in a little while after publish it in Print and did therein explain the whole Matter to all But how the King did afterward perform these many Promises in many of his Actions the Event will soon shew Neither must we pass over in this place that upbraiding Letter that was written and sent to the King by a Quaker then lying in Prison George Fox was this Quaker not he that was the first beginner and Founder of the Society of the Quakers who was indeed no ways related or a-kin to that same though most like and near unto him in Nature and Manners but one that had lately been a Trooper under O. Cromwel or in the Common-wealth's Army wherefore that he might distinguish himself from the other and older George Fox he called himself who was not so old Fox the Younger His Letter was to this effect O King he who is King of Kings sees and observes all thy Actions in the midst of Darkness and seeing that they proceed from thence even thy most hidden Counsels can by no means escape the sight of God so that there remain no lurking places for thy specious and pretended words and therefore hath he freely observed all thy Wiles and Treacheries laid for those who did no hurt and hath also manifested them unto all Men and that at the very time when thou didst make those great and fictitious Promises and only didst play the Hypocrite wherefore thou hast angred God when at the time thou didst promise Liberty unto us thou didst then suffer that outrage to be done us and the Imprisonment of so many Men for the Testimony of a good Conscience Alas how has the Pride and Impiety as well of thy House as of thy Government sadded thee for as often as I revolve within my self upon the Vnjustice Cruelty and publick Persecutions of this Country and as often as I think upon their Wickednesses that are committed in Secret so often is my Spirit grieved and in anguish and my Heart distracted by reason of the fierce wrath of the great God against all Men. And I have had it often in my thoughts both before and after thy Restauration to the Kingdom when I have considered the fixt and established Idolatry of this Land that it had been better for thee that thou hadst never come hither because I find it has been to thy Ruin and I have often prayed to God that thou wouldst become of that Mind as to depart again out of the Kingdom that while thou hast Life left thee and space to Repent thou mayest Repent of thine Iniquities do not O King suffer any one to flatter thee God will not be mocked what any Man shall sow that shall he also reap consider with thy self how thy Brother the Duke of Gloucester was so suddenly and unexpectedly cut off who might have survived after thy Death and do not imagine that thou canst be preserved by Men when God sets upon thee and God's Will shall stand that his Kingdom may extend over all Ah! what shall I say as to what appertains to thy Salvation God is burning with Anger and will shorten the days of his Enemies for his Elect sake and Oh that thou mayest be saved in the day of the Lord for my Soul is even under Horror and Amazement at the sight of the inevitable Destruction that attends thee These things that I write are true and I would have thee to know that I write these things both godlily and lovingly as for my own part though I suffer many Miseries from without yet I have that inward Peace with God that exceeds all Earthly Crowns It was said that while the King was reading this Letter his Brother the Duke of York stood by him and that he after he had read it also advised the King to order the Quaker to be hanged but that the King had answered That it were better that they themselves should have a regard to their own good and amend their Lives and Manners that there is no Understanding so great but that many times is overtaken with Error and sometimes Folly About this time came forth a Book written in English marked in every Page with the form or note of a Child's Tablet such as Children use in England as also in our own Country out of which they learn to pronounce their Letters in Alphabetical Order This Book did in every Page shew that it was in use throughout the World in all and every Language whereof there were no less than Thirty Languages recounted and set forth and each of them distinguished into its proper Table that when any one spoke to a single Person to call him Thou and not You which the English used if they talked with a Man that they respected The Work was neatly and ingeniously done with much Cost by John Subbs and Benjamin Furley but Fox who besides the English Tongue understood none of these Thirty was so desirous to seem to be the Author of this Work and that whatever it contained of Industry and Praise-worthiness had its Original
and unlearned Man and who besides the common English Books had ne're looked into any other nor could he Read them would by no means have it thought or doubted that this weighty Epistle â—o full of Learning and compos'd and written in so Elaborate a manner and with so much Pains and Study was not Written by him and his own Production and that he was not the Man who had daily perused all those Books and made them his own or that it was thus Written by a Multitude or whole Society of Men yet so as that they should leave it to the Judgment of one Fox an ignorant Fellow and upon his Approbation look upon it to be firm and good and he to approve of the same by the greatness and Authority of his Name affixed to it And hence it 's apparent that there is no mind so Humble but is apt to be carried away with the Air of Glory yea many times Glory and Applause is mostly coveted by those who most contemn it and endeavour to introduce a Contempt thereof glorying and taking Pride herein in that they despised all manner of Glory so much But however it were the Letter pleased the King and the Matter of it was very grateful to him insomuch that the King either by his own Authority or other Engagements brought it so about that they ceased to persecute them But the same Persecution was in a short time after revived and introduced upon them When Fox writes a new Epistle to the King and deprecates the Injuries and Dangers brought upon those People his Friends interceding with the King thereby on their behalf discovering now in this his Letter himself entirely as he was and not as before hand over head without all manner of shame and blushing Arrogating to himself the Work of other Men and a false praise But this Letter did not please the King so well so as either to purge them from what was laid to their Charge or to free them from their Sufferings These Quakers are even to the present time a prey and a laughing-stock to almost all the Inhabitants and they had long since been utterly ruined and destroyed all of them had it not been for a few among them that had some small Substance who out of their own Necessities have sustained them under their oppressive Poverty And had it not been also for those Quakers in Holland who are superiour to these in Fortunes and Estates And now that I may pass over nothing that may appertain to the State and Concerns of the Quakers before I depart from these Men in Germany It will not be impertinent to insert the short History of those Men lately sprung up in Germany and who still coverse and are scattered up and down in divers parts of the same Country which are called by the name of Pretists and whom many look upon as the Brood and Offspring of the Quakers or Enthusiasts sprung up again in these times and being as it were lopped off grow again and bud out from the old Stock concerning which Men there are many who have taken upon them to write who have discovered themselves to have heard and imagined more things concerning them than they really know but I shall not take in all herein but will leave out the larger passages and only take notice of the Principal Heads For seeing that in so great a multitude of Christians as well else where as in Germany who declare themselves to be the Disciples of blessed Luther and to follow his Doctrine and way of Living most of them all were indeed affected with a great desire of and love to their Religion but yet retained through great Ignorance and intollerable superstition the observance of some Rites and Ceremonies and which in very deed had little or nothing in common with some Religion Piety and Holiness and this was not so abstruse but that it was apparent to all so as that they might behold it with their Eyes and handle it with their Hands yea and the same was now consined and as it were â—ealed by examples and manners some Godly Men zealous towards God and for the good of Men and such as were also both Learned and Experienced bethought themselves that it was every ones duty with the utmost care and Diligence to heal or cut off this Malady or Pestilence in the Church which crept dayly more and more into Men's Lives and Conversations Among these in the Year sixty one one Theophilus Brosgeband a Deacon of the Lutheran Church in the City of Rostock in the Duchy ef Mâ—chelenburg sets up in Opposition to these Practices and so in a book written by him in the German Tongue sets forth and notes the various Errors that the Lutherans were conscious of and at the same time speaks moderately and gently concerning the Controversies that were between the Lutherans and other Reformed concerning the Lord's Supper and sets down his own Opinion in the matter with his Reasons for the same He was indeed a man that studied and was a lover of Concord and Peace between Friends who held the same Faith which is very good and the very name delectable but he got little Praise and Thanks for his Pains nay this his labour and endeavour went scarce unpunished for there were many Persons that forthwith fell at variance with him hereupon reviled him were very bitter against and troublesome to him which he by his long-suffering and patience wore out and diverted After this Henry Muller became one of this number who in the same City was Teacher and Professor of Divinity in the Church and University and a Person of exquisite Learning and Piety and who about five or six years after Brosgeband did in like manner reprove those of his own Religion concerning their Errors and Lives and Conversations that were unsuitable to Religion and especially in a book written also in the German Tongue that it might come into the hands of all those to whom it did more peculiarly belong handling that Passage of the Apostle Paul which is in his First Epistle to the Corinthians 12. c. 2. v. in which place the Holy Apostle that he might make way for to shew to those Men how much they were now Honoured and Enrich'd by the Spirit of God puts them in mind how in times past they were carried away to dumb Idols led and driven thereunto by unclean Spirits he wrote that Christians now a-days had not left their dumb Idols whereunto they cleaved to whom they attributed all things neglecting true Religion and setting true Godliness at naught to wit The Pulpit from whence they Preach to the People The Baptismal Font The Confessor's Tribunal and the Altar By which words many that were of the same Function with him took themselves to be much Inspired and so lookt upon him to be their Enemy and did not only content themselves with injuring of him in his fame and the esteem had of him and seeing that the Name of
of themselves are very tender and nice and their Families live deliciously and they esteem nothing more honourable and desirable than this On the other hand their Enemies lay a long Catalogue of foul Errors to their Charge and send them up and down every where and so recount them all and confute them in the Chairs and Auditories of the Universities and Churcheâ— before the Students and People who at least are of themselves inclined and when there is so great a stress laid upon it to run altogether head-long thereunto so as to take all things in a perverted Sence and to entertain a most ill Opinion of those Men. And that the Sect might be the better known and a summary given of their Errors and the greatness and horridness of their Faults they gave those Men the Name of Pietists and the Sect it self they dignified with the Appellation of Pietism which name those Men in the mean time looked upon to be their Honour and Glory these their Enemies put upon them as a mark of their Crime and a term of Ignominy and Reproach as if they thought all Vices were to be couched under this one alone And the Envy and Rage of some proceeded so far that if any one explained who those Pietests were and how this name might rightly and properly be taken they inveighed also against this as a most horrid Wickedness and a capital Crime An Example where you have in these four Verses written in the German Tongue but turned for your better Information into Latin and are as followeth Quum nomen Pictesta omnem sic personat orbeâ—â— Quis Pictista Studens noscere verba Dei Et Juxta hanc normam vi am emendare laborans Illius at quantum hoc Christianumque decus But that these Men might be distinguish'd by their proper Forms and Characters they called them also by the Names of the Illuminate Cathari Puritans c. as being those who were full of their own most proud but vain Conceit or boasted themselves to be the only Persons that had the Light when in the mean time they had not a spark of Knowledge and Truth and in their whole life seemed to be so pure and perfect when as in truth there was an Ulcer within them which in time would break out that in publick continually carried a counterfeit face of Goodness but did in the mean time defile themselves secretly and in their Recesses with the most notorious Vices This was the common Opinion By-Word and Laughing-stock of all that these Men were Imitators of the old Enthusiasts and the Inventors of new That they were like the Quakers and that they followed their Doctrine and Discipline throughout when at the same time all or the most part of them scarce knew what the Opinions Constitutions and Heresies of the Quakers were which thing is evident from Spener's Book in the German Tongue wherein that Person defending his own Cause and as to Quakerism going about to remove that suspicion Men had of him upon that account while he quotes the Opinions of the Quakers he alledged them in such a manner that he to whom the Opinion of the Quakers was known understood at the first Reading of them saving the Man's Honour that he had not known what the Quakers meant And so grievously were these Men dealt with after they had thus loaded them with these obnoxious Names that those Students who would not leave these ways and who from their Dependencies were called the Elector's Scholars were deprived of their Stipends others of all hopes of Preferment by Men of their own Functions who most of them betook themselves to the Territories of the Elector of Brandenburg