A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF THE PEOPLE CALLED QUAKERS, IN WHICH THEIR FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE, DOCTRINES, WORSHIP, MINISTRY, AND DISCIPLINE, ARE PLAINLY DECLARED. 

 WITH A SUMMARY RELATION OF THE FORMER DISPENSATIONS OF GOD IN THE WORLD; BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION. 

 BY WILLIAM PENN. 

 AS UNKNOWN, AND YET WELL KNOWN. 2 COR. VI. 9. 

 TWELFTH EDITION. 

 MANCHESTER:

 _Printed by Harrison and Crosfield_, _Market Street_. 

 SOLD BY

 HARVEY & DARTON, GRACECHURCH STREET, LONDON. 

 1834. 

AN EPISTLE TO THE READER. 

Reader, this following account of the people called Quakers, &c. Waswritten in the fear and love of God: first, as a standing testimony tothat ever blessed truth in the inward parts, with which God, in myyouthful time, visited my soul, and for the sense and love of which I wasmade willing, in no ordinary way, to relinquish the honours and interestsof the world. Secondly, as a testimony for that despised people, thatGod has in his great mercy gathered and united by his own blessed Spiritin the holy profession of it; whose fellowship I value above all worldlygreatness. Thirdly, in love and honour to the memory of that worthyservant of God, George Fox, the first instrument thereof, and thereforestyled by me--The great and blessed apostle of our day. As this gavebirth to what is here presented to thy view, in the first edition of it, by way of preface to George Fox's excellent Journal; so the considerationof the present usefulness of the following account of the people calledQuakers, by reason of the unjust reflections of some adversaries thatonce walked under the profession of Friends, and the exhortations thatconclude it, prevailed with me to consent that it should be republishedin a smaller volume; knowing also full well, that great books, especiallyin these days, grow burthensome, both to the pockets and minds of toomany; and that there are not a few that desire, so it be at an easy rate, to be informed about this people, that have been so much every wherespoken against: but blessed be the God and Father of our Lord JesusChrist, it is upon no worse grounds than it was said of old time of theprimitive Christians, as I hope will appear to every sober andconsiderate reader. Our business, after all the ill usage we have metwith, being the realities of religion, an effectual change before ourlast and great change: that all may come to an inward, sensible, andexperimental knowledge of God, through the convictions and operations ofthe light and spirit of Christ in themselves; the sufficient and blessedmeans given to all, that thereby all may come savingly to know the onlytrue God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent to enlighten and redeem theworld: which knowledge is indeed eternal life. And that thou, reader, mayst obtain it, is the earnest desire of him that is ever thine in sogood a work. 

WILLIAM PENN. 

CHAP. I. 

_Containing a brief account of divers dispensations of God in the world_, _to the time he was pleased to raise this despised people_, _calledQuakers_. 

Divers have been the dispensations of God since the creation of theworld, unto the sons of men; but the great end of all of them, has beenthe renown of his own excellent name in the creation and restoration ofman: man, the emblem of himself, as a God on earth, and the glory of allhis works. The world began with innocency; all was then good that thegood God had made: and as he blessed the works of his hands, so theirnatures and harmony magnified him their Creator. Then the morning starssang together for joy, and all parts of his work said Amen to his law. Not a jar in the whole frame; but man in paradise, the beasts in thefield, the fowl in the air, the fish in the sea, the lights in theheavens, the fruits of the earth; yea, the air, the earth, the water, andfire, worshipped, praised, and exalted his power, wisdom, and goodness. O holy sabbath! O holy day to the Lord!

But this happy state lasted not long; for man, the crown and glory of thewhole, being tempted to aspire above his place, unhappily yielded, against command and duty, as well as interest and felicity, and so fellbelow it; lost the divine image, the wisdom, power, and purity he wasmade in; by which, being no longer fit for paradise, he was expelled thatgarden of God, his proper dwelling and residence, and was driven out, asa poor vagabond, from the presence of the Lord, to wander in the earth, the habitation of beasts. 

Yet God that made him had pity on him; for he, seeing man was deceived, and that it was not of malice, or an original presumption in him, butthrough the subtilty of the serpent, who had first fallen from his ownstate, and by the mediation of the woman, man's own nature and companion, whom the serpent had first deluded, in his infinite goodness and wisdomprovided a way to repair the breach, recover the loss, and restore fallenman again by a nobler and more excellent Adam, promised to be born of awoman; that as by means of a woman the evil one had prevailed upon man, by a woman also he should come into the world, who would prevail againsthim, and bruise his head, and deliver man from his power: and which, in asignal manner, by the dispensation of the Son of God in the flesh, in thefulness of time was personally and fully accomplished by him, and in him, as man's Saviour and Redeemer. 

But his power was not limited, in the manifestation of it to that time;for both before and since his blessed manifestation in the flesh, he hasbeen the light and life, the rock and strength of all that ever fearedGod; was present with them in their temptations, followed them in theirtravels and afflictions, and supported and carried them through and overthe difficulties that have attended them in their earthly pilgrimage. Bythis, Abel's heart excelled Cain's, and Seth obtained the pre-eminence, and Enoch walked with God. It was this that strove with the old world, and which they rebelled against, and which sanctified and instructed Noahto salvation. 

But the outward dispensation that followed the benighted state of man, after his fall, especially among the patriarchs, was generally that ofangels; as the scriptures of the Old Testament do in many places express, as to Abraham, Jacob, &c. The next was that of the law by Moses, whichwas also delivered by angels, as the apostle tells us. This dispensationwas much outward, and suited to a low and servile state; calledtherefore, by the apostle Paul, that of a schoolmaster, which was topoint out and prepare that people to look and long for the Messiah, whowould deliver them from the servitude of a ceremonious and imperfectdispensation, by knowing the realities of those mysteriousrepresentations in themselves. In this time the law was written onstone, the temple built with hands, attended with an outward priesthood, and external rites and ceremonies, that were shadows of the good thingsthat were to come, and were only to serve till the seed came, or the moreexcellent and general manifestation of Christ, to whom was the promise, and to all men only in him, in whom it was yea and amen, even life fromdeath, immortality and eternal life. 

This the prophets foresaw, and comforted the believing Jews in thecertainty of it; which was the top of the Mosaical dispensation, whichended in John's ministry, the forerunner of the Messiah, as John's wasfinished in him, the fulness of all. And then God, that at sundry times, and in divers manners, had spoken to the fathers by his servants theprophets, spoke to men by his Son Christ Jesus, who is heir of allthings, being the gospel-day, which is the dispensation of sonship:bringing in thereby a nearer testament, and a better hope; even thebeginning of the glory of the latter days, and of the restitution of allthings; yea, the restoration of the kingdom unto Israel. 

Now the spirit, that was more sparingly communicated in formerdispensations, began to be poured forth upon all flesh, according to theprophet Joel; and the light that shined in darkness, or but dimly before, the most gracious God caused to shine out of darkness, and the day-starbegan to rise in the hearts of believers, giving unto them the knowledgeof God in the face, or appearance, of his Son Christ Jesus. 

Now the poor in spirit, the meek, the true mourners, the hungry andthirsty after righteousness, the peacemakers, the pure in heart, themerciful and persecuted, came more especially in remembrance before theLord, and were sought out and blessed by Israel's true Shepherd. OldJerusalem with her children grew out of date, and the new Jerusalem intorequest, the mother of the sons of the gospel-day. Wherefore, no more atold Jerusalem, nor at the mountain of Samaria, will God be worshippedabove other places; for, behold, he is, by his own Son, declared andpreached a Spirit, and that he will be known as such, and worshipped inthe spirit and in the truth. He will now come nearer than of old time, and he will write his law in the heart, and put his fear and spirit inthe inward parts, according to his promise. Then signs, types, andshadows flew away, the day having discovered their insufficiency in notreaching to the inside of the cup, to the cleansing of the conscience;and all elementary services expired in and by him, that is the substanceof all. 

And to this great and blessed end of the dispensation of the Son of God, did the apostles testify, whom he had chosen and anointed by his spirit, to turn the Jews from their prejudice and superstition, and the Gentilesfrom their vanity and idolatry, to Christ's light and spirit that shinedin them; that they might be quickened from the sins and trespasses inwhich they were dead, to serve the living God, in the newness of thespirit of life, and walk as children of the light, and of the day, eventhe day of holiness: for such put on Christ, the light of the world, andmake no more provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof. Sothat the light, spirit, and grace, that come by Christ, and appear inman, were that divine principle the apostles ministered from, and turnedpeople's minds unto, and in which they gathered and built up the churchof Christ in their day. For which cause they advise them not to quenchthe spirit, but to wait for the spirit, and speak by the spirit, and prayby the spirit, and walk in the spirit too, as that which approved themthe truly begotten children of God, born not of flesh and blood, or ofthe will of man, but of the will of God; by doing his will, and denyingtheir own; by drinking of Christ's cup, and being baptized with hisbaptism of self-denial; the way and path that all the heirs of life haveever trod to blessedness. 

But alas! even in the apostles' days, those bright stars of the firstmagnitude of the gospel light, some clouds, foretelling an eclipse ofthis primitive glory, began to appear; and several of them gave earlycaution of it to the Christians of their time, that even then there was, and yet would be more and more, a falling away from the power ofgodliness, and the purity of that spiritual dispensation, by such assought to make a fair show in the flesh, but with whom the offence of thecross ceased. Yet with this comfortable conclusion, that they saw beyondit a more glorious time than ever to the true church. Their sight wastrue; and what they foretold to the churches, gathered by them in thename and power of Jesus, came to pass: for Christians degenerated apaceinto outsides, as days, and meats, and divers other ceremonies. And, which was worse, they fell into strife and contention about them;separating one from another, then envying, and, as they had power, persecuting one another, to the shame and scandal of their commonChristianity, and grievous stumbling and offence of the heathen; amongwhom the Lord had so long and so marvellously preserved them. And havinggot at last the worldly power into their hands, by kings and emperorsembracing the Christian profession, they changed, what they could, thekingdom of Christ, which is not of this world, into a worldly kingdom;or, at least, styled the worldly kingdom that was in their hands, thekingdom of Christ, and so they became worldly and not true Christians. Then human inventions and novelties, both in doctrine and worship, crowded fast into the church; a door opened thereunto, by the grossnessand carnality that appeared then among the generality of Christians, whohad long since left the guidance of God's meek and heavenly spirit, andgiven themselves up to superstition, will-worship, and voluntaryhumility. And as superstition is blind, so it is heady and furious, forall must stoop to its blind and boundless zeal, or perish by it: in thename of the spirit, persecuting the very appearance of the spirit of Godin others, and opposing that in others, which they resisted inthemselves, viz. The light, grace, and spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ;but always under the notion of innovation, heresy, schism, or some suchplausible name; though Christianity allows of no name, or pretencewhatever, for persecuting of any man for matters of mere religion, beingin its very nature meek, gentle, and forbearing; and consists of faith, hope, and charity, which no persecutor can have, whilst he remains apersecutor; in that a man cannot believe well, or hope well, or have acharitable or tender regard to another, whilst he would violate his mind, or persecute his body, for matters of faith or worship towards his God. 