who granted these Distressed Men not only a place of Refuge but also whatever they had occasion for and did moreover assign to their principal Doctors a place in the University of Halen that every one might instruct his Pupils as he pleased Now Horbius upon the French War if that may be called a War wherein there has been such unheard of Devastations made and Barbarities committed went from Trarback to Wishenheim upon the Neckar and from thence to Hamburg and there was made Minister of St. Nicholas's Church where according to his wonted manner he applied himself to instruct his hearers in true Piety and particularly in his Catechisings to instil his Principles into the Youth and even young Children but soon after the Fame and Dignity of Horbius stirred his two Colleagues whose Eyes and Ears he had offended above the rest of the People to Envy and Cavil at him as if Horbius brought hither also these odious Precepts and Opinions of Enthusiasts and Quakers which accusation 't is strange too believe how it increased after that Horbius had distributed a little Book among those that were Catechised by him not written by himself but by another concerning the Rudiments of Christian Education for when the elder of the two Colleagues aforesaid who became Horbius's Adversaries there is no occasion to name his Name seeing its common in the Mouths of all Men had concluded with himself that the Book was Writ by a Pietist he immediately proscribes it as an Heretical Book and sets Horbius forth to his Auditors and by his Rhetorical Flourishes as if he were an Heretical Doctor a Quaker and such an one as ought to be expelled out of the City And as there is nothing so easily given out and harder stopped nothing nearer received and further spread then Lies and Mens Evil Reports concerning their Guides and Rulers so the same report in the twinkling as it were of an Eye without any more ado did so dilate it self not only through the whole City but all the Country over so as that Horbius was known by no other Name than the Quaker-Doctor Moreover the rude multitude and the most abject sort of Men some of them through a stupid Ignorance as being not able to distinguish the first Principles of the Christian Doctrine others partly through Ignorance and partly through an uncertain Authority and blind Guidance of other Men as if they were Slaves or Brute-Beasts Some seeing themselves unable to try the thing it self and being very much afraid of the Evil least that also should fall upon them so referring the first beginning thereof to one which they much suspected And lastly others through a blinded prejudice and accustomed to raillery and to do ill turns received Horbius every where with Hissing and Reproaches railed at him and did really persecute the Man so as that unless his Life had been preserved through the faithfulness of honest Men and they his Friends too he had through the fury and violence of those his Enemies been certainly deprived of it Wherefore when Horbius saw that his hopes was over-born by the Malice and Envy of so many Men and that there was nothing now left for him but Dangers he chose rather to forsake his Ministry and the City and by giving way rather than by resisting to break
perhaps destruction The same year did William Cotton go to Calaiâ— a City on the Sea-coast of France six miles distant from Dunkirk with the same design as the other two had before-mentioned but not so skilful in the Language of the Country where entring into the great Church and viewing all things frowningly but holding his Peace he said at last that he was a sort of a new Guest and when after some time he was known to be an English-man he was led to the House of a certain Noble Scotch-man and being asked what he was he did not deny but that he was so and so There when the foresaid Scotch-man made himself to be his Interpreter to the People Cotten speaks a few words concerning the Idolatry and Corrupt Manners of the People which when he had done and that they contrived to do him an Injury he no sooner came to hear of it but bethinking himself he ought to take heed and to reserve his life for another necessity of dying as his Friends before had done he suddenly and without any manner of delay that he might disappoint the Consultations and Contrivances of his Enemies flies and makes the best of his way back again into England George Ball was the only person that penetrared into France and so that he never returned thence again and so it 's uncertain and unknown what he did or what became of him The Quakers think he perished somewhere in Prison None other after thesemen went on this design into France St. Crisp tryed this Experiment in that horrid and more than barbarous Persecution of the whole Reformed Churches in that Kingdom and in the dispersion of so many Thousands of men through other Reformed Countries of which we have not yet seen an end that he wrote a book and took care to send and deliver it to those men to try whether he could aâ—â—ect some of them so as to entertain a good Opinion of the Quakers Religion and joyn themselves to their Sect. It 's not to be doubted but that Book had its first beginning from Crisp but because it was written in French as it was to the French and that Crisp was ignorant of that Language or not well skilled therein itâ—s certain it was Translated and believed to have been much increased and published bâ— another hand And it 's no crime to think seeing the Style is so like unto that way of wâ—iâ—ing used by Peâ—n who is still the choicest Writer amongst the Quakers that he was that same Artificer It contains in it nothing concerning Religion It only puts those French in mind to consider with themselves wherefore God suffered such Calamities to befal them whether they were not the Consequent of their Soft and Depraved Education and Love to Earthly things and blind Obedience towards those to whose care they commited the Direction of their Consciences then that they should weigh what Good what Progress in Sanctity of Life those Calamities wrought in them which they endured with so much Lamentation Lastly That not contenting themselves with that Reformation which hitherto was instituted amongst them they should go on and do their endeavour to Finish and Consummate this begun Work But the Book was writ both in Respect to the Sentences Phrases and words very different from the English Mode and not only from that of the Quakers and to Conform to the Method and way of Writing in the French Tongue at this day when that Language is Arrived to its highest Maturity that there could be nothing in my Judgment writ more neatly and more congruous to the Genius and Temper of those People This Book the Quakers distributed gratis every where through the Countries where those French Refugees had Fled and in some places as the People were coming out of their Churches But there was not one found that we have heard of or came to understand that was induced by this Book to fall in with the Quakers Hester Bidley relates this Passage to have happened to her self a little before this time which every one is at liberty to believe as he pleases She went to the late Q. of England of happy memory and complains to her That it was very great grief of Heart to her as she was a Woman and a Christian that so great and tedious a War was waged between Christians and such great Calamities and Slaughters of Men which happened every day pierced her Heart and therefore she Exhorted the Queen to endeavour at least to bend her study this way for to end this War that Peace may be made and so gain great respect and affection from all The Queen who was of a most free and good Temper having given her her Answer she further desires That the Queen would grant her leave to go over into France saying she would advise and speak to the French King about the same affair and would have a Letter from the Queen to the same effect This the Queen refused and diswades her from the said enterprise urging that such a Journey and Business would be very difficult and dangerous yet for all this the woman through her importunity and earnest sollicitation got a pass from the said Queen's Secretary and seeing that a short space of time is tedious to a longing person she forthwith sets out and after various traverses comes into France and goes to Versailles and there coming to know that the late King of England was there she at first applies her self unto him as to one to whom he had been some years before known upon the like occasion and delivers unto him the Letter written by her to the French King the substance whereof was this That she being stirred by God the Supreme King of all that Illuminates this World pray'd the King to make his Peace with God and with the Nations he was at War with and put a stop to such an over-flowing and Rivulet of Blood that was shed King James having seen the Epistle sends the Woman to the Duke of Orleance to whom when she had come she delivered the Letter and said withal that she must speak with the King the Duke agrees to deliver the Letter but said she must not speak with the King whereupon the Woman full of Grief and Lamentation and with shedding many Tears did at last break forth into these words Am I permitted to speak with the King of Kings anâ— may not I speak with Man Should I tell this to our People in England they would believe what they are all of them already perswaded of that the King of France is so high and proud that none can speak with him Which passage when the King came to understand he in about three days after grants her liberty to come to his Presence the Room was full of Princes and Princesses Prelates and great Men the King Enters the same and having seen the Woman speaks to her with his Hat under his Arm whereupon she asked whether he was the King the King
THE General History OF THE QUAKERS CONTAINING The Lives Tenents Sufferings Tryals Speeches and Letters Of all the most Eminent Quakers Both Men and Women From the first Rise of that SECT down to this present Time Collected from Manuscripts c. A Work never attempted before in English Being Written Originally in Latin By GERARD CROESE To which is added A LETTER writ by George Keith and sent by him to the Author of this Book Containing a Vindication of himself and several Remarks on this History LONDON Printed for Iohn Dunton at the Raven in Jewen-street 1696. TO THE Truly Noble and Honourable NICHOLAS WITSEN Burgomaster and Senator of Amsterdam c. THOSE two very things Right Noble and Honourable Sir to wit the greatness of your Name and the smallness of this Work which might disswade me from such an Application do both of them invite and in some sort engage me to adventure not only to make a Present of this Book but also a particular Dedication thereof unto you And seeing that it is a thing most certain and that the very sight of the Book doth immediately shew it that what I here offer is a Piece that is altogether new but yet neither over bulky nor prolix I was perswaded that this my Undertaking would not prove unpleasing to you because that as the Great are very much taken with the Novelty of other things even so they are of Books and as a conciseness in speaking is very agreeable to them a short and compendious way of Writing is found to be no less so which has given occasion to that old Proverbial Adage Little things are pretty To this I may add that this Book briefly treats of things transacted up and down and for some time in that Nation where in the Name of the Renowned States you have been first Envoy to the Most Potent and most Serene Princes King William and Queen Mary to that great and glorious Queen alas lately ravished from Earth by inexorable Fate of whose Vertues there are at this time so many Testimonies in the funebrous Orations of great and most Eloquent Men who for all that had they never so much exhausted their brains and been profuse of their Abilities in declaring and magnifying the Excellencies of this Queen had yet nee'r been able to form a true Idea of them in their Thoughts much less represent them as they ought to be to their Auditors than which nothing more can be said of Man and after that for some time Resident there where you were to Congratulate Their Royal Majesties Accession to the Throne and the Deliverance of so many Countries and People as also to confirm that Ancient League and Amity that was between both Nations In which Time and Place seeing that perhaps some but not all these things came within the Verge of your Knowledge this new and small Treatise but Pardon the Expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may gratifie that desire which your Honour and even most Men have who have lived or come from abroad of having a perfect Knowledge of such Transactions as have happened in those places during their time or near unto it by exhibiting as in a little Table-Book the first Rise Progress and End of all these doings But yet this is not all the Reason I had for such an Undertaking I must confess Illustrious Sir that as to the matter of this Work it is such as may seem to them that are not very curious needless and unnecessary and that it is such a way or method as may easily induce some who are not over-skilful but given to scoff and chatter to look upon it as very mean and contemptible because that having regard only to the single Relation of Things and to Truth I treat thereof in a Style and Language that is plain and ordinary free from all manner of Affectation and do not which is a thing very common and much approved of and prevalent among the Vulgar either ridicule or proudly scoff at and prosecute in Writing those things which 〈…〉 the Religion and Manners of those Men who are treated of herâ—en Neither do I though there may be some among those very Persons who look with an evil Eye upon and bear ill will unto us for that Reason retribute the same and make the like return unto them as some are pleased to do who think such reciprocal doings ought always to be But seeing that it many times so happens that they who write with such Moderation are liable to fall under I know not what Suspicion of crack'd Credit from these Men so as that I found my self under a necessity of seeking out for some Patronage and Refuge-place upon this Account I was fully satisfied I could meet with that principally in you Great Sir who know as well as any Man alive what amongst such a multitude of Writers and itch of Writing is most fit to be writ what an Historian's scope ought to be in such a Work as this is and over and above that what on the one hand Religion and what in the mean time also Nature and the Power of Humanity require and call for And because I have fallen upon this Head I earnestly wish the Temper of the present Times was not such that this were not the sad distinguishing mark of the Age we live in as that there should be so many Men such strangers to and devoid of Charity and Modesty and hurried with that unruliness and outrageousness of Mind that as soon as they discern any Heterodox Opinion in matters of Religion and especially if any Heresie be smelt in the case they immediately suppose that it is the Property of Religion to scoff at persecute and afflict such Men some going so far as to urge there ought to be a precision or a cutting off of the same by violent Methods Fire and Sword Imprisonment and Bonds Racks and Torments and even by the most dreadful and cruel Deaths For the Good and Peace of the Church and State for so they Argue cannot otherwise be preserved nor the Christian Faith and Humane Obligations subsist Were it not for this we should not see against so many Reformed Churches so many Hundred Thousand Christians such and so great and nefandous Violences contrived and offered such lamentable yea unheard-of Calamities and Slaughters and even if they could make entire Extirpation Rulne and Destruction by those who go by the Names of Christians and Catholicks but are in truth the most bitter and implacable Enemies of the True Religion I 'll go yet further I heartily wish there were not sometimes amongst others and even among them who have withdrawn themselves from the Papacy that immoderation of Spirit that even where there is no manner of Heresie no Fundamental Error yea not the least difference but in words and way of Expression only mens Minds become forthwith divided thereupon an Interruption of Fellowship and at last a sâ—â—â—ssion into Parties doth ensue And that those who lay