Thus the false church sprang up, and mounted the chair; but, though shelost her nature, she would needs keep her good name of the Lamb's bride, the true church, and mother of the faithful: constraining all to receiveher mark, either in their forehead, or right-hand; that is, publicly, orprivately. But, in deed and in truth, she was mystery Babylon, themother of harlots, mother of those that, with all their show and outsideof religion, were adulterated and gone from the spirit, nature, and lifeof Christ, and grown vain, worldly, ambitious, covetous, cruel, &c. Whichare the fruits of the flesh, and not of the spirit. 

Now it was, that the true church fled into the wilderness, that is, fromsuperstition and violence, to a retired, solitary, and lonely state:hidden, and as it were, out of sight of men, though not out of the world. Which shows, that her wonted visibility was not essential to the being ofa true church in the judgment of the Holy Ghost; she being as true achurch in the wilderness, though not as visible and lustrous, as when shewas in her former splendor of profession. In this state many attemptsshe made to return, but the waters were yet too high, and her way blockedup; and many of her excellent children, in several nations and centuries, fell by the cruelty of superstition, because they would not fall fromtheir faithfulness to the truth. 

The last age did set some steps towards it, both as to doctrine, worship, and practice. But practice quickly failed: for wickedness flowed, in alittle time, as well among the professors of the reformation, as thosethey reformed from; so that by the fruits of conversation they were notto be distinguished. And the children of the reformers, if not thereformers themselves, betook themselves, very early, to earthly policyand power, to uphold and carry on their reformation that had been begunwith spiritual weapons; which I have often thought has been one of thegreatest reasons the reformation made no better progress, as to the lifeand soul of religion. For whilst the reformers were lowly andspiritually minded, and trusted in God, and looked to him, and lived inhis fear, and consulted not with flesh and blood, nor sought deliverancein their own way, there were daily added to the church such as, one mightreasonably say, should be saved: for they were not so careful to be safefrom persecution, as to be faithful and inoffensive under it: being moreconcerned to spread the truth by their faith and patience in tribulation, than to get the worldly power out of their hands that inflicted thosesufferings upon them: and it will be well if the Lord suffer them not tofall, by the very same way they took to stand. 

In doctrine they were in some things short; in other things, to avoid oneextreme, they ran into another: and for worship, there was, for thegenerality, more of man in it than of God. They owned the spirit, inspiration, and revelation, indeed, and grounded their separation andreformation upon the sense and understanding they received from it, inthe reading of the scriptures of truth. And this was their plea; thescripture is the text, the spirit the interpreter, and that to every onefor himself. But yet there was too much of human invention, tradition, and art, that remained both in praying and preaching; and of worldlyauthority, and worldly greatness in their ministers; especially in thiskingdom, Sweden, Denmark, and some parts of Germany. God was thereforepleased in England to shift us from vessel to vessel; and the next removehumbled the ministry, so that they were more strict in preaching, devoutin praying, and zealous for keeping the Lord's day, and catechising ofchildren and servants, and repeating at home in their families what theyhad heard in public. But even as these grew into power, they were notonly for whipping some out, but others into the temple: and they appearedrigid in their spirits, rather than severe in their lives, and more for aparty than for piety: which brought forth another people, that were yetmore retired and select. 

They would not communicate at large, or in common with others; but formedchurches among themselves of such as could give some account of theirconversion, at least of very promising experiences of the work of God'sgrace upon their hearts, and under mutual agreements and covenants offellowship, they kept together. These people were somewhat of a softertemper, and seemed to recommend religion by the charms of its love, mercy, and goodness, rather than by the terrors of its judgments andpunishments; by which the former party would have awed people intoreligion. 

They also allowed greater liberty to prophesy than those before them; forthey admitted any member to speak or pray, as well as their pastor, whomthey always chose, and not the civil magistrate. If such found anythingpressing upon them to either duty, even without the distinction of clergyor laity, persons of any trade had their liberty, be it never so low andmechanical. But alas! even these people suffered great loss: for tastingof worldly empire, and the favour of princes, and the gain that ensued, they degenerated but too much. For though they had cried down nationalchurches and ministry, and maintenance too, some of them, when it wastheir own turn to be tried, fell under the weight of worldly honour andadvantage, got into profitable parsonages too much, and outlived andcontradicted their own principles; and, which was yet worse, turned, someof them, absolute persecutors of other men for God's sake, that but solately came themselves out of the furnace; which drove many a stepfurther, and that was into the water: another baptism, as believing theywere not scripturally baptized: and hoping to find that presence andpower of God, in submitting to this watery ordinance, which they desiredand wanted. 

These people also made profession of neglecting, if not renouncing andcensuring not only the necessity, but use, of all human learning, as tothe ministry; and all other qualifications to it, besides the helps andgifts of the spirit of God, and those natural and common to men. And fora time they seemed, like John of old, a burning and a shining light toother societies. 

They were very diligent, plain, and serious; strong in scripture, andbold in profession; bearing much reproach and contradiction. But thatwhich others fell by, proved their snare. For worldly power spoiled themtoo; who had enough of it to try them what they would do if they hadmore: and they rested also too much upon their watery dispensation, instead of passing on more fully to that of the fire and Holy Ghost, which was his baptism, who came with a fan in his hand, that he mightthoroughly, and not in part only, purge his floor, and take away thedross and the tin of his people, and make a man finer than gold. Withal, they grew high, rough, and self-righteous; opposing further attainment;too much forgetting the day of their infancy and littleness, which gavethem something of a real beauty; insomuch that many left them, and allvisible churches and societies, and wandered up and down as sheep withouta shepherd, and as doves without their mates; seeking their beloved, butcould not find him, as their souls desired to know him, whom their soulsloved above their chiefest joy. 

These people were called Seekers by some, and the Family of Love byothers; because, as they came to the knowledge of one another, theysometimes met together, not formally to pray or preach at appointed timesor places, in their own wills, as in times past they were accustomed todo, but waited together in silence; and as anything rose in any one oftheir minds, that they thought savoured of a divine spring, theysometimes spoke. But so it was, that some of them not keeping inhumility, and in the fear of God, after the abundance of revelation, wereexalted above measure; and for want of staying their minds in an humbledependance upon him that opened their understandings, to see great thingsin his law, they ran out in their own imaginations, and mixing them withthose divine openings, brought forth a monstrous birth, to the scandal ofthose that feared God, and waited daily in the temple not made withhands, for the consolation of Israel; the Jew inward, and circumcision inspirit. 

This people obtained the name of Ranters, from their extravagantdiscourses and practices. For they interpreted Christ's fulfilling ofthe law for us, to be a discharging of us from any obligation and dutythe law required of us, instead of the condemnation of the law for sinspast, upon faith and repentance: and that now it was no sin to do thatwhich before it was a sin to commit; the slavish fear of the law beingtaken off by Christ, and all things good that man did, if he did but dothem with the mind and persuasion that it was so. Insomuch that diversfell into gross and enormous practices; pretending in excuse thereof, that they could, without evil, commit the same act which was sin inanother to do: thereby distinguishing between the action and the evil ofit, by the direction of the mind, and intention in the doing of it. Which was to make sin super-abound by the aboundings of grace, and toturn from the grace of God into wantonness; a securer way of sinning thanbefore: as if Christ came not to save us from our sins, but in our sins;not to take away sin, but that we might sin more freely at his cost, andwith less danger to ourselves. I say, this ensnared divers, and broughtthem to an utter and lamentable loss as to their eternal state; and theygrew very troublesome to the better sort of people, and furnished thelooser with an occasion to profane. 

CHAP. II. 

_Of the rise of this People_, _their fundamental principle_, _anddoctrine_, _and practice_, _in twelve points resulting from it_: _theirprogress and sufferings_: _an expostulation with England thereupon_. 

At was about that very time, as you may see in George Fox's annals, thatthe eternal, wise, and good God, was pleased, in his infinite love, tohonour and visit this benighted and bewildered nation, with his gloriousday-spring from on high; yea, with a more sure and certain sound of theword of light and life, through the testimony of a chosen vessel, to aneffectual and blessed purpose, can many thousands say, glory be to thename of the Lord for ever!

For as it reached the conscience, and broke the heart, and brought manyto a sense and search, so that which people had been vainly seekingwithout, with much pains and cost, they, by this ministry, found within, where it was they wanted what they sought for, viz. The right way topeace with God. For they were directed to the light of Jesus Christwithin them, as the seed and leaven of the kingdom of God; near all, because in all, and God's talent to all: a faithful and true witness, andjust monitor in every bosom. The gift and grace of God to life andsalvation, that appears to all, though few regard it. This thetraditional Christian, conceited of himself, and strong in his own willand righteousness, overcome with blind zeal and passion, either despisedas a low and common thing, or opposed as a novelty, under many hard namesand opprobrious terms; denying, in his ignorant and angry mind, any freshmanifestations of God's power and spirit in man, in these days, thoughnever more needed to make true Christians. Not unlike those Jews of old, that rejected the Son of God, at the very same time that they blindlyprofessed to wait for the Messiah to come; because, alas! he appeared notamong them according to their carnal mind and expectation. 

This brought forth many abusive books, which filled the greater sort withenvy, and lesser with rage; and made the way and progress of this blessedtestimony strait and narrow, indeed, to those that received it. However, God owned his own work, and this testimony did effectually reach, gather, comfort, and establish the weary and heavy-laden, the hungry and thirsty, the poor and needy, the mournful and sick of many maladies, that hadspent all upon physicians of no value, and waited for relief from heaven, help only from above; seeing, upon a serious trial of all things, nothingelse would do but Christ himself; the light of his countenance, a touchof his garment, and help from his hand, who cured the poor woman's issue, raised the centurion's servant, the widow's son, the ruler's daughter, and Peter's mother: and like her they no sooner felt his power andefficacy upon their souls, but they gave up to obey him in a testimony tohis power: and that with resigned wills and faithful hearts, through allmockings, contradictions, confiscations, beatings, prisons, and manyother jeopardies that attended them for his blessed name's sake. 