Enemy to the Opposers of Fox and his Society rendring all their Efforts against him ineffectual But when the Hatred and Envy of Fox's Antagonists grew to so great a height that he could no longer restrain them and fearing they should become his Enemies likewise he seldom went to the Publick Meetings shunning to hear their Voices whose different Manners Designs and Contrivances he so much abhorr'd So much for the Husband But as to the Wife she totally forsook the Reformed Churches dedicating her self entirely to be a Member of the Quakers Society and spending all her time in their Company Her Husband loved her exceedingly and was much taken with her Piety so that she could easily obtain of him this favour that her House might be a Receptacle for Fox and his Colleagues and also a place of Meeting for all the Society to Assemble in together as oft as they would for the Publick Performance of Sacred Duties as indeed it was and continued so after his death till the death of Fox her second Husband Not long after her Conversion to this new Religion she began to abandon her Distaff and Womanly Instruments betaking her self to Preach and Teach Instructing the People not only Viva Voce but by several Books wrote and published by her by which means she gained many Proselytes And after this time her House and Family became as it were a School and Nursery for all that Sect both Hearers Preachers and Students of both Sexes and accordingly sent out about this time one William Caton a Young Man of Pregnant Parts conspicuous for his Modesty and Learning whom Judge Fell had taken into his Family for a Companion to his Eldest Son that by his good Example he might Encourage and Conduct him to a Vertuous Behaviour This worthy Young Man became afterwards very Famous and Renown'd for his great Accomplishments both at home and abroad in Holland But this was not all Leonard Fell a Son of the Family followed his Example as one Comrade imitates another or a Disciple traces the foot-steps of his Master being fondly loved and caressed by his Father for that he introduced into his Family that Sacred Office of a Minister His Brother Henry Fell imitated his Elder Brother They both became Great and Famous Teachers and tenacious defenders of that Sect. After the Males of the Family followed Sarah Fell their Sister undertaking the same Office whom these People do so much extol that they say she was not only Beautiful and Lovely to a high degree but wonderfully Happy in Ingeny and Memory so stupendiously Eloquent in Discoursing and Preaching and so effectual and fervent in her Addresses and Supplications to God that she ravish'd all her beholders and hearers with Admiration and Wonder She apply'd her self to the study of the Hebrew Tongue that she might be more prompt and ready in defending and proving their Doctrine and Principles from the Holy Scriptures and in this study the Progress she made was so great that she wrote Books of her Religion in that Language This is that Family which Fox came afterwards to be a Member of when upon the Death of Fell the Husband he married Margaret his Widow of which I shall have occasion to speak afterwards I now return to the Order of Times and Places that corresponds to the Actions of Fox and his Colleagues While Fox is propagating his Doctrine in the Countries above-mentioned in the Year Fifty Two of a sudden there appeared some in Cambridgeshire a place considerably distant from the Countries where Fox was now residing who owned themselves Members of this New Church Among whom excelled James Parnel a Youth of Fifteen Years of Age well skilled in the Tongues and of no obscure Birth or Condition Because the History of this Youth's Life and Actions is but short I shall here insert the same in one perpetual thread of Discourse This Young Man having so boldly adventur'd in so tender an Age on such an Enterprize was disown'd disinherited rejected and shut out of Doors by his Parents Friends and Relations all upon this Account Being thus forsaken and left to himself and receiving but sorry assistance from his new Friends he was obliged to live sparingly and meanly yet nevertheless he continued steadfast and eager in pursuing the same Design And after having frequently debated with his Condisciples and others concerning their Religion and his own and in this condition of Life spent two Years he comes into the County of Essex and Cloaths himself with the Office of a Preacher which accordingly he performed in the Fields Then in the Year Fifty Five he goes to Colchester and the next day after his arrival Preaches there and entertains many Disputations and Dialogues with the Doctor and Reader to that Church both publickly in the Church and in his own Lodgings and elsewhere by which one day's work he converted many to his Religion Having staid here some few days he goes to Cogshall where he went to Church and heard the Minister Preach a Sermon against the Quakers upon which when Sermon was ended he answered and resuted him in Publick Church Then retiring from Church he was caught and brought to Colchester and there put into a Castle or strong Prison Afterwards he was taken to Chelmsford to appear before the Judges but they because they could not finish and conclude the Business remitted him back to Colchester where he was block'd up in a Cave in some high craggy place where having endured Hunger want of Sleep and Cold for a long time becoming benumb'd in this nasty Dungeon and at length misfortunately falling and bruising his whole Body he finished his unhappy days notwithstanding all the Complaints and Addresses he made himself and all the Entreaties and Sollicitations made to the Magistrate by his Friends for relieving him out of all these Miseries It is reported that before his Death he sometimes was heard to say One hour's sleep shall put an end to all my Troubles When Death approached he said Now I go away then he fell asleep and about an hour thereafter he awaked and yielded up the Ghost His Body was tumbled away to the place where Malefactors are executed and interred In this same Year this Doctrine and Scheme began to diffuse it self beyond the Countries where Fox was now making his Terms with the Neighbouring County of Cumberland in which great numbers associated themselves to this Party Amongst the more Remarkable of these new Converts the first was one Thomas Lawson at that time Publick Minister to a Church at a Village called Ramside in Westmorland afterwards he continued both the Exercise of this Function among these People and likewise gave himself to the study of Herbs and after he came to London became the most noted Herbalist in England Next after him followed John Wilkinson Pastor to a Church at Embleton in Cumberland who afterwards proved a Famous Preacher among the Quakers both in Scotland and Ireland All his Hearers had deserted
of these Students they flew thither and halâ—d and thrust the Men out of Doors and there tossed them backward and forward and tormented them all the ways they could but if they could not conveniently get in they broke the Doors and Windows but when they could not or would not do that they stood about the House and there received them as they came out as before and this also was a small matter with them there were some of them who were furnished with Pipes and Tobacco an Herb well known and so called from him who first shewed the use of it and Ale of which they themselves did not only sip often but also reached the same to the Quakers and upon their refusing thereof yea saying nothing at all to the matter and as it were silently sipping up and digesting all that Affliction they poured the Drink down the Throats of the People and upon their Cloaths struck them pulled them by the Nose and tore their Beards that they might force them to speak something to them But these vile doings were yet but little in their Eyes there were some of them who run upon and trod them under their Feet who discharged Muskets at them and threw Squibs and Serpents as they call them which flew and burnt their Cloaths where ever they touched them others brought Mastiff Dogs with them and set them on not only to bark at the People but to fly at them and bite them some of them when they went away took the mens Goods along with them and when the Quakers made Complaint of these Mischiefs and Injuries done them to their Tutors and Professors they were deaf to them and took them but as so many Tales told them And indeed they suffered such great and so many Evils that unless these Men had written concerning the same openly to the World and that none did ever refel and confute what was written by them hereupon they could not be believed Such things also as these they complained were done unto them by the Students in Cambridge and this they set forth in Print While these things were transacted Oliver Cromwel died being the Year One Thousand Six Hundred Fifty and Eight on the Third Day of September at Three of the Clock in the Afternoon of a Tertian Ague after he had had a severe Fit of it This Man had the boldness to arrogate to himself so great a Power in all the three Kingdoms that of Old were esteemed to be another World that all things were governed and managed according to his Pleasure alone having rejected the Name of King and assuming that of Protector that he himself might be the more protected from all Hatred and Envy Under the Government of whose Son Richard which was but very short and not managed with that Industry as his Father had done nor administred with that Moderation that he shewed so as that neither his Authority had lessened the Peoples Love to him nor the Favour of the People his Gravity the Quakers Affairs begun daily to grow worse and worse while both on the one side and the other the Quakers were hurried on with greater boldness and those who opposed with greater Cruelty And seeing there are very many Instances extant and such as are very memorable yet because we would shun satiety and that I find the same creeping on I shall dispatch the matter in a few words Seeing there were now more Persons among the Quakers than before who uttered their vain Ribaldry and Bablings even in the Churches and while the Ministers were in the midst of their Sermons so there were also other Men that were more animated and forward to do nothing with Deliberation so that the Quakers for that reason were much more severely punished especially in Wales and some parts of Pembrokeshire There was at London a certain Man whose Name was Solomon Eccles a Man void not of Understanding but of all Shame and Fear who began such a deed that it 's very strange that the same Quaker himself should be willing to Record it and put the matter beyond all doubt and maintain it besides in the very same Pamphlet and thereby shew that no Fact can be feigned be it never so foolish and rash which some would not at least do and not commend as a right and laudable thing to be committed against those whom they so much complained of in respect to the wrongs and injuries done unto them I shall take the thing from the beginning This Man was a Musician and could Sing and Play very well having been Instructed in this Art and Science by his Father and Grandfather and did by it maintain both himself and his Family very genteelly and plentifully It was believed he could Yearly by Teaching of others and by Playing get no less than Two Hundred Pounds Sterling But he had a mind to change this sort of Life and to get into the Fellowship of the Quakers and so experience another way of Living and so he first sells his Books and all his Musical Instruments at a great rate as being now useless and noxious to him but afterwards bethinking himself that they might be hurtful to others as well as to him and that he ought not if he could avoid it suffer any to be injured at the expence of his Profit and Conveniency he buys them back again of those to whom he had Sold them for the same Money and when he had so done he gathered them all together and goes with them directly to Tower-Hill and having there set up a Pile of Wood and fired it at Noon day he does in the sight of many People commit to the Flames and burn all these Excellent and Precious Instruments and Books altogether as being a means to draw Men to be idle to promote a Lascivious Life and as stings to their Lusts and commands all Men to take Pattern by him and shun and curse all such vain and profane Arts. So great was the Zeal of this Man for his new Religion and so great was his Anger and the fervour of his Mind against the Publick Religion of the Kingdom that he could not forbear but must go upon every new bold and rash Act whereof above others this is a most memorable Instance When the People were met together in Aldermanbury Church for to Celebrate the Lord's Supper this Man came thither having furnished himself first with a Sack full of Shooe-maker's Ware so that now from a Musician he was turned Shooe-maker and partly a Cobler to that end that he might go into the Church and there in the croud before that the Minister had got into the Pulpit might Act somewhat of the part of a Shooe-maker And so that he might not be put out he had taken care to get very timely and secretly into the Church and hid himself there in some place Afterward when they were singing of Psalms he rushes up and draws nigh unto the Table and stood with his Hat on