And, truly, they were very many, and very great; so that in all humanprobability they must have been swallowed up quick of the proud andboisterous waves that swelled and beat against them, but that the God ofall their tender mercies was with them in his glorious authority; so thatthe hills often fled, and the mountains melted before the power thatfilled them; working mightily for them, as well as in them; one everfollowing the other. By which they saw plainly, to their exceeding greatconfirmation and comfort, that all things were possible with him withwhom they had to do. And that the more that which God required seemed tocross man's wisdom, and expose them to man's wrath, the more God appearedto help and carry them through all to his glory. 

Insomuch, that if ever any people could say in truth, Thou art our sunand our shield, our rock and sanctuary; and by thee we have leaped over awall, and by thee we have run through a troop, and by thee we have putthe armies of the aliens to flight; these people had a right to say it. And as God had delivered their souls of the wearisome burdens of sin andvanity, and enriched their poverty of spirit, and satisfied their greathunger and thirst after eternal righteousness, and filled them with thegood things of his own house, and made them stewards of his manifoldgifts; so they went forth to all quarters of these nations, to declare tothe inhabitants thereof, what God had done for them; what they had found, and where and how they had found it, viz. --The way to peace with God:inviting all to come and see, and taste for themselves, the truth of whatthey declared unto them. 

And as their testimony was to the principle of God in man, the preciouspearl and leaven of the kingdom, as the only blessed means appointed ofGod to quicken, convince, and sanctify man; so they opened to them whatit was in itself, and what it was given to them for; how they might knowit from their own spirit, and that of the subtle appearance of the evilone: and what it would do for all those whose minds should be turned offfrom the vanity of the world, and its lifeless ways and teachers, andadhere to his blessed light in themselves, which discovers and condemnssin in all its appearances, and shows how to overcome it, if minded andobeyed in its holy manifestations and convictions: giving power to such, to avoid and resist those things that do not please God, and to growstrong in love, faith, and good works. That so man, whom sin hath madeas a wilderness, over-run with briers and thorns, might become as thegarden of God, cultivated by his divine power, and replenished with themost virtuous and beautiful plants of God's own right-hand planting, tohis eternal praise. 

But these experimental preachers of glad tidings of God's truth andkingdom could not run when they list, or pray or preach when theypleased, but as Christ their Redeemer prepared and moved them by his ownblessed Spirit, for which they waited in their services and meetings, andspoke as that gave them utterance; and which was as those havingauthority, and not like the dry, and formal Pharisees. And so it plainlyappeared to the serious-minded, whose spiritual eye the Lord Jesus had inany measure opened: so that to one was given the word of exhortation, toanother the word of reproof, to another the word of consolation, and allby the same Spirit, and in the good order thereof, to the convincing andedifying of many. 

And, truly, they waxed strong and bold through faithfulness; and by thepower and Spirit of the Lord Jesus became very fruitful; thousands, in ashort time, being turned to the truth in the inward parts, through theirtestimony in ministry and sufferings: insomuch as, in most counties, andmany of the considerable towns of England, meetings were settled; anddaily there were added such as should be saved. For they were diligentto plant and to water, and the Lord blessed their labours with anexceeding great increase; notwithstanding all the opposition made totheir blessed progress, by false rumours, calumnies, and bitterpersecutions; not only from the powers of the earth, but from every onethat listed to injure and abuse them: so that they seemed, indeed, to beas poor sheep appointed to the slaughter, and as a people killed all theday long. 

It were fitter for a volume than a preface, but so much as to repeat thecontents of their cruel sufferings; from professors as well as fromprofane, and from magistrates as well as the rabble: that it may be saidof this abused and despised people, they went forth weeping, and sowed intears, bearing testimony to the precious seed, even the seed of thekingdom, which stands not in words, the finest, the highest that man'swit can use; but in power, the power of Christ Jesus, to whom God theFather hath given all power in heaven and in earth, that he might ruleangels above, and men below. Who empowered them, as their workwitnesseth, by the many that were turned through their ministry, fromdarkness to light, and out of the broad into the narrow way of life andpeace: bringing people to a weighty, serious, and God-like conversation;the practice of that doctrine which they taught. 

And as without this secret divine power, there is no quickening andregenerating of dead souls, so the want of this generating and begettingpower and life, is the cause of the little fruit that the manyministries, that have been and are in the world, bring forth. O thatboth ministers and people were sensible of this! My soul is oftentroubled for them, and sorrow and mourning compass me about for theirsakes. O that they were wise! O that they would consider, and lay toheart the things that truly and substantially make for their lastingpeace!

Two things are to be considered; the doctrine they taught, and theexample they led among all people. I have already touched upon theirfundamental principle, which is as the corner-stone of their fabric: and, indeed, to speak eminently and properly, their characteristic, or maindistinguishing point or principle, viz. The light of Christ within, asGod's gift for man's salvation. This, I say, is as the root of thegoodly tree of doctrines that grew and branched out from it, which Ishall now mention in their natural and experimental order. 

First, repentance from dead works to serve the living God. Whichcomprehends three operations. First, a sight of sin. Secondly, a senseand godly sorrow for sin. Thirdly, an amendment for the time to come. This was the repentance they preached and pressed, and a natural resultfrom the principle they turned all people unto. For of light came sight;and of sight came sense and sorrow; and of sense and sorrow cameamendment of life. Which doctrine of repentance leads to justification;that is, forgiveness of the sins that are past, through Christ the alonepropitiation, and the sanctification or purgation, of the soul from thedefiling nature and habits of sin present, by the Spirit of Christ in thesoul; which is justification in the complete sense of that word:comprehending both justification from the guilt of the sins that arepast, as if they had never been committed, through the love and mercy ofGod in Christ Jesus; and the creature's being made inwardly just, throughthe cleansing and sanctifying power and Spirit of Christ revealed in thesoul; which is commonly called sanctification. But none can come to knowChrist to be their sacrifice, that reject him as their sanctifier: theend of his coming being to save his people from the nature anddefilement, as well as guilt of sin; and, therefore, those that resisthis light and Spirit, make his coming and offering of none effect tothem. 

From hence sprang a second doctrine they were led to declare, as the markof the prize of the high calling to all true Christians, viz. Perfectionfrom sin, according to the scriptures of truth; which testify it to bethe end of Christ's coming, and the nature of his kingdom, and for whichhis Spirit was and is given, viz. To be perfect as our Heavenly Father isperfect, and holy, because God is holy. And this the apostles labouredfor, that the Christians should be sanctified throughout in body, soul, and spirit; but they never held a perfection in wisdom and glory in thislife, or from natural infirmities, or death, as some have, with a weak orill mind, imagined and insinuated against them. 

This they called a redeemed state, regeneration, or the new birth:teaching everywhere, according to their foundation, that unless this workwas known, there was no inheriting of the kingdom of God. 

Thirdly, this leads to an acknowledgment of eternal rewards andpunishments, as they have good reason; for else, of all people, certainlythey must be most miserable, who, for above forty years, have beenexceeding great sufferers for their profession; and, in some cases, treated worse than the worst of men; yea, as the refuse and off-scouringof all things. 

This was the purport of their doctrine and ministry; which for the mostpart, is what other professors of Christianity pretend to hold in wordsand forms, but not in the power of godliness; which, generally speaking, has been long lost by men's departing from that principle and seed oflife that is in man, and which man has not regarded, but lost the senseof; and in and by which he can only be quickened in his mind to serve theliving God in newness of life. For as the life of religion was lost, andthe generality lived and worshipped God after their own wills, and notafter the will of God, nor the mind of Christ, which stood in the worksand fruits of the Holy Spirit; so that which these pressed, was notnotion, but experience; not formality, but godliness; as being sensiblein themselves, through the work of God's righteous judgments, thatwithout holiness no man shall ever see the Lord with comfort. 

Besides these general doctrines, as the larger branches, there sprangforth several particular doctrines, that did exemplify and fartherexplain the truth and efficacy of the general doctrine before observed, in their lives and examples. As, I. Communion and loving one another. This is a noted mark in the mouthsof all sorts of people concerning them: they will meet, they will helpand stick one to another: whence it is common to hear some say, "Look howthe Quakers love and take care of one another. " Others, less moderate, will say, "The Quakers love none but themselves:" and if loving oneanother, and having an intimate communion in religion, and constant careto meet to worship God, and help one another, be any mark of primitiveChristianity, they had it, blessed be the Lord, in an ample manner. 

II. To love enemies. This they both taught and practised. For they didnot only refuse to be revenged for injuries done them, and condemned itas of an unchristian spirit; but they did freely forgive, yea, help andrelieve those that had been cruel to them, when it was in their power tohave been even with them: of which many and singular instances might begiven: endeavouring, through faith and patience, to overcome allinjustice and oppression, and preaching this doctrine as Christian, forothers to follow. 

III. Another was, the sufficiency of truth-speaking, according toChrist's own form of sound words, of yea, yea, and nay, nay, amongChristians, without swearing, both from Christ's express prohibition toswear at all; (Mat. V. ) and for that, they being under the tie and bondof truth in themselves, there was no necessity for an oath; and it wouldbe a reproach to their Christian veracity to assure their truth by suchan extraordinary way of speaking; simple and uncompounded answers, as yeaand nay, without asseveration, attestation, or supernatural vouchers, being most suitable to evangelical righteousness. But offering, at thesame time, to be punished to the full for false-speaking, as others forperjury, if ever guilty of it: and hereby they exclude with all true, allfalse and profane swearing; for which the land did and doth mourn, andthe great God was, and is, not a little offended with it. 

IV. Not fighting, but suffering, is another testimony peculiar to thispeople: they affirm that Christianity teacheth people to beat theirswords into plough-shares, and their spears into pruning-hooks, and tolearn war no more; that so the wolf may lie down with the lamb, and thelion with the calf, and nothing that destroys be entertained in thehearts of people: exhorting them to employ their zeal against sin, andturn their anger against Satan, and no longer war one against another;because all wars and fightings come of men's own hearts' lusts, accordingto the apostle James, and not of the meek Spirit of Christ Jesus, who iscaptain of another warfare, and which is carried on with other weapons. Thus, as truth-speaking succeeded swearing, so faith and patiencesucceeded fighting, in the doctrine and practice of this people. Norought they for this to be obnoxious to civil government, since, if theycannot fight for it, neither can they fight against it; which is no meansecurity to any state. Nor is it reasonable, that people should beblamed for not doing more for others than they can do for themselves. And, Christianity set aside, if the costs and fruits of war were wellconsidered, peace, with all its inconveniencies, is generally preferable. But though they were not for fighting, they were for submitting togovernment, and that, not only for fear, but for conscience-sake, wheregovernment doth not interfere with conscience; believing it to be anordinance of God, and where it is justly administered, a great benefit tomankind. Though it has been their lot, through blind zeal in some, andinterest in others, to have felt the strokes of it with greater weightand rigour than any other persuasion in this age; whilst they of allothers, religion set aside, have given the civil magistrate the leastoccasion of trouble in the discharge of his office. 

V. Another part of the character of this people was, and is, they refuseto pay tithes or maintenance to a national ministry; and that for tworeasons: the one is, they believe all compelled maintenance, even togospel-ministers, to be unlawful, because expressly contrary to Christ'scommand, who said, "Freely you have received, freely give:" at least, that the maintenance of gospel-ministers should be free, and not forced. The other reason of their refusal is, because these ministers are notgospel ones, in that the Holy Ghost is not their foundation, but humanarts and parts. So that it is not matter of humour or sullenness, butpure conscience towards God, that they cannot help to support nationalministries where they dwell, which are but too much and too visiblybecome ways of worldly advantage and preferment. 

VI. Not to respect persons, was, and is, another of their doctrines andpractices, for which they were often buffeted and abused. They affirmedit to be sinful to give flattering titles, or to use vain gestures andcompliments of respect. Though to virtue and authority they ever made adeference; but after their plain and homely manner, yet sincere andsubstantial way: well remembering the examples of Mordecai and Elihu; butmore especially the command of their Lord and Master Jesus Christ, whoforbade his followers to call men Rabbi, which implies Lord or Master;also the fashionable greetings and salutations of those times; that soself-love and honour, to which the proud mind of man is incident, in hisfallen state, might not be indulged, but rebuked. And though thisrendered their conversation disagreeable, yet they that will rememberwhat Christ said to the Jews, "How can you believe which receive honourone of another?" will abate of their resentment, if his doctrine has anycredit with them. 

VII. They also used the plain language of Thee and Thou, to a singleperson, whatever was his degree among men. And, indeed, the wisdom ofGod was much seen in bringing forth this people in so plain anappearance. For it was a close and distinguishing test upon the spiritsof those they came among; showing their insides, and what predominated, notwithstanding their high and great profession of religion. This amongthe rest sounded harsh to many of them, and they took it ill, forgettingthe language they use to God in their own prayers, and the common styleof the scriptures, and that it is an absolute and essential propriety ofspeech. And what good, alas! had their religion done them, who were sosensibly touched with indignation for the use of this plain, honest, andtrue speech?

VIII. They recommended silence by their example, having very few wordsupon all occasions. They were at a word in dealing: nor could theircustomers, with many words, tempt them from it, having more regard totruth than custom, to example than gain. They sought solitude: but whenin company, they would neither use, nor willingly hear unnecessary orunlawful discourses: whereby they preserved their minds pure andundisturbed from unprofitable thoughts, and diversions. Nor could theyhumour the custom of Good Night, Good Morrow, God Speed; for they knewthe night was good, and the day was good, without wishing of either; andthat in the other expression, the holy name of God was too lightly andunthankfully used, and therefore taken in vain. Besides, they were wordsand wishes of course, and are usually as little meant, as are love andservice in the custom of cap and knee; and superfluity in those, as wellas in other things, was burthensome to them; and therefore, they did notonly decline to use them, but found themselves often pressed to reprovethe practice. 

IX. For the same reason they forbore drinking to people, or pledging ofthem, as the manner of the world is: a practice that is not onlyunnecessary, but they thought evil in the tendencies of it, being aprovocation to drink more than did people good, as well as that it was initself vain and heathenish. 

X. Their way of marriage is peculiar to them; and shows a distinguishingcare above other societies professing Christianity. They say, thatmarriage is an ordinance of God, and that God only can rightly join manand woman in marriage. Therefore, they use neither priest normagistrate; but the man and woman concerned take each other as husbandand wife, in the presence of divers credible witnesses, promising to eachother, with God's assistance, to be loving and faithful in that relation, till death shall separate them. But antecedent to this, they firstpresent themselves to the monthly meeting for the affairs of the churchwhere they reside; there declaring their intentions to take one anotheras husband and wife, if the said meeting have nothing material to objectagainst it. They are constantly asked the necessary questions, {25} asin case of parents or guardians, if they have acquainted them with theirintention, and have their consent, &c. The method of the meeting is, totake a minute thereof, and to appoint proper persons to inquire of theirconversation and clearness from all others, and whether they havedischarged their duty to their parents or guardians; and to make reportthereof to the next monthly meeting, where the same parties are desiredto give their attendance. {26} In case it appears they have proceededorderly, the meeting passes their proposal, and so records it in theirmeeting book. And in case the woman be a widow, and hath children, duecare is there taken that provision also be made by her for the orphans, before the meeting pass the proposals of marriage: advising the partiesconcerned, to appoint a convenient time and place, and to give fittingnotice to their relations, and such friends and neighbours, as theydesire should be the witnesses of their marriage: where they take oneanother by the hand, and by name promise reciprocally, love and fidelity, after the manner before expressed. Of all which proceedings, a narrativein way of certificate is made, to which the said parties first set theirhands, thereby confirming it as their act and deed; and then diversrelations, spectators, and auditors, set their names as witnesses of whatthey said and signed. And this certificate is afterward registered inthe record belonging to the meeting, where the marriage is solemnized. Which regular method has been, as it deserves, adjudged in courts of lawa good marriage, where it has been by cross and ill people disputed andcontested, for want of the accustomed formalities of priest and ring, &c. --ceremonies they have refused, not out of humour, but consciencereasonably grounded; inasmuch as no scripture example tells us, that thepriest had any other part, of old time, than that of a witness among therest, before whom the Jews used to take one another: and, therefore, thispeople look upon it as an imposition, to advance the power and profits ofthe clergy: and for the use of the ring, it is enough to say, that it wasa heathenish and vain custom, and never in practice among the people ofGod, Jews, or primitive Christians. The words of the usual form, as"with my body I thee worship, " &c. Are hardly defensible. In short, theyare more careful, exact, and regular, than any form now used; and it isfree of the inconveniences, with which other methods are attended; theircare and checks being so many, and such, as that no clandestine marriagescan be performed among them. 

XI. It may not be unfit to say something here of their births andburials, which make up so much of the pomp of too many called Christians. For births, the parents name their own children; which is usually somedays after they are born, in the presence of the midwife, if she can bethere, and those that were at the birth, who afterwards sign acertificate for that purpose prepared, of the birth and name of the childor children; which is recorded in a proper book, in the monthly-meetingto which the parents belong; avoiding the accustomed ceremonies andfestivals. 

XII. Their burials are performed with the same simplicity. If the bodyof the deceased be near any public meeting-place, it is usually carriedthither, for the more convenient reception of those that accompany it tothe burying-ground. And it so falls out sometimes, that while themeeting is gathering for the burial, {27} some or other has a word ofexhortation, for the sake of the people there met together. After whichthe body is borne away by young men, or else those that are of theirneighbourhood, or those that were most of the intimacy of the deceasedparty: the corpse being in a plain coffin, without any covering orfurniture upon it. At the ground they pause some time before they putthe body into its grave, that if any there should have anything upon themto exhort the people, they may not be disappointed; and that therelations may the more retiredly and solemnly take the last leave of thebody of their departed kindred, and the spectators have a sense ofmortality, by the occasion then given them, to reflect upon their ownlatter end. Otherwise, they have no set rites or ceremonies on thoseoccasions. Neither do the kindred of the deceased ever wear mourning;{28} they looking upon it as a worldly ceremony and piece of pomp; andthat what mourning is fit for a Christian to have, at the departure of abeloved relation or friend, should be worn in the mind, which is onlysensible of the loss: and the love they had to them, and remembrance ofthem, to be outwardly expressed by a respect to their advice, and care ofthose they have left behind them, and their love of that they loved. Which conduct of theirs, though unmodish or unfashionable, leaves nothingof the substance of things neglected or undone; and as they aim at nomore, so that simplicity of life is what they observe with greatsatisfaction; though it sometimes happens not to be without the mockeriesof the vain world they live in. 

These things gave them a rough and disagreeable appearance with thegenerality; who thought them turners of the world upside down, as, indeed, in some sense they were: but in no other than that wherein Paulwas so charged, viz. To bring things back into their primitive and rightorder again. For these and such like practices of theirs were not theresult of humour, or for civil distinction, as some have fancied; but afruit of inward sense, which God through his holy fear, had begotten inthem. They did not consider how to contradict the world, or distinguishthemselves as a party from others; it being none of their business, as itwas not their interest; no, it was not the result of consultation, or aframed design, by which to declare or recommend schism or novelty. ButGod having given them a sight of themselves, they saw the whole world inthe same glass of truth; and sensibly discerned the affections andpassions of men, and the rise and tendency of things; what it was thatgratified the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride oflife, which are not of the Father, but of the world. And from thencesprang, in the night of darkness and apostacy, which hath been overpeople through their degeneration from the light and Spirit of God, theseand many other vain customs, which are seen, by the heavenly day ofChrist that dawns in the soul, to be either wrong in their original, or, by time and abuse, hurtful in their practice. And though these thingsseemed trivial to some, and rendered these people stingy and conceited insuch persons' opinion; there was and is more in them, than they were, orare, aware of. 

It was not very easy to our primitive friends to make themselves sightsand spectacles, and the scorn and derision of the world; which theyeasily foresaw must be the consequence of so unfashionable a conversationin it: but here was the wisdom of God seen in the foolishness of thesethings; first, that they discovered the satisfaction and concern thatpeople had in and for the fashions of this world, notwithstanding theirhigh pretences to another: in that any disappointment about them came sovery near them, as that the greatest honesty, virtue, wisdom, andability, were unwelcome without them. Secondly, it seasonably andprofitably divided conversation; for this making their society uneasy totheir relations and acquaintance, it gave them the opportunity of moreretirement and solitude; wherein they met with better company, even theLord God their Redeemer; and grew strong in his love, power, and wisdom;and were thereby better qualified for his service. And the successabundantly showed it, blessed be the name of the Lord. 

And though they were not great and learned in the esteem of this world, (for then they had not wanted followers upon their own credit andauthority, ) yet they were generally of the most sober of the severalpersuasions they were in, and of the most repute for religion; and manyof them of good capacity, substance, and account among men. 