Brethren that are in Prisons Bridewels and Iron Chains beaten severely by merciless Officers fined and punished to Death and dying in their Imprisonments seeing that now many of them lie sick lying upon Straw we give up our selves and ours unto you that you may shut up us like Sheep in the Prisons Bridewels Litter and Sinks of those our Brethren and we are ready as so many Sacrifices to go into their places out of the Love which we bear unto them for we cannot choose but be ready to lay down our Lives for our Brethren and take those Torments upon our selves which you have prepared for them neither can we when our Brethren suffer choose but feel our selves the same thing even as Christ has said he suffered and was afflicted and this indeed is our Love towards God and Christ and our Brethren which we owe both to them and to our Enemies who are also the lovers of your Souls and of your Eternal Salvation and if ye will take our Bodies which we offer for our Brethren who are Imprisoned because they have preached the Truth in many places refused to pay Tythes met together in the fear of God have not sworn stood with their Hats on because they have been looked upon as Vagabonds when they have gone to visit their Friends and such like we whose Names are under written wait for your Answer in the great Hall of Westminster to the end we may be satisfied in this our desire and manifest our Love to our Friends and remove the Judgment and Vengeance that hangs over our Enemies The Parliament did indeed reject this Petition but seeing these Men were affected with so much Pity and Concern for the Miseries of their Friends and that they themselves were so nearly touched with a sense of so many Evils and Miseries it had this further Effect that other Men seeing such great Affection of Heart between them and so great Courage and Constancy in bearing any Miseries they began to judge more favourably of them and many daily joyned themselves to their Society and Community Moreover what these Petitioners and Deprecators of these Miseries and Dangers complained of in this their Humble Petition to the Parliament as also in that mentioned a little before concerning their Brethren that there was so many of them shut up in Prisons and that some of them were so severely and hardly used some perished under the weight and pressure of their Afflictions was so true that there was scarce any Common Gaol or such like places wherein Felons and Criminals were kept which could not very manifestly bear Testimony to the Complaints of these Men. Now for the remainder of the Year Sixty until King Charles the Second his Coming in these Men had no better Fortune for during that time the Soldiers in many Countries following the heels of their Commanders break into the Houses of these Men whilst they kept their Meetings and drive them out with Muskets and Swords in some places discharging their Muskets upon them and wounding them or struck them with their Hands and kicked them or pulled them by the hair of the Head and sometimes after they had haled them out of their Houses drove them into the Water Sometimes the Soldiers came alone and being asked by whose Command they came and what Authority they had And answering That their Warrant was in their Pockets they fell upon them and did them violence ransacked all things or took them away and turned them to their own Use though many times it was but little that these Burglars and Sharers carryed away though they did not only not spare the Houshold Goods of the richer sort but also seized upon whatever they had in their Possession of other things seeing they had mostly nothing of their own but what was necessary for daily use for the support of their Bodies The Students in the University of Cambridge had not yet sufficiently insulted over and exercised their Rage against the Quakers they therefore at this time reassumed their former Licentiousness Wantonness and Impudence and did not alone but accompanied with the Populacy and meaner sort of People that are ready for all audacious facinorous and vile doings several times but more especially thrice break into the Quakers Meeting and Assault them after they had broke the Locks and Doors with great Hammers and break all things with their Hands and Feet to pieces frighten some of the Men away use others basely and throw Dirt and such like filth in their Faces beat others with sticks tear their Cloaths prick and wound them with Knives till the Blood gushed out others they haled cruelly by the hair of the Head and having so done let them down and soaked them in Ditches and the Kennels of the Streets neither did they spare any of them had no regard to any Age nor Sex nor Degrees of Men for when an Alderman came to them the second time they were engaged in this Work to hinder them to proceed they thrust him into the Water-course of the City and abused not the Man only but the Dignity also and so the last time when some of the Justices of the Peace disswaded them from such Practices in the King's Name because the King some days before had been Proclaimed publickly and that others also stood by and urged them to desist they for all that go on There were besides at this time also many of these Men by the Magistrates Command haled from the Conventicles and shut up in Prisons whipped and sent into Banishment as wicked Men and Vagabonds from which People they thought their present Danger might arise In the mean time the Soldiers which were thus placed every where in Garrison or wandered up and down the Country that the Quakers could reside no where but as it were within their Camps did so Ravage these Men at their pleasure that no Person nor House nor Goods could be safe nothing so well fortified and defended that was not exposed to their Fury and became a Prey to their Rage And the Quakers made no less Complaint of the Officers than they did of the Soldiers because they did not restrain their Insolence and punish them for their Wickedness but they did more especially complain of General Lambert whom they said was a great Enemy to their Sect. Which Person however some Years after when we went to visit in the Company of an Honourable Person being then kept a Prisoner in a certain Castle in the County of Devon we found he was not so averse to the Sect of the Quakers and such sort of Men. All sorts of Men both learned and unlearned had to this time written and published Books and Pamphlets against the Quakers all these which were an Hundred and Fifteen in all Fox in the Year Fifty Nine gathered together and digested in Order into one Book and did partly refute them and scoffed at the rest as being some of them not written in any serious manner At
of these Men which are Fundamental to all the rest were after this time taken into task by George Keith and in various Writings partly handled and exprest more distinctly and politely partly chang'd and represented after the Image of the Idea's of the Ancient Philosophers not in that new Dress which the Quakers at first affected designing afterwards to give account of George Barcley in his own time and place Keith first apply'd his Mind to Write in the year Sixty Five and continued in that exercise for many years all his writings were originally in English except some few sheets He having observ'd that the Quakers wrote but very obscurely and perplexedly of that Divine light which is in every Man and of Christ dwelling in him which they place for the principle and foundation of all their Religion and Doctrine and being a Man of a subtile and acute Wit has accurately represented what they had but rudely and lamely begun concerning that Doctrine displaying it in this manner God has given a light unto every Man which he plac'd within him Which cannot be the mind or humane reason for that is innate whereas the light is adventitious and given to him from without to command and govern his Reason This same light is the Seed of God or Instrument whereby Men fallen and corrupted through sin are born again of God And this is a substance a part of that invisible and spiritual substance of Jesus Christ the Son of God that divine invisible spiritual and heavenly Man For Christ is so the Son of God that he is made to be such a Man by a Divine vertue proceeding from God So Christ and by him God dwells and is implanted in every Man nay in every Creature But since Men have made defection from God corrupting and depraving themselves altogether Christ and God is dead and extinguish'd in them but not totally So that Christ being mov'd with pity and compassion towards Men and remaining in some measure within them do's so help and assist their miserable impotency that he moves from within incites and admonishes every Man that they would give ear to and follow Christ their light and that laying aside their wicked manners and evil opinions they would submit themselves to Christ embracing and adhering to him thus expecting his divine vertue within them proposing him for their guide and conducter in going about duties and maintaining the same imitating him in every thing as their Master Which if they do Christ revives and lives within them establishing and renewing an Union and Communion with them and becoming righteousness and salvation unto them So Christ becomes meat heavenly and spiritual food unto Men. And thus in all Ages the Godly did eat the flesh and drink the Blood of Christ And so indeed Christ is in the ungodly tho hiddenly and as if he were quite away from whence it is that the Scriptures sometimes say that Christ is not in them But he is so far within them that when they are selling and enslavening themselves to sin he suffers and is afflicted by the same and through the infamy and piercing of his own Body which ensues from this their wickedness he is oppress'd with grief and anguish as if he were again fastened to the Cross This Christ is to be ador'd and worshiped as being that Divine heavenly and spiritual Man not as being an External Man born of Mary This opinion of Keith concerning these Articles was first invented and publish'd to the World by Men of no good Name which Keith was not ignorant of Hereticks and such as were addicted to the Schools and Discipline of the Gentile Philosophers especially the Platonicks but it was only scatter'd here and there by parcels in their writings not Collected into one entire system till in the last Century William Postell a Frenchman publish'd it openly in the same entire form that Keith has done tho I have certainly inform'd my self that Keith knew nothing of it in a particular book set out on that occasion but it was accounted so foolish and silly by the Learned World that none of them thought it worth their while to write against or confute him and his writings And these were the positions so long invented and retain'd before Keith that this same Keith was advancing and proposing in several books wrote by him vindicating them from what objections were either obvious to himself or mov'd to him by others But he took care that these his books should be Printed without the knowledge or advice of those of his own Society and therefore sent them to Holland to be Printed lest any of the English should come to know it Now there being two principal parts of this Keithian Doctrine the first concerning the presence of God and Christ not only in Men but in all his Creatures the second concerning the indwelling and operation of Christ within Men there was none found among all the initiatory Apostles of this Society who either maintain'd taught or publickly mention'd that former branch of his Doctrine Yet none of the Quakers wrote against him neither did those who assembled among themselves upon such like occasions condemn that principle being tender of his name and fame and judging it reasonable that this one errour should be past over in silence because of his other good Endowments and Accomplishments But as to the latter part of his sentiments there was none among all those who profess'd themselves Quakers that did not embrace it for his own opinion subscribing to it as the singular and peculiar Doctrine of their Church except some few insignificant thick scull'd fellows that liv'd in some remote and hidden Corner of the other Western World There was yet another Tenet which Keith was not averse to but he was unwilling to obtrude it upon any for that those of that Society did not desire it should be receiv'd or entertain'd for their common Principle it was that of the perpetuity of Souls and of their Transmigration and Variation through several bodies which proceeded at first from Empedocles Pythagoras and Plato and was afterwards variously trimm'd and furbish'd about some hundred years ago by those pratling Jewish Masters call'd Rabbius who not only tell but write when awake whatever they have dream'd upon that subject while asleep particularly by R. Jitzhakus Loriensis in a tractate wrote in Hebrew and in these our days is reviv'd by Baron van Helmont who hath deck'd it with all the necessary Ornaments fit to procure it Reception an Author famous for the splendour of his Nobility and his insatiable desires after Knowledge and Learning which he accounted the most comely and laudable Enjoyments he could be Master of who because he lives well and has not whereupon is deem'd by his friends to have found out the Philosophers Stone This Man living in England at that time conversing among the Quakers as one of their Society had occasion frequently to converse with a Noble Countess that was a great