And also some among them wanted not for parts, learning, or estate;though then as of old, not many wise, or noble, &c, were called; or, atleast, received the heavenly call, because of the cross that attended theprofession of it in sincerity. But neither do parts or learning make menthe better Christians, though the better orators and disputants; and itis the ignorance of people about the divine gift, that causes that vulgarand mischievous mistake. Theory and practice, speculation and enjoyment, words and life, are two things. O! it is the penitent, the reformed, thelowly, the watchful, the self-denying, and holy soul, that is theChristian! And that frame is the fruit and work of the Spirit, which isthe life of Jesus; whose life, though hid in the fulness of it in God theFather, is shed abroad in the hearts of them that truly believe, according to their capacity. O that people did but know this to cleansethem, to circumcise them, to quicken them, and to make them new creaturesindeed! recreated, or regenerated, after Christ Jesus unto good works;that they might live to God, and not to themselves; and offer up livingprayers and living praises to the living God, through his own livingSpirit, in which he is only to be worshipped in this gospel day. 

O that they that read me could but feel me! for my heart is affected withthis merciful visitation of the Father of lights and spirits to this poornation, and the whole world through the same testimony. Why should theinhabitants thereof reject it? Why should they lose the blessed benefitof it? Why should they not turn to the Lord with all their hearts, andsay from the heart, Speak Lord, for now thy poor servants hear: O thatthy will may be done, thy great, thy good, and holy will, in earth as itis in heaven! do it in us, do it upon us, do what thou wilt with us; forwe are thine, and desire to glorify thee our Creator, both for that, andbecause thou art our Redeemer; for thou art redeeming us from the earth, from the vanities and pollutions of it, to be a peculiar people untothee. O! this were a brave day for England, if so she could say intruth! but alas, the case is otherwise! for which some of thineinhabitants, O land of my nativity! have mourned over thee with bitterwailing and lamentation. Their heads have been, indeed, as waters, andtheir eyes as fountains of tears, because of thy transgression andstiffneckedness; because thou wilt not hear, and fear, and return to theRock, even thy Rock, O England! from whence thou art hewn. But be thouwarned, O land of great profession, to receive him into thy heart. Behold, at that door it is he hath stood so long knocking; but thou wiltyet have none of him. O! be thou awakened! lest Jerusalem's judgments doswiftly overtake thee, because of Jerusalem's sins that abound in thee. For she abounded in formality, but made void the weighty things of God'slaw, as thou daily dost. 

She withstood the Son of God in the flesh, and thou resistest the Son ofGod in the Spirit. He would have gathered her, as a hen gathereth herchickens under her wings, and she would not; so would he have gatheredthee out of thy lifeless profession, and have brought thee to inheritsubstance; to have known his power and kingdom: for which he oftenknocked within, by his grace and Spirit; and without, by his servants andwitnesses: but, on the contrary, as Jerusalem of old persecuted themanifestation of the Son of God in the flesh, and crucified him, andwhipped and imprisoned his servants; so hast thou, O land! crucified tothyself afresh the Lord of life and glory, and done despite to his Spiritof grace; slighting the fatherly visitation, and persecuting the blesseddispensers of it by thy laws and magistrates: though they have early andlate pleaded with thee in the power and Spirit of the Lord; in love andmeekness, that thou mightest know the Lord, and serve him, and become theglory of all lands. 

But thou hast evilly entreated and requited them, thou hast set at noughtall their counsel, and wouldst have none of their reproof, as thoushouldst have had. Their appearance was too straight, and theirqualifications were too mean for thee to receive them; like the Jews ofold, that cried, Is not this the Carpenter's Son, and are not hisbrethren among us; which of the scribes, of the learned (the orthodox)believe in him? Prophesying their fall in a year or two, and making andexecuting of severe laws to bring it to pass: endeavouring to terrifythem out of their holy way, or destroy them for abiding faithful to it. But thou hast seen how many governments that rose against them, anddetermined their downfall, have been overturned and extinguished, andthat they are still preserved, and become a great and a considerablepeople, among the middle sort of thy numerous inhabitants. Andnotwithstanding the many difficulties without and within, which they havelaboured under, since the Lord God eternal first gathered them, they arean increasing people; the Lord still adding unto them, in divers parts, such as shall be saved, if they persevere to the end. And to thee, OEngland! were they, and are they lifted up as a standard, and as a cityset upon a hill, and to the nations round about thee, that in their lightthou mayst come to see light, even in Christ Jesus the light of theworld, and, therefore, thy light and life too, if thou wouldst but turnfrom thy many evil ways, and receive and obey it. "For in the light ofthe Lamb must the nations of them that are saved walk, " as the scripturetestifies. 

Remember, O nation of great profession! how the Lord has waited upon theesince the dawning reformation, and the many mercies and judgments bywhich he has pleaded with thee; and awake and arise out of thy deepsleep, and yet hear his word in thy heart, that thou mayst live. 

Let not this thy day of visitation pass over thy head, nor neglect thouso great salvation as is this which is come to thy house, O England! forwhy shouldst thou die? O land that God desires to bless, be assured itis he that has been in the midst of this people, in the midst of thee, and not a delusion, as thy mistaken teachers have made thee believe. Andthis thou shalt find by their marks and fruits, if thou wilt considerthem in the spirit of moderation. 

CHAP. III. 

_Of the Qualifications of their Ministry_. _Eleven marks that it isChristian_. 

I. They were changed men themselves, before they went about to changeothers. Their hearts were rent, as well as their garments; and they knewthe power and work of God upon them. And this was seen by the greatalteration it made, and their stricter course of life, and more godlyconversation that immediately followed upon it. 

II. They went not forth, or preached, in their own time or will, but inthe will of God; and spoke not their own studied matters, but as theywere opened and moved of his Spirit, with which they were well acquaintedin their own conversion: which cannot be expressed to carnal men, so asto give them any intelligible account; for to such it is, as Christ said, like the blowing of the wind, which no man knows whence it cometh, orwhither it goeth. Yet this proof and seal went along with theirministry, that many were turned from their lifeless professions, and theevil of their ways, to an inward and experimental knowledge of God, and aholy life, as thousands can witness. And as they freely received whatthey had to say from the Lord, so they freely administered it to others. 

III. The bent and stress of their ministry was conversion to God;regeneration and holiness. Not schemes of doctrines and verbal creeds, or new forms of worship: but a leaving off in religion the superfluous, and reducing the ceremonious and formal part, and pressing earnestly thesubstantial, the necessary and profitable part to the soul; as all, upona serious reflection, must and do acknowledge. 

IV. They directed people to a principle in themselves, though not ofthemselves, by which all that they asserted, preached, and exhortedothers to, might be wrought in them, and known to them, throughexperience, to be true; which is a high and distinguishing mark of thetruth of their ministry, both that they knew what they said, and were notafraid of coming to the test. For as they were bold from certainty, sothey required conformity upon no human authority, but upon conviction, and the conviction of this principle, which they asserted was in themthat they preached unto: and unto that they directed them, that theymight examine and prove the reality of those things which they hadaffirmed of it, as to its manifestation and work in man. And this ismore than the many ministers in the world pretended to. They declare ofreligion, say many things true, in words, of God, Christ, and the Spirit;of holiness and heaven; that all men should repent and amend their lives, or they will go to hell, &c. But which of them all pretend to speak oftheir own knowledge and experience; or ever directed to a divineprinciple, or agent, placed of God in man, to help him; and how to knowit, and wait to feel its power to work that good and acceptable will ofGod in them?

Some of them, indeed, have spoken of the spirit, and the operations of itto sanctification, and performance of worship to God; but where and howto find it, and wait in it, to perform our duty to God, was yet as amystery to be declared by this farther degree of reformation. So thatthis people did not only in words, more than equally press repentance, conversion, and holiness, but did it knowingly and experimentally; anddirected those, to whom they preached, to a sufficient principle; andtold them where it was, and by what tokens they might know it, and whichway they might experience the power and efficacy of it to their souls'happiness. Which is more than theory and speculation, upon which mostother ministers depend: for here is certainty; a bottom upon which manmay boldly appear before God in the great day of account. 

V. They reached to the inward state and condition of people; which is anevidence of the virtue of their principle, and of their ministering fromit, and not from their own imaginations, glosses, or comments uponscripture. For nothing reaches the heart, but what is from the heart; orpierces the conscience, but what comes from a living conscience; insomuchas it hath often happened, where people have under secrecy revealed theirstate or condition to some choice friends, for advice or ease, they havebeen so particularly directed in the ministry of this people, that theyhave challenged their friends with discovering their secrets, and tellingtheir preachers their cases, to whom a word hath not been spoken. Yea, the very thoughts and purposes of the hearts of many have been so plainlydetected, that they have, like Nathaniel, cried out, of this inwardappearance of Christ, "Thou art the Son of God, thou art the King ofIsrael. " And those that have embraced this divine principle, have foundthis mark of its truth and divinity, that the woman of Samaria did ofChrist when in the flesh, to be the Messiah, viz. It had told them allthat ever they had done; shown them their insides, the most inwardsecrets of their hearts, and laid judgment to the line, and righteousnessto the plummet; of which thousands can at this day give in their witness. So that nothing has been affirmed by this people, of the power and virtueof this heavenly principle, that such as have turned to it have not foundtrue, and more; and that one half had not been told to them of what theyhave seen of the power, purity, wisdom, and goodness of God therein. 

VI. The accomplishments, with which this principle fitted even some ofthe meanest of this people for their work and service, furnishing some ofthem with an extraordinary understanding in divine things, and anadmirable, fluency, and taking-way of expression, gave occasion to someto wonder, saying of them, as of their Master, "Is not this such amechanic's son, how came he by this learning?" As from thence otherstook occasion to suspect and insinuate they were Jesuits in disguise, whohad the reputation of learned men for an age past; though there was notthe least ground of truth for any such reflection; in that theirministers are known, the places of their abode, their kindred andeducation. 

VII. That they came forth low, and despised, and hated, as the primitiveChristians did; and not by the help of worldly wisdom or power, as formerreformations in part have done: but in all things it may be said, thispeople were brought forth in the cross; in a contradiction to the ways, worships, fashions, and customs of this world; yea, against wind andtide, that so no flesh might glory before God. 

VIII. They could have no design to themselves in this work, thus toexpose themselves to scorn and abuse; to spend and be spent; leaving wifeand children, house and land, and all that can be accounted dear to men, with their lives in their hands, being daily in jeopardy, to declare thisprimitive message revived in their spirits, by the good Spirit and powerof God, viz. 

That God is light, and in him is no darkness at all; and that he has senthis Son a light into the world, to enlighten all men in order tosalvation; and that they that say they have fellowship with God, and arehis children and people, and yet walk in darkness, viz. In disobedienceto the light in their consciences, and after the vanity of this world, lie and do not the truth. But that all such as love the light, and bringtheir deeds to it, and walk in the light, as God is light, the blood ofJesus Christ his Son should cleanse them from all sin. Thus John i. 4. 19. Chap. Iii. 20, 21. 1 John i. 5, 6, 7. 

IX. Their known great constancy and patience in suffering for theirtestimony in all the branches of it; and that sometimes unto death, bybeatings, bruisings, long and crowded imprisonments, and noisomedungeons: four of them in New England dying by the hands of theexecutioner, purely for preaching amongst that people: besidesbanishments, and excessive plunders and sequestrations of their goods andestates, almost in all parts, not easily to be expressed, and less tohave been endured, but by those that have the support of a good andglorious cause; refusing deliverance by any indirect ways or means, asoften as it was offered unto them. 

X. That they did not only not show any disposition to revenge, when itwas at any time in their power, but forgave their cruel enemies; showingmercy to those that had none for them. 

XI. Their plainness with those in authority, like the ancient prophets, not fearing to tell them to their faces, of their private and publicsins; and their prophesies to them of their afflictions and downfal, whenin the top of their glory: also of some national judgments, as of theplague, and fire of London, in express terms; and likewise particularones to divers persecutors, which accordingly overtook them; and werevery remarkable in the places where they dwelt, which in time may be madepublic for the glory of God. 

Thus, reader, thou seest this people in their rise, principles, ministry, and progress, both their general and particular testimony; by which thoumayst be informed how, and upon what foot, they sprang, and became soconsiderable a people. It remains next, that I show also their care, conduct, and discipline as a Christian and reformed society, that theymight be found living up to their own principles and profession. Andthis the rather, because they have hardly suffered more in theircharacter from the unjust charge of error, than by the false imputationof disorder: which calumny, indeed, has not failed to follow all the truesteps that were ever made to reformation, and under which reproach nonesuffered more than the primitive Christians themselves, that were thehonour of Christianity, and the great lights and examples of their ownand succeeding ages. 

CHAP. IV. 

_Of the discipline and practice of this people_, _as a religioussociety_. _The church power they own and exercise_, _and that which theyreject and condemn_: _with the method of their proceedings against erringand disorderly persons_. 

This people increasing daily both in town and country, a holy care fellupon some of the elders among them, for the benefit and service of thechurch. And the first business in their view, after the example of theprimitive saints, was the exercise of charity; to supply the necessitiesof the poor, and answer the like occasions. Wherefore collections wereearly and liberally made for that and divers other services in thechurch, and intrusted with faithful men, fearing God, and of good report, who were not weary in well doing; adding often of their own in largeproportions, which they never brought to account, or desired should beknown, much less restored to them, that none might want, nor any servicebe retarded or disappointed. 

They were also very careful, that every one that belonged to them, answered their profession in their behaviour among men, upon alloccasions; that they lived peaceably, and were in all things goodexamples. They found themselves engaged to record their sufferings andservices: and in the case of marriage, which they could not perform inthe usual methods of the nation, but among themselves, they took carethat all things were clear between the parties and all others: and it wasthen rare, that any one entertained an inclination to a person on thataccount, till he or she had communicated it secretly to some very weightyand eminent friends among them, that they might have a sense of thematter; looking to the counsel and unity of their brethren as of greatmoment to them. But because the charge of the poor, the number oforphans, marriages, sufferings, and other matters, multiplied; and thatit was good that the churches were in some way and method of proceedingin such affairs among them, to the end they might the better correspondupon occasion, where a member of one meeting might have to do with one ofanother; it pleased the Lord, in his wisdom and goodness, to open theunderstanding of the first instrument of this dispensation of life, abouta good and orderly way of proceeding; who felt a holy concern to visitthe churches in person throughout this nation, to begin and establish itamong them: and by his epistles, the like was done in other nations andprovinces abroad; which he also afterwards visited, and helped in thatservice, as shall be observed when I come to speak of him. 

Now the care, conduct, and discipline, I have been speaking of, and whichare now practised among this people, is as followeth. 

This godly elder, in every county where he travelled, exhorted them thatsome, out of every meeting of worship, should meet together once in themonth, to confer about the wants and occasions of the church. And, asthe case required, so those monthly meetings were fewer or more in numberin every respective county; four or six meetings of worship, usuallymaking one monthly meeting of business. And accordingly, the brethrenmet him from place to place, and began the said meetings, viz. For thepoor, orphans, orderly walking, integrity to their profession, births, marriages, burials, sufferings, &c. And that these monthly meetingsshould, in each county, make up one quarterly meeting, where the mostzealous and eminent friends of the county should assemble to communicate, advise, and help one another, especially when any business seemeddifficult, or a monthly meeting was tender of determining a matter. 

Also that these several quarterly meetings should digest the reports oftheir monthly meetings, and prepare one for each respective county, against the yearly meeting, in which all quarterly meetings resolve;which is held in London: where the churches in this nation, and othernations {43a} and provinces, meet by chosen members of their respectivecounties, both mutually to communicate their church affairs, and toadvise, and be advised in any depending case, to edification. Also toprovide a requisite stock for the discharge of general expenses forgeneral services in the church, not needful to be here particularized. {43b}

At these meetings any of the members of the churches may come, if theyplease, and speak their minds freely, in the fear of God, to any matter;but the mind of each quarterly meeting, therein represented, is chieflyunderstood, as to particular cases, in the sense delivered by the personsdeputed, or chosen for that service by the said meeting. 

During their yearly meeting, to which their other meetings refer in theirorder, and naturally resolve themselves, care is taken by a selectnumber, for that service chosen by the general assembly, to draw up theminutes {44} of the said meeting, upon the several matters that have beenunder consideration therein, to the end that the respective quarterly andmonthly meetings may be informed of all proceedings; together with ageneral exhortation to holiness, unity, and charity. Of all whichproceedings in yearly, monthly, and quarterly meetings, due record iskept by some one appointed for that service, or that hath voluntarilyundertaken it. These meetings are opened and usually concluded in theirsolemn waiting upon God, who is sometimes graciously pleased to answerthem with as signal evidences of his love and presence, as in any oftheir meetings of worship. 

It is further to be noted, that in these solemn assemblies for thechurches' service, there is no one presides among them after the mannerof the assemblies of other people; Christ only being their President, ashe is pleased to appear in life and wisdom in any one or more of them, towhom, whatever be their capacity or degree, the rest adhere with a firmunity, not of authority, but conviction, which is the divine authorityand way of Christ's power and Spirit in his people: making good hisblessed promise, "that he would be in the midst of his, where andwhenever they were met together in his name, even to the end of theworld. " So be it. 

Now it may be expected, I should here set down what sort of authority isexercised by this people, upon such members of their society ascorrespond not in their lives with their profession, and that arerefractory to this good and wholesome order settled among them: and therather, because they have not wanted their reproach and sufferings fromsome tongues and pens, upon this occasion, in a plentiful manner. 

The power they exercise, is such as Christ has given to his own people, to the end of the world, in the persons of his disciples, viz. Tooversee, exhort, reprove, and, after long suffering and waiting upon thedisobedient and refractory, to disown them, as any longer of theircommunion, or that they will stand charged with the behaviour of suchtransgressors, or their conversation, until they repent. The subjectmatter about which this authority, in any of the foregoing branches ofit, is exercised, is, first, in relation to common and general practice. And, secondly, about those things that more strictly refer to their owncharacter and profession, and which distinguish them from all otherprofessors of Christianity; avoiding two extremes upon which many split, viz. Persecution and libertinism, that is, a coercive power to whippeople into the temple; that such as will not conform, though againstfaith and conscience, shall be punished in their persons or estates; orleaving all loose and at large, as to practice; and so unaccountable toall but God and the magistrate. To which hurtful extreme, nothing hasmore contributed than the abuse of church power, by such as suffer theirpassion and private interests to prevail with them, to carry it tooutward force and corporal punishment: a practice they have been taughtto dislike, by their extreme sufferings, as well as their known principlefor a universal liberty of conscience. 

On the other hand, they equally dislike an independency in society:--anunaccountableness, in practice and conversation, to the rules and termsof their own communion, and to those that are the members of it. Theydistinguish between imposing any practice that immediately regards faithor worship, which is never to be done or suffered, or submitted unto; andrequiring Christian compliance with those methods that only respectchurch-business in its more civil part and concern; and that regard thediscreet and orderly maintenance of the character of the society as asober and religious community. In short, what is for the promotion ofholiness and charity, that men may practise what they profess, live up totheir own principles, and not be at liberty to give the lie to their ownprofession without rebuke, is their use and limit of church power. Theycompel none to them, but oblige those that are of them to walk suitably, or they are denied by them: that is all the mark they set upon them, andthe power they exercise, or judge a Christian society can exercise, uponthose that are members of it. 

The way of their proceeding against such as have lapsed or transgressed, is this. He is visited by some of them, and the matter of fact laid hometo him, be it any evil practice against known and general virtue, or anybranch of their particular testimony, which he, in common, professethwith them. They labour with him in much love and zeal, for the good ofhis soul, the honour of God, and reputation of their profession, to ownhis fault and condemn it, in as ample a manner as the evil or scandal wasgiven by him; which, for the most part, is performed by some writtentestimony under the party's hand: and if it so happen, that the partyprove refractory, and is not willing to clear the truth they profess, from the reproach of his or her evil doing or unfaithfulness, they, afterrepeated entreaties and due waiting for a token of repentance, give fortha paper to disown such a fact, and the party offending: recording thesame as a testimony of their care for the honour of the truth theyprofess. 

And if he or she shall clear their profession and themselves, by sincereacknowledgment of their fault, and godly sorrow for so doing, they arereceived and looked upon again as members of their communion. For asGod, so his true people, upbraid no man after repentance. 

This is the account I had to give of the people of God called Quakers, asto their rise, appearance, principles, and practices, in this age of theworld, both with respect to their faith and worship, discipline andconversation. And I judge it very proper in this place, because it is topreface the journal of the first, blessed, and glorious instrument ofthis work, and for a testimony to him in his singular qualifications andservices, in which he abundantly excelled in this day, and which areworthy to be set forth as an example to all succeeding times, to theglory of the most high God, and for a just memorial to that worthy andexcellent man, his faithful servant and apostle to this generation of theworld. 

CHAP. V. 

_Of the first instrument or person by whom God was pleased to gather thispeople into the way they profess_. _His name George Fox_: _his manyexcellent qualifications; showing a divine_, _and not a human power tohave been their original in him_. _His troubles and sufferings both fromwithout and within_. _His end and triumph_. 