into and continued in Prison at Aberdeen for many months He then wrote a book of the immediate Revelation of Christ in Man which is a Summary of all their Doctrine the next year W. Penn on the same score was put in Custody at London Penn and some of his Companions had a Conference with the Presbyterians touching their Doctrine of the Trinity and Justification of Sins wherein neither party could convince the other by Argument Nay at last not so much as hear each other speak When this had given rise to a great Confusion Penn being firm to his purpose and restless till he had effected it betakes himself to a Retirement for Writing Shortly after he publishes a book shaking these three Presbyterian Doctrines pretending to fight with the Testimonies of Scripture and Reason Implanted into the knowledge and understanding of Men viz. That there is one God subsisting in three distinct and separate persons that there 's no Remission of sins without full Satisfaction and that Men are Justified by imputed Righteousness I make choice of those words which Penn does in English as suited to the proper Idiom of that Tongue which now others when they speak of Theological Subjects do use These words I suppose he the rather pitch'd upon because the Presbyterians snarl'd at his former expreâ—â—ions about the first Article concerning the separate persons in the Trinity as if Penn had been more verbal than real in his Controversies This did not only inspire the Presbyterians but also the English Clergy with anger and hatred which broke out into Reproaches that his book show'd his mind and what he was viz. A denier of the Trinity and so not at all to be suffer'd amongst Christians Upon these Clamours Penn was Imprisoned where he wrote a book call'd The Crown not without the Cross handling the Actions of Life and not Articles of Religion not barren of things or swell'd with words but fruitful of matter ponderous and sententious for its phrases and polish'd with the Ornaments of orat'ry so that his Enemies Scruple not to praise his skill and industry Penn was set free by the Kings desire who also because danger seem'd to threaten his fortune which he had Considerably in England and Ireland by the endeavouring of some so to shorten his wings that they might ne're again grow did so protect him as to prevent the seizure and confiscation of his goods About this time by his Rashness Boldness and Impudence Salomon Eccles felt the smart of what he drew on himself which he might have avoided This Zealot whom in the former book from a Musician we made Quaker so Contemn'd the sweeter Children of the Muses as to expose their Instruments to the cruelty of the flames He was no sooner made Preacher than he Acted his part with such eagerness as answer'd the expectation of his own Party and fill'd the Ears and Tongues of the contrary In the year 67 he wrote a Dialogue concerning the excellency and use of the Art of Musick betwixt himself as opponent and the Defendents of that Art whom he brings in speaking and so silenc'd as to raise himself Trophies of Praise and Victory The next year he published a Challenge daring Presbyterians Independents Baptists Papists and all other Doctors and Pastors to try by this Experiment with him who were the true Worshippers of God That without either meat or drink for seven Days and Nights they might devout themselves to watching and praying and they on whom Celestial fire should fall down might be esteem'd to receive that Eternal Testimony for the true Religion that 's acceptable to God But there was none found so frothy or vain as to enter the Lists with so foolish a Challenger tho these words pass'd unresented what followed the next year had not the same success For Eccles in a town of Galloway in Scotland knowing of a Popish Meeting at some distance puts a Chassing-dish with fire and brimstone on his head and goes to their assembly with three of his Associates and giving the fire to his Friends who received it on their knees on the blazing of the flame he denounces to all the sudden danger of being devour'd with fire if they did not presently forsake their Idolatry Returning from thence into the City and repeating his famous precept and sign that they might also learn the wisdom to amend who rewarded his Sermon and sign no better than with blows and ill words and then with a Jayl upon his Enlargement and return to London he Commences the like Admonition in Bartholomew-fair to the whole Croud in the Ring of the Rabble but a sharp Man attacking him had disarm'd him of his shield and given him a mark to put him in mind of that time and place had not another of some note and honesty defended Eccles with his naked Sword and deliver'd him from the hands of the enraged Multitude The Quakers themselves take such Actions to be unwarrantable and inconsiderate not long after Eccles went to Ireland and at Cork in the great Church the service being ended he thunders that solemn Scripture some so often abuse The Prayers of the Wicked are an Abomination to the Lord. Whence being dragg'd into Prison and then whipt through all the streets by the common Hangman he was thrown out of the City as a Vagabond and factious fellow whose deprav'd mind ill custom and foolish humour stir'd him up to pervert and trouble the people Afterward Eccles went into New England where at a Sermon being greatly mov'd with anger he Prophesied a Judgment as ordain'd by God to fall on a certain person within a time he prefix'd but the falsehood of his Oracle giving him experience of his vanity and afterward to confess by a publick writing the folly and error or his own Rashness having at length imitated an Ingenuous Man in this for as it 's best to do nothing to be repented of so it's next best by Repentance to repair what 's done amiss Whilst the Don 's of the Quakers were thus punished In England Scotland and especially in Ireland their whole Society met likeways with great opposition for refusing to forbear their assemblies which having mention'd already what I find to be observable I shall here content my self barely to Name Fox this year went into Ireland yet did little there but visit his friends and advise each of 'em to what he Judg'd for their Advantage Fox having thence return'd in England and till then by reason of troublesome Incumbrances been oblig'd to lead a single life having now got some liberty and ease grew weary of the lonelyness of a Solitary bed tho otherways free and pleasant in it self and in this mind he addrest himself to Margaret the Widdow of L. Fell his old Friend with whom he had lodg'd and afterward by the advice of both their Friends he marry'd her neither to supply the beggery of the one nor gratify the lust of the other and therefore they were less
the Quakers with respect and civility whilst Fox with his friends went further into the Countrey and there had the fortune to light upon others of 'em they entertain'd him and his friends Discreetly and Courteously This Journey of two years space being ended a few months after Fox in Vigornia by Judge Parker's command for their frequent Meetings was put in Custody in the Country-Jail There he continued for a year and more being sometimes brought to a judicial appearance When nothing could be made out he was remanded into Jayl or so delay'd to a certain season upon his promise of another appearance wherein Fox did always satisfy the Judges observing his promise with a Religious tenderness The strife and Controversy was levell'd at this to make Fox take the Oath of fidelity to the Government Fox denyed to make Corporal Oath or swear in express words not that he refus'd to undertake or affirm the thing for he was ready to give a written bill to the Judges tying himself to the performance of all that was requir'd thinking they could expect or demand no more from him he defended his cause at all occasions with many sounding and sententious Arguments and such as are thought to be deriv'd from the sacred fountain of the word of God but to no purpose for the Judges regarded all the Allegations brought by that sort of Men as nothing but base and contemptible pretences How Fox spent his time whilst kept here in prison the many books written by him do declare especially that containing the Confession of the faith of Jesus Christ enrich'd and Interwoven with Scriptural places cull'd out of the New Testament by a singular order he had also Divers Conferences with Learned Men while he enjoy'd the leisure the prison afforded him in which he often show'd the disparity of the encounter betwixt the Learned in the Dialectick Art and those that are wholly Rude and Artless whereof I have this Example He had a Disputation with Dr. Crowder prebendary of Worcester concerning an Oath as it was lawful or forbidden under Gospel or Law In which debate when Crowder concluded that as an Oath was of old Lawful under the Law so now it was not unlawful under the Gospel In like manner as Adultery and other vices forbidden by the Law are also prohibited under the Gospel Fox being offended by so Ignorant a Consequence began to be in a passion but before he had liberty to reply to what was said all that were present contested and exclaim'd and rais'd this groundless report aginst him that he affirm'd and taught as Orthodox that Swearing Adultery Drunkenness and other vices of that nature were Lawful notwithstanding the fruitless resistance of Crowder and that he had broke out in obscene cursing and lying who only defended a Nod might be a certain pledge of fidelity and one word fill the place of an Oath another Clergy-Man disputing with Fox concerning the perfection of Saints in this Life forming an induction from the word of God wherein he thought great force of Argument to be couch'd came to Fox and ask'd him what he thought of himself pressing him more than ordinarily to answer ingenuously Fox scarce knowng what such a question was design'd for at length made no other return than this By the grace of God I am what I am Thereby neither expresly affirming nor denying and yet obscurely hinting what he thought at length Fox after many disappointments by the coming of the Governour Alesius was dismist after so long absence returning to his House and Wife he liv'd there with her for some time so quietly that there was not a Syllable spoken of Fox in the mean time he wrote and sent many Letters Suasory Hortatory and of other sorts concerning such things as he thought his labour and pains might not be lost on but be useful and advantagious He wrote also to the Jews at Amsterdam and to the Papists yea and to the Pope himself as also to the rulers of the lesser Africa and even to the Emperour of the Turks accosting him with this very Inscription and Title of the great Turk a name horrid and unsavoury enough especially in that Nation and Language Fox wrote and caus'd all those Letters to be Printed in his Mother-Tongue the English Language but they were not Translated and sent as they were Inscrib'd So that they rather prov'd tokens of a laborious Confident and Arrogant mind than in any measure profitable and advantagious At London in the year 74 on the 9th and 16th days of October there was a Conference held in a Meeting house of the Baptists 'twixt the Quakers and them concerning the person of Christ the speakers on the Quakers side were G. Withad and S. Crisp G. Keith and W. Penn for the Baptists T. Hicky Jer. Joes W. Kiffin T. Planty all preachers in their own perswasion the cause of the debate was a book publish'd by Hicky in which he branded the Quakers with the reproach of being disintituled to the Character of Christians teaching Christ to be no person without us but that the Internal light of every Man's mind is Christ The Quakers desired them to prove their challenge by showing which of them had ever taught such Doctrine or else that the reproacher might be punished by his fellowship according to the due desert of his delinquency The first day they handled the Quakers opinion the Baptists alledging such words to have been written by the Quakers in a certain book that Christ was never seen with bodily eyes by any Man By which words the Baptists did not yet make out the weight of their charge against the Quakers for they explained the words thus that tho it be certain as Christ was Man he was Externally seen by Men but as he is God that he is Invisible doth sufficiently comport with the Analogy of Scripture That when we speak of Christ's being known loved or worshiped 't is evident we mean not of Corporeal vision but mental Intuition At the next Meeting the Baptists took another Argument to prove the Quakers to be no Christians because they taught Divine Revelation to be the Immediate Rule of Faith and Life which Argument when the Quakers had shown to be weak and childish the Baptists having few more Topicks to lean upon turn'd aside to what concern'd not the Controversy But being unable by Windings and Circumlocutions to defend themselves and taking it ill to be worsted and confuted began to place their victory in Reproach and Loquacity filling all with Tumult and Noise The Quakers who all this time sat still with an equality of fixedness sedateness and constancy receiv'd their assaults as the swelling floods are broken and beat of by the Rocks Thus they parted so far from adjusting the matter that they were more exasperated by the Conference they had enjoy'd The next year Rob. Barclay wrote his Theological Theses and sent them to the Doctors Professors and Students of Theology Popish and Protestant in
with the Authority of a General assembly of that perswasion about the end of the year ensuing I long sought it with great Industry and after much pains it came at length to my hand but not till the whole work was almost finished and a part of it already receiv'd from the Printer I perceive by that book some things we 've related concerning Fox to be there omitted but what we 've said in ours of Fox doth for the main agree with what there is recorded I made some Remarks from thence of Fox which tho I knew not before I adventur'd to make use of relying on his own Credit and Testimony I may take the liberty to say further of that great book of Fox that it contains but few Historical Narratives consisting chiefly 〈◊〉 Enumerating places he Travell'd to all the days of his Life and the disputes he there maintain'd with several sorts of Men and the almost innumerable Orations and Epistles he wrote Fox was a Man alike famous for the temper and disposition of his body and mind of a very solid and succulent body and a mind fitly attemper'd thereto of a great Memory and tho not at all dull yet not Extraordinarily quick and acute Always more ready to think than to talk and yet more forward to speak than to write Unacquainted with no Doctrine or Art tho ne're so Vulgar not Curious yet sometimes taking pleasure to divert himself by playing with the cheats of the Learned Laborious and diligent tho 't were of little or nothing in all the minutes of his Common leisure Indefatigable even when strugling with the greatest of troubles Much given to watching making the measure shorter than that of the Night So given to frugality both for Health and Religion that he once fasted ten days as he testifies of himself being equally temperate in all the parts of his Life Bold and always of a constant patience doing all things so openly as not fearing to make 'em known so enduring all things as if the sole suffering and not the Cause or Action were glorious so ambitioning the Title of a Martyr as if he had thought the Name alone to be sufficient He was moreover couragious tenacious of his Opinion and morose so much considing in his Person Pains and Advice that he thought nothing could be done rightly or perfected without him being deâ—irous every where to be present and preside and what happen'd to be done well he laid claim to the glory of it pretending Title to the Reward of the Praise