I am now come to the third head or branch of my preface, viz. Theinstrumental author. For it is natural for some to say, Well, here isthe people and work, but where and who was the man, the instrument? Hethat in this age was sent to begin this work and people? I shall, as Godshall enable me, declare who and what he was; not only by report ofothers, but from my own long and most inward converse, and intimateknowledge of him; for which my soul blesseth God, as it hath often done:and I doubt not, but by that time I have discharged myself of this partof my preface, my serious readers will believe I had good cause so to do. 

The blessed instrument of, and in this day of God, and of whom I am nowabout to write, was George Fox, distinguished from another of that name, by that other's addition of younger to his name, in all his writings; notthat he was so in years, but that he was so in the truth: but he was alsoa worthy man, witness, and servant of God in his time. 

But this George Fox was born in Leicestershire, about the year 1624. Hedescended of honest and sufficient parents, who endeavoured to bring himup, as they did the rest of their children, in the way and worship of thenation: especially his mother, who was a woman accomplished above most ofher degree in the place where she lived. But from a child he appeared ofanother frame of mind than the rest of his brethren; being morereligious, inward, still, solid, and observing beyond his years, as theanswers he would give, and the questions he would put, upon occasion, manifested, to the astonishment of those that heard him, especially indivine things. 

His mother, taking notice of his singular temper, and the gravity, wisdom, and piety, that very early shined through him, refusing childishand vain sports, and company, when very young, was tender and indulgentover him, so that from her he met with little difficulty. As to hisemployment, he was brought up in country business, and as he took mostdelight in sheep, so he was very skilful in them; an employment that verywell suited his mind in several respects, both for its innocency andsolitude; and was a just emblem of his after ministry and service. 

I shall not break in upon his own account, which is by much the best thatcan be given, and therefore desire what I can, to avoid saying anythingof what is said already, as to the particular passages of his comingforth: but, in general, when he was somewhat above twenty, he left hisfriends, and visited the most retired and religious people in thoseparts; and some there were in this nation, who waited for the consolationof Israel, night and day; as Zacharias, Anna, and good old Simeon did ofold time. To these he was sent, and these he sought out in theneighbouring counties, and among them he sojourned till his more ampleministry came upon him. At this time he taught, and was an example of, silence, endeavouring to bring them from self-performances; testifyingof, and turning them to, the light of Christ within them, and encouragingthem to wait in patience, and to feel the power of it to stir in theirhearts, that their knowledge and worship of God might stand in the powerof an endless life, which was to be found in the light, as it was obeyedin the manifestation of it in man. For in the word was life, and thatlife is the light of men: life in the word, light in men; and life in mentoo, as the light is obeyed: the children of the light living by the lifeof the word, by which the word begets them again to God, which is theregeneration and new birth, without which there is no coming into thekingdom of God: and to which whoever comes, is greater than John; thatis, than John's dispensation, which was not that of the kingdom, but theconsummation of the legal, and fore-running of the gospel-times, the timeof the kingdom. Accordingly several meetings were gathered in thoseparts; and thus his time was employed for some years. 

In 1652, he being in his usual retirement, his mind exercised towards theLord, upon a very high mountain in some of the higher parts of Yorkshire, as I take it, he had a vision of the great work of God in the earth, andof the way that he was to go forth in a public ministry, to begin it. Hesaw people as thick as motes in the sun, that should in time be broughthome to the Lord, that there might be but one shepherd and one sheepfoldin all the earth. There his eye was directed northward, beholding agreat people that should receive him and his message in those parts. Upon this mountain he was moved of the Lord to sound out his great andnotable day, as if he had been in a great auditory; and from thence wentnorth, as the Lord had shown him. And in every place where he came, ifnot before he came to it, he had his particular exercise and serviceshown to him, so that the Lord was his leader indeed. For it was not invain that he travelled; God in most places sealing his commission withthe convincement of some of all sorts, as well publicans as soberprofessors of religion. Some of the first and most eminent of those thatcame forth in a public ministry, and who are now at rest, were RichardFarnsworth, James Nayler, William Dewsberry, Thomas Aldam, FrancisHowgil, Edward Burroughs, John Camm, John Audland, Richard Hubberthorn, T. Taylor, T. Holmes, Alexander Parker, Wm. Simson, William Caton, JohnStubbs, Robert Withers, Thomas Low, Josiah Coale, John Burnyeat, RobertLodge, Thomas Salthouse, and many more worthies, that cannot well be herenamed; together with divers yet living of the first and greatconvincement; who, after the knowledge of God's purging judgment inthemselves, and some time of waiting in silence upon him, to feel andreceive power from on high to speak in his name, (which none else rightlycan, though they may use the same words, ) felt its divine motions, andwere frequently drawn forth, especially to visit the public assemblies, to reprove, inform, and exhort them: sometimes in markets, fairs, streets, and by the highway-side: calling people to repentance, and toturn to the Lord with their hearts as well as their mouths; directingthem to the light of Christ within them, to see, examine, and considertheir ways by, and to eschew the evil, and do the good and acceptablewill of God. And they suffered great hardships for this their love andgood-will; being often stocked, stoned, beaten, whipped, and imprisoned, though honest men, and of good report where they lived; that had leftwives, children, and houses and lands to visit them with a living call torepentance. And though the priests generally set themselves to opposethem, and wrote against them, and insinuated most false and scandalousstories to defame them, stirring up the magistrates to suppress them, especially in those northern parts; yet God was pleased to fill them withhis living power, and give them such an open door of utterance in hisservice, that there was a mighty convincement over those parts. 

And through the tender and singular indulgence of judge Bradshaw, andjudge Fell, and colonel West, in the infancy of things, the priests werenever able to gain the point they laboured for, which was to haveproceeded to blood; and, if possible, Herod-like, by a cruel exercise ofthe civil power, to have cut them off, and rooted them out of thecountry. But especially judge Fell, who was not only a check to theirrage in the course of legal proceedings, but otherwise upon occasion; andfinally countenanced this people. For, his wife receiving the truth withthe first, it had that influence upon his spirit, being a just and wiseman, and seeing in his own wife and family a full confutation of all thepopular clamours against the way of truth, that he covered them what hecould, and freely opened his doors, and gave up his house to his wife andher friends; not valuing the reproach of ignorant or evil-minded people:which I here mention to his and her honour, and which will be, I believe, an honour and a blessing to such of their name and family, as shall befound in that tenderness, humility, love, and zeal for the truth andpeople of the Lord. 

That house was for some years, at first especially, until the truth hadopened its way into the southern parts of this island, an eminentreceptacle of this people. Others, of good note and substance in thosenorthern countries, had also opened their houses, together with theirhearts, to the many publishers, that, in a short time, the Lord hadraised to declare his salvation to the people; and where meetings of theLord's messengers were frequently held, to communicate their services andexercises, and comfort and edify one another in their blessed ministry. 

But lest this may be thought a digression, having touched upon thisbefore, I return to this excellent man; and for his personal qualities, both natural, moral, and divine, as they appeared in his converse withthe brethren, and in the church of God, take as follows:

I. He was a man that God endued with a clear and wonderful depth: adiscerner of others' spirits, and very much a master of his own. Andthough that side of his understanding which lay next to the world, andespecially the expression of it, might sound uncouth and unfashionable tonice ears, his matter was nevertheless very profound; and would not onlybear to be often considered, but the more it was so, the more weighty andinstructing it appeared. And as abruptly and brokenly as sometimes hissentences would seem to fall from him, about divine things, it is wellknown they were often as texts to many fairer declarations. 

And indeed it showed, beyond all contradiction, that God sent him, inthat no arts or parts had any share in the matter or manner of hisministry; and that so many great, excellent, and necessary truths, as hecame forth to preach to mankind, had therefore nothing of man's wit orwisdom to recommend them. So that as to man he was an original, being noman's copy; and his ministry and writings show they are from one that wasnot taught of man, nor had learned what he said by study. Nor were theynotional or speculative, but sensible and practical truths, tending toconversion and regeneration, and the setting up of the kingdom of God inthe hearts of men: and the way of it was his work. So that I have manytimes been overcome in myself, and been made to say, with my Lord andMaster, upon the like occasion, "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heavenand earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent ofthis world, and revealed them to babes:" for, many times hath my soulbowed in an humble thankfulness to the Lord, that he did not choose anyof the wise and learned of this world to be the first messenger in ourage, of his blessed truth to men; but that he took one that was not ofhigh degree, or elegant speech, or learned after the way of this world, that his message and work he sent him to do might come with lesssuspicion, or jealousy of human wisdom and interest, and with more forceand clearness upon the consciences of those that sincerely sought the wayof truth in the love of it. I say, beholding with the eye of my mind, which the God of heaven had opened in me, the marks of God's finger andhand visibly in this testimony, from the clearness of the principle, thepower and efficacy of it, in the exemplary sobriety, plainness, zeal, steadiness, humility, gravity, punctuality, charity, and circumspect carein the government of church-affairs, which shined in his and their lifeand testimony, that God employed in this work, it greatly confirmed methat it was of God, and engaged my soul in a deep love, fear, reverence, and thankfulness for his love and mercy therein to mankind: in which mindI remain, and shall, I hope, through the Lord's strength, to the end ofmy days. 

II. In his testimony or ministry, he much laboured to open truth to thepeople's understandings, and to bottom them upon the principle andprincipal, Christ Jesus the light of the world; that by bringing them tosomething that was from God in themselves, they might the better know andjudge of him and themselves. 

III. He had an extraordinary gift in opening the scriptures. He wouldgo to the marrow of things, and show the mind, harmony, and fulfilling ofthem, with much plainness, and to great comfort and edification. 

IV. The mystery of the first and second Adam, of the fall andrestoration, of the law and gospel, of shadows and substance, of theservant's and Son's state, and the fulfilling of the scriptures in Christand by Christ the true light, in all that are his, through the obedienceof faith, were much of the substance and drift of his testimonies: in allwhich he was witnessed to be of God: being sensibly felt to speak thatwhich he had received of Christ, and was his own experience, in thatwhich never errs nor fails. 

V. But, above all, he excelled in prayer. The inwardness and weight ofhis spirit, the reverence and solemnity of his address and behaviour, andthe fewness and fulness of his words, have often struck even strangerswith admiration, as they used to reach others with consolation. The mostawful, living, reverent frame I ever felt or beheld, I must say, was hisin prayer. And truly it was a testimony he knew and lived nearer to theLord than other men; for they that know Him most, will see most reason toapproach him with reverence and fear. 