of it from all and yet all this under colour of Simplicity and Humility Pleasant and Bountiful to those that lov'd him but bitter against others that were not of his Society not only hurting 'em verbally but really as fer as he cou'd and that sometimes not only imprudently but even immodestly and impudently too One of his ancient friends and acquaintances writes in a certain Letter of Fox that he was according to the measure of his Capacity devoted greatly to the worship of God and promoting of Piety among Men meek in Conversation yet tainted with this which almost all teachers labour under in a new Sect or Discipline that he was too harsh 'mongst the Quakers themselves especially those that wou'd not receive such forms as he had conceiv'd or constituted He left many books which some of his followers do but faintly praise yet others extoll 'em to the Skies few touch 'em that are not of their perswasion and no body reads 'em that loaths repetition of the same thing in various dress of words and expressions or dislikes treating a theme with that Prolixity as not to regard what 's sufficient but how much can be said While Fox was alive the Quakers lived with a Brotherly Concord though there always were some that differ'd in some Article beside others that fell off from their Fellowship but Fox as their supreme Master being remov'd whose sayings and doings they regarded as a Law the Bond of Union being now broken though hitherto they seem'd to be led and govern'd only by his Mind and Desire a great Discord arose in England especially among those who tho they were not much wiser than the Vulgar arrogated more Wit and Accuracy to themselves The Subject of this Controversie was the Humanity of Christ first kindled some Years ago in Pensylvania and now toss'd 'twixt Keith and his Friends and others with their Followers puff'd up with some Knowledge I shall treat of this Controversie in the following book They 've Disputed in England concerning that Article almost to the losing of all Society He that pursues the Life of an Enemy neglects the use of no sort of Weapon but he that studies to rob him of his Fame forbears to revile him with no sort of Reproach That Controversie was so invidious divisive and troublesome and persu'd with so much eagerness of mind that men being flush'd with the Desire of Overcoming were not content to contend with words nor only to load one another with many Suspicions but also to spread an ill Report of their Antagonists to hunt after and wound one another with Calumnies openly denouncing Enmity Division and Schism Upon this it 's almost a wonder to think what Ignominy the Quakers did every where incur what Reports were in all places dispers'd of 'em for their so great desire of strife and contention that their whole Church seem'd infected with that Itch and Contagion And since the division of their parties was such there was little Conjunction Peace and Brotherly affection to be expected nay rather the time seem'd to draw nigh when the Sect and its Name must dwindle into nothing and that by the force of its own endeavour There were some concern'd in this Controversy who tho they managed it not by force and violence but hidden Engines not by open blows but private Lashes yet certainly contributed to their downfall and destruction There were General Councils of 'em held yearly at London from ninety two to the year ninety four In this year Keith came from Pensilvania to London and was called by the Council of that year as the principal head and adviser of the whole affair After he came and was long heard even that Council cou'd not compose these strifes nor so much as a little decide the difference So that the mischief as yet remains with Reproach and Disgrace Such is the stiffness and vehemency of these Men while now Iull'd with the soft Gale of Prosperity and Ease that there was never the least shadow of the like before while they wrestled with the rough wind of Adversity But of this I 'll speak more fully in the following Book lest this be swell'd beyond its bounds and there the matter comes in in its more proper place And now this and many other signs give some no small occasion to affirm that liberty case and External Tranquillity do Minister to discord slothfulness wantonness and Intemperance which are all dangerous to
it were distributed by John Comb which so soon as it was known the Magistrates pronounces them all guilty as breakers of the Peace and disturbers of the Government and sends the Mayor Wyth who seizes the Printer and Publisher and carries them from their Houses into Prison and withal as if he had been in his own Possession or Estate takes out of their Work-houses what Tools or Utensils he pleases and carries them away The next day the Magistrate orders the Mayor to lay his Action against Keith and his Companions and partners in his Crime joyning for help two of the Colledge of the Magistrates who were not Quakers namely Lucius Coke a Lutheran and John Holmes a Baptist who as being of a different Perswasion and partial to neither side might pass for upright Judges But these Gentlemen declin'd the Office for this reason because the thing which these Men were accus'd of arose from Religion and Tending thereunto had nothing of concern with the civil Government and therefore was more proper to be decided by those Men from whom it came and who were concern'd in it To which they added that since neither Humane nor Divine Laws allow'd that any one should be Condemned without being first heard it was just and right that Keith before any Judgment pass'd upon him should be heard This was an answer that did not please those whose designs seem'd not to aim at the quieting of the present Disorders but rather to the increase of them and raising of new And so they go on with their Intention and without hearing of Keith proceed to sentence They give Judgment for Keith's Condemnation in a long Writing of which these were the heads That the Governours have declared Keith to be a wicked Man an ill Citizen a Teacher ill Principled and Disaffected to the Government King and Queen And this they order the Cryer to publish in the Court before a great Concourse of People In the Ecclesiastical Convention where the debate between Keith and his Adversaries was handled the Governour and other of the Magistracy being present there happen'd a dispute between Keith and the Governour himself about a place which the Governour had quoted out of a book formerly written by Keith Which place when Keith had said it made nothing to the purpose nor was it rightly cited by the Governour he went on and added that the Governour was also one of those who had not cited him to the hearing of the cause but had Condemned him unheard This slipt from Keith in his heat and suddain transport of mind and by a slip of the Tongue which often happens in hot disputes that the Governour was an Impuâ—ent Man and his Name would rot Which words tho the Governour had more than once said that he would not take notice of as spoken upon such a time and occasion yet now he lays to Keiths charge as an Egregious reproach to Magistracy not to be pass'd by without punishment It was added that Keith at the same time Reproached the Governour as a person not capable for the due discharge of his Office But as to that Keith says that he neither said nor thought so In the said sentence of Condemnation also it is contained that Keith should call another of the Magistrates by a Name which in English Signifies one or all of these viz. Scolder Quareller wrody deceiver Sordid fellow Seoundel Knave Which accusation Keith thus wip'd off Not denying the fact he said he call'd that Man by that Name as being one who indeed was not of the Magistracy and yet notwithstanding sate in that assembly that Condemned Keith and as such concurred with them in the same sentence and subscribed his Condemnation Amongst these Disputes and Wranglings there was a New Court of Judicature held at Philadelphia for the passing an Impartial Sentence upon these three Men who had lain under so much prejudice Jenings was President and Cook one of the Judges who I have both said before were Quaker Ministers Now hither were cited to plead their own Cause Keith Bradford Combe Bud Buss and others of the Keithians who all came all and every of them were Indicted of this Crime of Writing Uttering and Devising a Book intituled an Appeal being a very Seditious Scandalous Book and full of a great many Lies in which particularly Jennings the President of this Assembly was Charged as a proud imperious Man and insolent in his Discourse and Demeanour and the said book did Print concealing the Printers Name Buss whose Christian Name was Peter was charged over and above the rest to have said many other things of Jennings more than was contained in the book Wonderful this The case with Jennings the president and the whole Senate was whether they that were brought afore them as Criminals or Jennings himself were guilty he an untainted and unblamable person or they foul Detractors worthy the highest punishment The Court was full of Scolding and Quarrelling Whatsoever they alledged had been said or written against Jennings was not against him as a Magistrate but an Ecclesiastical person a Preacher and if he pleased his Colleague not with an intent to reproach or accuse him but for his Correction and to try all things as brethren us'd or ought to do And these Criminals prov'd by good Witnesses and Evidences that they who complained so much of the Calumnies laid to their Charge were worse than the Objections against them insinuated Namely that they were not onely Proud and Imperious persons but so far from having the Command of themselves that they could scarce contain themselves within any bounds of their Lusts and Pleasures In this troublesome assembly Keith made many grave Speeches whereof this was the sense and sum Will there never an end be put to these sort of Controversies and Quarrels or will these Latentions be always continued which whether we be Victors or Vanquished are so Shameful and Commentable to us and wish'd for and laughed at by those who once seeming desirous of our Friendship and Amity now are turn'd our Haters and Enemies and curse us And as if in this Case we had lost all our wisdom and there was no further place left for a remedy to this mischief which if it remains and spreads farther will not onely reflect an Eternal Disgrace upon our Truth but also will so afflict and spoil it especially in these parts amongst these Barbarians as will at last bring on it all manner of Ruine and Destruction to its utter Subversion The State of the Case lies here While those whose province it is to take care of the safety of this Country and Religion find it a difficult task to please all parties but much more so to set themselves openly against all hence comes there to be called so many Concurâ—ions and so many various and different events till it s come to that pass by the setting up a few bold Men against all Laws that some narrow Soul'd people terrified in Conscience
Assembly's Trouble and and at last there seem'd to be more need for doing something than further consulting the major part of the Meeting and those of the greatest Anthority concluded upon and determined this Sentence And having considered the Case since there was no hopes now of a Reconciliation That Keith should acknowledge himself to have very much burthened the Church and take upon himself the Occasion of this so great Disturbance and beg pardon for this miscarriage and moreover leave off the maintaining and dispersing of and forsake his Opinions Novelties and Sophisms whereby he has so much either adulrerated the Church or despoiled her of her former splendor and enfeebled her and that he should follow after this to consult the Honour and Interest of the whole Society and defend and promote that Which Sentence struck this man with such a sudden and vehement Impulse as made him break out into a Speech in these Terms That nothing could be better entertain'd by him than this Endeavour of the Meeting as it relates to the Establishing a mutual Peace and Concord and that there was nothing that he would more willingly perform than Obedience to this Assembly and to have the happiness to be serviceable to them and all theirs And therefore that he did in no respect decline the Authority and Decision of this so great assembly but so While these things consist with Equity and Reason and he may without prejudice to himself and them But now since he is free from Error and no fault or Crime is found in him he has nothing to excuse himself for or ask pardon of and that it was not he that is liable to blame or had involv'd himself in guilt but they which do not Comprehend what he had taught and presently and rashly believe and spread about reports of things that they do not rightly understand And so that they deserve most to be blam'd that they may not go on so to insult over the name and fame of otherâ— and those their Brethren and to set the whole Church in an uproar that every one of them may receive such a sentence as they have deserv'd Lastly since that it had happen'd so that his Adversaries would not forsake their private Animosities and Singular Opinions as for their own so for the peace and profit of the publick but lay the faults which belong to themselves at his door that he relying upon the justice and innocency of his Cause and resting satisfied with the Testimony of the Spirit and Witness of his Conscience whatsoever should happen so long as he was not Culpable he would moderately bear and in the mean while he would unburthen himself and do what became a good Christian to defend his reputation and good Name least seeming regardless of that he should seem not to value and betray his Religion and Honesty So since there was no hopes of a peace the Meeting being ended after it had held so long Keith appears abroad again and defends his Speech and excuses himself in the best terms he could both by speaking in his Sermons and publishing Books in Print and altho he confesses that thro' mistake not wilful culpability he had formerly written some things which now a-days were not approv'd of yet that as for his Doctrine of the humanity of Christ being what he had the greatest reason himself to approve of and being indeed most justly approvable and a principal Article and foundation of the Doctrine and Faith of Christians he would to his utmost power Preach it abroad On the other hand his Adversaries also with equal Zeal go on to observe Keith in the Meetings to refute his opinions and inveigh against him with hard Speeches Amongst which the chief were Dan. Whirley and W. Penn which Penn as Keith was in the middle of his Discourse before the whole Meeting could not forbear more than once to call him Apostate and an open Enemy to the truth and the whole Society Others as Tho. Ellwood and John Pennington not onely by their books impugned the Tenents of this Man and refelled his Arguments but also traduc'd his person rendred him infamous So at last some began to find fault with others and use a greater liberty in accusing them and to hate them and provoke them to anger and fury as it were and euery one strove to bring others to his own party and inspire them with Enmity against the others These things lasted till the late General Meeting held at Lonâ— this year 95. Which as soon as it began to be held Keith came hither with an Intention to lay all things clearly open in hopes to find more Equitable Treatment from his Judges But when he came to the door which he did the first day he was stop't by the Door-Keepers who knew aforehand what his mind and Intentions were but the day after tho 't were late first getting admittance he came before his Adversaries who he knew were within and whose Intentions against him he was sensible of beforehand and not Viva voâ—â— which would have had more of a forcible Energy in it but in Writing the more carefully and moderately to Express himself he deliver'd a Speech to this purpose That he was never convinc'd either by any assembly or by that which was held in that place the year before of any Errour of his either in Doctrine or Life tho he don't pretend to exempt himself from Errour being a frailty incident to all Men and not forreign to himself but he Confessed himself to have said and written several things heretofore in which at this time he acknowledges his frailty And because no assembly of those people who are commonly called Quakers lawfully and rightly conveen'd has condemned him of them as by the silence of them all on that account appears he therefore looks upon himself as free from all Errour That he well knows the Council the last Meeting gave him but since that was onely Counsel which obliges no Man and infers no necessity equal to a Command that he was at his own liberty either to follow it or let it alone But that he had omitted it because he thought he had done all that was his duty to do in this business and that there was none of the Brethren of the Society who if they would but consider the deeds both of him and his Adversaries without prejudice or being byass'd by others opinions or making a rash Determination of things and weigh them in the Ballance of the sacred Scriptures and right reason but what would approve of his doings and condemn theirs This 〈◊〉 was searce read but it rais'd a mighty commotion in the minds of them all But the principal adversaries of Keith and speakers in this Contention were W. Penn W. Bingley G. Withale J. Vaughton J. Feild and J. Waldenfield And Penn and Withade had so little Command of their minds and tongues as Keith also was so unable to contain himself by which you may see the
into Joke and Banter and so it ended after the same rate as Disputations most commonly do The Quakers are wont when they talk of the Things that happen'd to them in these Countries to say That they never suffered so much but that the benefits they now enjoy do more than countervail it and that whatsoever they have suffered that they have suffered nothing for any ill Deed or Crime which even those that are most inraged against them never pretended to object against any one of them and that indeed they have not suffered for their Doctrine and Religion since that at the time they suffered those who were their Persecutors did not so much as know what their Doctrine and Religion was and such their Religion was looked upon as Error through mistake had apprehended it and when afterwards what their Doctrine and Religion was began to be more exactly known and conceived by Men and that not upon suspicion and by conjecture only but certain notices and due apprehensions thereof that thenceforward no Injury or Violence was offer'd to them by any Persons whatsoever upon the account of their Doctrine and Religion Moreover thus they will go on to argue with you and say That although they cannot absolutely forget nor totally blot out of their mind the remembrance of what had befallen them in these Countries yet that this they can do nevertheless to take no notice of but bury them in perpetual silence and to rejoyce in their present enjoyment Now there springs up a new race of Men a new Sect Discipline and new way of living in these Provinces These were comprehended in that Communion and Society which they called Labadistic from the Author and Gatherer of it one John Labadee a French Walloon formerly a Papist and Jesuit afterwards coming over to our side a Minister of the Gospel in several of the French Churches last of all at Middleburgh in Zealand but he was put out of his place for refusing to submit to the Judgment and Decree of the Walloon Synod for so here they call the French Churches of some Fact he had done A very ripe-witted and subtle Man he was indeed moderately Learned but above measure Eloquent and Rhetorical and beyond expression prompt and ready to speak Extempore upon any subject Of this Man various were the Opinions and Senses of the People For thus they that were Adversaries to him described him as a Man of a sickle temper and always changing disdainful yielding to none that were his Superiours to his Equals arrogant and proud and to his Inferiours altogether intollerable neither in Mind nor Manners the same sort of a Man that in Countenance and Habit he seem'd to be making shew of a great deal of Modesty and Humility but full of Craft in Counterfeiting and Dissimulation though better at playing the Counterfeit of what he was not than Dissembling what he was so that there was no Man living more fit or better qualified under a specious pretence of Goodness and shew of Religion to tickle the Minds of unwary People and circumvent them as he pleas'd There were others that lov'd the Man well and were his Followers and familiar Friends and most intimate Acquaintance as could scarce ever endure to be out of his Sight and these celebrated his Praises as one that far exceeded all the Doctors of the Churches and a Man sent on a Divine Embassy from Heaven to Mankind who thought and did all things Divinely and with a Mind perpetually conversant in Heaven and from thence deriv'd instituted and was to perfect the Work of Reformation to others either altogether unknown or an ungrateful task they would not care to undertake or that it would seem an insupportable burthen or of such a kind as no body would be able to go through with Others there were that had entertained a middling sort of an Opinion of him between both these Extreams and they look'd upon him as a very excellent Man and a very useful and necessary instrument for the Reformation of Life and Manners and likely to become their undoubted Restorer but that he was a little too hasty and severe and almost passionately intent in the weighing and correcting of Men and so by over-doing did undo and spoil what his Intentions aim'd at Of thi◠Society there was as it were another Parent one Anna Maria a Schurman a noble Maid and very Rich and more than that which is seldom heard of or found I had almost said known 〈◊〉 Person endued with most singular Piety and Integrity abounding in a universal Learning and Knowledge skill'd in various Arts and Sciences and the Knowledge of very many Languages not only of the European but also of the Oriental Tongues and that not only of those that were more anciently in use but of the modern times so that in this Sex there has either never or at least very seldom been seen a more illustrious or eminent Example so that hereby she was become the love and delight and as it were the Lady Patroness of the Learned of her time which she her self afterwards took notice of and deplored in a Book which she Writ and Intituled it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of this Society there were Members many of the Nobility and People but they were such as were of the best Esteem and Monied Men in whom there was either an inclination or intention of Piety and a forsaking of evil Company and a Contempt and avoidance of the frail and fleeting things of this World A fit Society this for those that were thus disposed for those I say who in this light transient and soon perishing state of the Affairs of the whole Universe and in so great an abundance of the wickedness of Mankind and those great numbers of Christians as they pretend themselves who only are so in name and not reality were nauseated and tired with what they heard and saw and to whom Christ alone and their Salvation of their Souls by him was their only desire and care The first House this Society had was at Amsterdam Then at Altona upon the Elbe where Labadee deceased being a Man mightily belov'd by all those of his Party Last of all at Wiewerd a Town in Friesland not far distant from Leeweward where they had a very ample House formerly the Mansion-House of the Waltars and then afterwards Hereditary to the Family of the Sommeldices In which place not long after this Society was dissolved and dispers'd about rfter the manner of the Primitive and most blessed State of the Church which a great many People presag'd and foretold from the very first and so all this expectation was lost and all those Treasures which several of the Society had contributed towards it were turned into Ashes Now before this came to pass this noble Maid being now stricken in years and almost decripit arriv'd at the end of her Race and Dying was Cloth'd with Immortality Happy she had she not in the very midst
therefore easily stuck to their Precepts and became themselves like unto them but also among many others who yet while they were carried with a desire alone to attain to Godliness were called by the only Name of Pietists and ingenuously took upon them to follow the Party of Horbius and Spener insomuch that now upon the Rhine and where the river Lippe discharges her self into the same at Wesel and the places adjacent towards Cleve many even of our Churches did also so embrace this mystical Theology some according to the Weigelian some the Tentonick mode and did so vigorously promote it cherish such as received it with so much Ardency that they began to unite and gather together so as that our Divines had no small task upon them for to instruct and teach them better that they might not withdraw from our Churches And there is no occasion here to relate how much vexation and trouble their Ministers and other good Men had in Holland both from the old Weigelian family and from this new brood of Teutonicks seeing this is so well known there and in every bodies mouth but this is not to be past over so far as it has relation to the affairs of the Quakers among these new mystical Men there was one John Jacob Zimmerman Pastor of the Lutheran Church in the Dutehy of Wirtemburg a Man skilled in Mathematicks and saving what he had Contracted of these erroneous opinions had all other excellent endowments of mind to which may be added the temperance of his Life wherein he was inferior to none and who was of considerable fame in the world Who when he saw there was nothing but great danger like to hang over himself and his Friends he invites and stirs up through his own hope about sixteen or seaventeen Families of these sort of Men to prefer also an hope of better things tho it were dubious before the present danger and forsaking their Country which they through the most precipitous and utmost danger tho they suffered Death for the same could not help and relieve as they supposed and leaving their Inheritance which they could not carry along with them to depart and betake themselves into other parts of the world even to Pensilvania the Quakers Country and there divide all the good and the evil that befall them between themselves and learn the Languages of that People and Endeavour to inspire Faith and Piety into the same Inhabitants by their words and examples which they could not do to these Christians here These agree to it at least so far as to try and sound the way and if things did not go ill to fortify and fit themselves for the same Zimmerman having yet N. Koster for his Colleague who was also a famous Man and of such severe manners that few could equal him writes to a certain Quaker in Holland who was a Man of no mean Learning and very wealthy very bountiful and liberal towards all the poor pious and good That as he and his followers and friends designed They are the very words of the Letter which is now in my Custody To depart from these Babilonish Coasts to those American Plantations being led thereunto by the guidance of the Divine Spirit and that seeing that all of them wanted wordly substance that they would not leâ— them want Friends but assist them herein that they might have a good Ship well provided for them to carry them into those places wherein they might mind this one thing to wit to shew with unanimous consent their Faith and Love in the Spirit in converting of People but at the same time to sustain their bodies by their daily Labour So great was the desire inclination and affection of this Man towards them that he forthwith promised them all manner of assistance and performed it and fitted them with a Ship for their purpose and did out of that large Portion of Land he had in Pensilvania assign unto them a matter of two thousand and four hundred Acres for ever of such Land as it was but such as might be manured imposing yearly to be paid a very small matter of rent upon every Acre and gave freely of his own and what he got from his friends as much as paid their Charge and Passage amounting to an hundred and thirty pounds sterling a very great gift and so much the more strange that that same Quaker should be so liberal and yet would not have his name mentioned or known in the matter But when these Men came into Holland they Sailed from thence directly for Pensilvania Zimmerman seasonably dies but surely it was unseasonable for them but yet not so but that they all did chearfully pursue their Voyage and while I am writing hereof I receive an account that they arrived at the place they aimed at and that they all lived in the same house and had a publick Meeting three times every week and that they took much pains to teach the blind people to become like unto themselves and to conform to their examples This Commotion and Disturbance made among the Lutherans has been not only noted here for a Commemoration of the present time but for a perpetual memorial of that people and I shall return to the Quakers and briefly say something of their passing into other Countries and the most remote parts of Europe and so shall conclude this book and the whole work therewith and this we must not and ought the lest to pass over because they also wonderfully extol but in words and Writing the doing of these Travellers and Itinerants almost beyond belief not indeed untruly but yet with so flattering an Estimation of these mens Labours and Troubles which they suffered for their Religion and had returned unto them for those Benefits and Rewards to wit for the Propagating of their Religion and the increase of it in those Countries and unless I mistake I confess I may mistake I see that in process of time as these men are very fond of their own Glory of whom some notwithstanding their external Plainness and Modesty swell with the leaven of Spiritual Pride that they will esteem all the sayings of their Predecessors as Oracles and their Actions Miracles and so Enhance and Magnify them as such and Boast and Glory that the same have done very great things every where and memorable to all Posterity A little before those first Emisaries went into Holland and the Adjacent Countries Edward Burroughs and Sam. Fisher went to Dunkirk a Sea-port Town in French Flanders to shew there to the People the Ignorance and Superstition of the Papacy But when they found none upon whom they thought they might work any thing they shortly without any delay return for England again flying from the Storm which they saw hanging over their Heads and seeing that they could do no good for the promotion of their Religion they were aâ—raid to do the same an injury in other things by their own misfortunes sufferings and
her any other way from her purpose he puts her on board a Ship go her Convey'd to Venice She having lost the opportunity but not the will she had to accomplish her design after that she had sailed up as high as Peloponesus or the Morea she made them put her a shore on the next Land There having got this freedom and regarding neither the circumstances of Nature nor the weakness of her Sex being all alone and ignorant of the Way and the Language that she might avoid the danger of falling into the hands of Thieves she Travails on Foot all along the Shoar and Sea-Coast of the Morea Greece and Macedon and from thence over the Mountains and craggy places of Romania or Thrace as far as the River Mariza came to Adrianople where the Emperor did then continually reside because he was very much hated by those of Constantinople and so he in like manner shunned the presence and sight of them There was a vast Retinue and Concourse of People attending the Emperor besides his Army which lay there so as that there was scarce room enough to containâ— such a multitude The Woman was lucky tho' she did not know it to alight upon such Men who tho' they are called by the name of Turks came not short in their Kindnesses to Strangers of any other Nation especially the nobler and better sort of them which I my self have not so much understood as experienced yea do so respect and esteem Women-kind that if any injure them in VVords or Actions he runs in danger of his Life It was a very difficult thing to come to and speak with the Emperor but as there is nothing pleasant to a Lover but what is sought after and hard to be obtained she trys every way looks about her narrowly follows closely her Business and after many Sollicitations and Traverses backwards and forwards through many places at last she found one who spoke for her to the Grand Visier who is the chief Man in Authority next the Emperor and acquaints him that there was an English VVoman who had some good Counsel to give the Emperor in the Name of the Great God This Visier was Achmet Bassa very Renowned among the Turks because he succeeded his Father in that great Office which Honour none ever before him attained to in that kind The Visier speaks to the Emperor on the Womans behalf the Emperor grants her Liberty to come to him She came accompanied with the Dragmans or Emperors Interpreters but I could never learn what it was the Woman said to him The Emperor after he had given her Audience commands her to withdraw and ordered her to be conveyed to Constantinople that she might from thence return to her own Country This is that which the Woman after her return was wont to relate to the Quakers and none able to confirm or confute it and this is that same person who together with Anne Austin was the first of all the Women that went to Preach their Religion in New England and who for her great Endowments not only of mind and wit but also for her great dexterity and experience was by William Ball a Preacher of no small fame among the Quakers thought worthy to make him a VVife as I have said in the beginning of this Book that so that which was the beginning of this Book is also the end of the same and of the whole work AN APPENDIX CONTAINING The True Copy of a Latine Letter Writ by George â—eith and sent by him to Gerard Croes Translated out of his Latine Manuscript into English Some Annotations upon diverse things related in the Latine Book called The Quakerian History of Gerard Croes concerning me G. K. and some Opinions or Sentiments not well by him alledged to be mine with an Emendation and Correction of those things which the Author through Mistake hath unduely fixed on me As also concerning some other things respecting some Sentiments of many called Quakers and our late Controversies in matters of Faith and Religion IN the Epist Dedicat. Who hate every humane Name in the Church The Annotation It is well said I wish the Reformed so called did endeavour so to do As to my part it is very odious to me that such among the People called Quakers professing the same Christian Faith with me should be called Keithians For if the Name of Calvinist be odious to him Why should not the Name of Keithian be equally odious to me and to my Brethren professing the same Faith of Christ with me the which Name this Author useth in divers places of his History In the Epist Dedic There is not any thing of any moment in the whole work that was not done in publick view The Annot. The Author doth relate most things in a good degree candidly and moderately but in some things that are no less matters of Fact than Articles of Doctrine which he imputeth to me he hath missed the Mark but as I believe unwillingly he not being in all things well informed that did concern my Affairs in Religious Controversies Page 192. of the History Being a Chaplain in a certain Noble Family was adapted a Minister of the Divine Word The Annot. I acknowledge I did live for some time in a certain rich Family giving Education to some Children belonging to that Family using frequent Prayer and other Exercises of Religion in the same but before I had the Profession of a Quaker I was never adapted a Minister of the Divine Word Page 194. Thus the Doctrine and Religion of the Quakers oweth its birth and growth to England its Accomplishment and Perfection to Scotland The Annot. Here he seemeth too much to favour Robert Barclay and Me being both Scotch-men for certain Writings and Labours of ours in Explaining the People called Quakers their Principles and so they seemed unto us But that I may confess the thing as it it By too great experience for some years past I have learned having more inward Conversation with some Ministers of the first rank among them than formerly I had and more intently Reading some of their Books which before I did little Read and such of them as I had Read I had not so carefully and accurately considered what I did Read in them that many of the Principles and Dogma's deliver'd and explain'd by me in the Name of the Quakers were not so according to the sense of most of the Ministry among that People as according to my sense given to me by the Grace of God and I do ingeniously confess that therein I was greatly mistaken P. 178. And concerning Christ dwelling in every Mâ—â—â— The Annot. Here he doth not relate aright the distinction at least wise as by me explained betwixt the Existence or in-being of Christ in Man and his In-dwelling Christ indeed is in every Man as he is the Word that hath proceeded or emanated from God but he dwelleth only in the Saints The Inhabitation of God and Christ in
America procured it to be Reprinted at London changing nothing at all in it I know that both these Books have much displeased many called Quakers and have pleased many others and doth still please them So that to many that of Virgil may be applyed Scinditur incertum studia in contraria vulgas S In English thus The wav'ring People divided are From one another asunder far Which their pretended Vnity doth marr P. 450. But when Keith did not so much positively determine as by Hypothesis suppose that which some did attribute to him concerning the Transmigration or Revolution of Souls and their State after Death or did subject it as fit to be examined whether it was true or not that was not made the Question betwixt his Adversaries in Pensilvania and him The Annot. Let the Reader compare what the Author brings in this place concerning the Opinion of the Transmigration c. untruly fixed upon me by some with what he hath said p. 284. in these words To me saith he it is certain as I think that Keith doth earnestly embrace if not all yet the chiefest of these Propositions as mentioned by him in the fore-cited place concerning the Transmigration and collected as I suppose out of the Book called The Two Hundred Queries Surely this Author doth not appear so well to agree with himself in this Affair for in the one place soberly enough and civilly he Writes concerning me not fixing that Opinion on me but in the other he saith it is certain that I earnestly embrace if not all yet the chiefest of these Propositions But I am most certain that he cannot produce any one Witness that did or could certainly inform him that I did any ways embrace all or any of these propositions either as any Article of Faith or as any positive Dogma or Principle in Philosophy And I know not any one that doth positively embrace them all But as concerning the Dogma it self of the revolution of some not all Souls setting aside many Circumstances and casual Propositions not touching the chief Question proposed only by some Christian Writers by way of Hypothesis and not as a positive Conclusion however I might seem to some to favour it as an Hypothesis because sometimes modestly discoursing of it with some very few of my familiar Acquaintance I did bring some Reasons both for and against as in other doubtful matters ingenuous and free-spirited men use to Discourse pro and contra in order to find out the Truth as concerning the Motion of the Earth and the like yet I openly declare that I never embraced it either as an Article of Faith or as any positive Dogma in Philosophy as I do not at present Nor am I asham'd to say as I am not sufficiently able and furnished in all respects to refute it by evident Reasons so nor am I to defend it And I oft call to mind that saying of Plato It is not the part of a wise man to determine of obscure matters and much more that of David I exercise not my self in things too high for me But because I could by no means approve that method of Arguing which some used against that opinion nor the false zeal kindled in some against it that did rise in them from their prejudice against the necessity of Faith in Christ Crucified in any degree either expresly or implicitely in order to eternal Salvation Therefore some leavened with this evil prejudice did make it their business to load me with Reproaches and to spread false Rumors concerning me as holding many absurd things concerning the Transmigration and Revolution of Souls For whereas many did use to bring this Argument against the necessity of Faith in the Crucified Jesus in order to Eternal Salvation If such a necessity of Faith in the Crucified Man Jesus Christ for Eternal Salvation be allowed or granted the Revolution of many Souls must be granted but the last is absurd and therefore is the first absurd also And I in my Answering to this Argument have sometimes said on the Hypothesis that if such a sequel of the Major or first Proposition were admitted it were better to admit or allow that Hypothesis concerning the Revolution of the Souls of some Gentiles dying in pure Gentilisme or Deisme who have in any manner lived Piously towards God and Soberly and Honestly towards Men suppose it be not true then to assert that such Dying in a pure Gentilisme are wholly and finally deprived of Eternal Life On the other hand to affirm that immediately after Death such dying without the least grain of the Knowledge and Faith of Christ Crucified either express or implicite do enter into Eternal Life Let now any Impartial Man Judge in this Case yea let the Author of this History himself Judge whether for my Christian Zeal in standing up for the necessity of the Christian Faith against these Deists lately risen up in these parts and elsewhere and against the Pelagians either rediviving or at least-wise calling back again to life the most filthy Errors of the Old Pelagians who were extreamly bitter Enemies to the necessity of Faith in Christ Crucified my Adversaries have justly accused me of a Crime in this matter Nor do I think that this Author whom I judge to be a sober Man when he hath well weighed the case will joyn himself a Neighbour or Consociate himself to these my Pelagian and Theist-Adversaries Confessing to Christ with the Mouth and Words but really and in the true Sence of Scripture denying him to Accuse me as they do as guilty of a Crime in this thing P. 384. The Cause was the Controversie that arose some few years agoe in Pensilvania and agitated betwixt Keith and his Neighbours concerning the Two-fold Humanity of Christ Annot. I marvel with what reason this Author could affirm that the Controversie about the Two-fold Humanity of Christ was the cause of the Strife betwixt my Adversaries and me in Pensilvania or here in England For I do not remember that I had the least Controversie with my Adversaries either there or here concerning the Two-fold Humanity of Christ but concerning Christ within and Christ without For because I frequently Preached in the Quakers Meetings Faith in Christ being Man without us as well as in Christ the Life the Light the Word in us and that this Faith that respected him both ways was necessary to our Eternal Salvation therefore first William Stockdale accused me of being guilty in Preaching Two Christs and after him Thomas Fitswater publickly in a Monthly Meeting accused me for denying That the Light within us was sufficient to Salvation without something else Now my Adversaries in Pensilvania by Christ within us understood no other thing than the God-head and they had this sense or meaning of Christ within that this only should be called and esteemed Christ which they did feel in their hearts to reprove sin and to refresh them with a certain Joy if at any time they did