VI. He was of an innocent life, no busy-body, nor self-seeker: neithertouchy nor critical: what fell from him was very inoffensive, if not veryedifying. So meek, contented, modest, easy, steady, tender, it was apleasure to be in his company. He exercised no authority but over evil, and that everywhere, and in all; but with love, compassion, andlong-suffering. A most merciful man, as ready to forgive, as unapt totake or give an offence. Thousands can truly say, he was of an excellentspirit and savour among them, and because thereof, the most excellentspirits loved him with an unfeigned and unfading love. 

VII. He was an incessant labourer: for in his younger time, before hismany, great, and deep sufferings and travels had enfeebled his body foritinerant services, he laboured much in the word and doctrine, anddiscipline, in England, Scotland, and Ireland, turning many to God, andconfirming those that were convinced of the truth, and settling goodorder, as to church affairs, among them. And towards the conclusion ofhis travelling service, between the years 1671, and 1677, he visited thechurches of Christ in the plantations of America, and in the UnitedProvinces, and Germany, as his journal relates; to the convincement andconsolation of many. After that time he chiefly resided in and about thecity of London; and, besides his labour in the ministry, which wasfrequent and serviceable, he wrote much, both to them that are within, and those that are without, the communion. 

But the care he took of the affairs of the church in general was verygreat. 

VIII. He was often where the records of the business of the church arekept, and where the letters from the many meetings of God's people overall the world use to come: which letters he had read to him, andcommunicated them to the meeting, that is weekly {57} held for suchservices; and he would be sure to stir them up to answer them, especiallyin suffering cases, showing great sympathy and compassion upon all suchoccasions; carefully looking into the respective cases, and endeavouringspeedy relief, according to the nature of them. So that the churches, orany of the suffering members thereof, were sure not to be forgotten, ordelayed in their desires, if he was there. 

IX. As he was unwearied, so he was undaunted in his services for God andhis people; he was no more to be moved to fear than to wrath. Hisbehaviour at Derby, Lichfield, Appleby, before Oliver Cromwell, atLaunceston, Scarborough, Worcester, and Westminster Hall, with many otherplaces and exercises, did abundantly evidence it, to his enemies as wellas his friends. 

But as, in the primitive times, some rose up against the blessed apostlesof our Lord Jesus Christ, even from among those that they had turned tothe hope of the gospel, and became their greatest trouble; so this man ofGod had his share of suffering from some that were convinced by him; who, through prejudice or mistake, ran against him, as one that soughtdominion over conscience, because he pressed, by his presence orepistles, a ready and zealous compliance with such good and wholesomethings, as tended to an orderly conversation about the affairs of thechurch, and in their walking before men. That which contributed much tothis ill work, was, in some, a begrudging of this meek man the love andesteem he had and deserved in the hearts of the people; and weakness inothers, that were taken with their groundless suggestions of impositionand blind obedience. 

They would have had every man independent, that as he had the principlein himself, he should only stand and fall to that, and nobody else: notconsidering that the principle is one in all; and though the measure oflight or grace might differ, yet the nature of it was the same; and beingso, they struck at the spiritual unity which a people, guided by the sameprinciple, are naturally led into: so that what is an evil to one, is soto all; and what is virtuous, honest, and of good repute to one, is so toall, from the sense and savour of the one universal principle which iscommon to all, and which the disaffected also profess to be the root ofall true Christian fellowship, and that spirit into which the people ofGod drink, and come to be spiritually-minded, and of one heart and onesoul. 

Some weakly mistook good order in the government of church affairs, fordiscipline in worship, and that it was so pressed or recommended by himand other brethren. And thereupon they were ready to reflect the samethings that dissenters had very reasonably objected upon the nationalchurches, that have coercively pressed conformity to their respectivecreeds and worships. Whereas these things related wholly toconversation, and the outward, and, as I may say, civil part of thechurch; that men should walk up to the principles of their belief, andnot be wanting in care and charity. But though some have stumbled andfallen through mistakes, and an unreasonable obstinacy even to aprejudice; yet, blessed be God, the generality have returned to theirfirst love, and seen the work of the enemy, that loses no opportunity oradvantage by which he may check or hinder the work of God, and disquietthe peace of his church, and chill the love of his people to the truth, and one to another; and there is hope of divers of the few that yet areat a distance. 

In all these occasions, though there was no person the discontentedstruck so sharply at, as this good man, he bore all their weakness andprejudice, and returned not reflection for reflection; but forgave themtheir weak and bitter speeches, praying for them, that they might have asense of their hurt, and see the subtilty of the enemy to rend anddivide, and return into their first love that thought no ill. 

And truly, I must say, that though God had visibly clothed him with adivine preference and authority, yet he never abused it; but held hisplace in the church of God with great meekness, and a most engaginghumility and moderation. For upon all occasions, like his blessedMaster, he was a servant to all; holding and exercising his eldership inthe invisible power that had gathered them, with reverence to the Head, and care over the body: and was received, only in that Spirit and powerof Christ, as the first and chief elder in this age: who, as he wastherefore worthy of double honour, so for the same reason it was given bythe faithful of this day; because his authority was inward and notoutward, and that he got it and kept it by the love of God, and power ofan endless life. I write my knowledge, and not report; and my witness istrue; having been with him for weeks and months together on diversoccasions, and those of the nearest, and most exercising nature; and thatby night and by day, by sea and by land; in this and in foreigncountries; and I can say, I never saw him out of his place, or not amatch for every service or occasion. For in all things he acquittedhimself like a man, yea, a strong man, a new and heavenly-minded man, adivine and a naturalist, and all of God Almighty's making. I have beensurprised at his questions and answers in natural things: that whilst hewas ignorant of useless and sophistical science, he had in him thegrounds of useful and commendable knowledge, and cherished it everywhere. Civil, beyond all forms of breeding, in his behaviour: verytemperate, eating little, and sleeping less, though a bulky person. 

Thus he lived and sojourned among us: and, as he lived, so he died;feeling the same eternal power, that had raised and preserved him, in hislast moments. So full of assurance was he, that he triumphed over death;and so even in his spirit to the last, as if death were hardly worthnotice, or a mention: recommending to some of us with him, the despatchand dispersion of an epistle just before given forth by him to thechurches of Christ throughout the world, and his own books: but, aboveall, Friends; and of all Friends, those in Ireland and America, twiceover, saying, "Mind poor Friends in Ireland and America. "

And to some that came in and inquired how he found himself, he answered, "Never heed, the Lord's power is over all weakness and death; the seedreigns, blessed be the Lord:" which was about four or five hours beforehis departure out of this world. He was at the great meeting nearLombard-street, on the first day of the week, and it was the thirdfollowing about ten at night when he left us; being at the house of HenryGoldney, in the same court. In a good old age he went, after havinglived to see his children's children in the truth to many generations. He had the comfort of a short illness, and the blessing of a clear senseto the last: and we may truly say, with a man of God of old, that beingdead, he yet speaketh: and though now absent in body, he is present inspirit; neither time nor place being able to interrupt the communion ofsaints, or dissolve the fellowship of the spirits of the just. His workspraise him, because they are to the praise of Him that wrought by him;for which his memorial is and shall be blessed. I have done, as to thispart of my preface, when I have left this short epitaph to hisname, --Many sons have done virtuously in this day; but, dear George, thouexcellest them all. 

CHAP. VI. 

_Containing five several exhortations_: _first_, _general_, _remindingthis people of their primitive integrity and simplicity_. _Secondly_, _in particular_, _to the ministry_. _Thirdly_, _to the young convinced_. _Fourthly_, _to the children of Friends_. _Fifthly_, _to those that areyet strangers to this people and way_, _to whom this book_, _and thatwhich it was preface to_, _in its former edition_, _may come_. _All theseveral exhortations accommodated to their several states andconditions_: _that all may answer the end of God's glory_, _and their ownsalvation_. 

And now, Friends, you that profess to walk in the way that this blessedman was sent of God to turn us into, suffer, I beseech you, the word ofexhortation, as well fathers as children, and elders as young men. Theglory of this day, and foundation of the hope that has not made usashamed since we were a people, you know, is that blessed principle oflight and life of Christ which we profess, and direct all people to, asthe great and divine instrument and agent of man's conversion to God. Itwas by this that we were first touched, and effectually enlightened, asto our inward state; which put us upon the consideration of our latterend, causing us to set the Lord before our eyes, and to number our days, that we might apply our hearts to wisdom. In that day we judged notafter the sight of the eye, or after the hearing of the ear; butaccording to the light and sense this blessed principle gave us, so wejudged and acted, in reference to things and persons, ourselves andothers; yea, towards God our Maker. For being quickened by it in ourinward man, we could easily discern the difference of things, and feelwhat was right and what was wrong, and what was fit, and what not, bothin reference to religion and civil concerns. That being the ground ofthe fellowship of all saints, it was in that our fellowship stood. Inthis we desired to have a sense of one another, acted towards oneanother, and all men; in love, faithfulness, and fear. 

In feeling of the stirrings and motions of this principle in our hearts, we drew near to the Lord, and waited to be prepared by it, that we mightfeel drawings and movings before we approached the Lord in prayer, oropened our mouths in ministry. And in our beginning and ending withthis, stood our comfort, service, and edification. And as we ran faster, or fell short in our services, we made burdens for ourselves to bear;finding in ourselves a rebuke instead of an acceptance; and, in lieu of"Well-done, " "Who has required this at your hands?" In that day we werean exercised people, our very countenances and deportment declared it. 

Care for others was then much upon us, as well as for ourselves;especially of the young convinced. Often had we the burden of the wordof the Lord to our neighbours, relations, and acquaintance; and sometimesstrangers also. We were in travail likewise for one another'spreservation; not seeking, but shunning, occasions of any coldness ormisunderstanding; treating one another as those that believed and feltGod present; which kept our conversation innocent, serious, and weighty;guarding ourselves against the cares and friendships of the world. Weheld the truth in the Spirit of it, and not in our own spirits, or afterour own wills and affections. 

We were bowed and brought into subjection, insomuch that it was visibleto them that knew us. We did not think ourselves at our own disposal, togo where we list, or say or do what we list, or when we list. Ourliberty stood in the liberty of the Spirit of truth; and no pleasure, noprofit, no fear, no favour, could draw us from this retired, strict, andwatchful frame. We were so far from seeking occasions of company, thatwe avoided them what we could; pursuing our own business with moderation, instead of meddling with other people's unnecessarily. 

Our words were few and savoury, our looks composed and weighty, and ourwhole deportment very observable. True it is, that this retired andstrict sort of life, from the liberty of the conversation of the world, exposed us to the censures of many, as humourists, conceited andself-righteous persons, &c. ; but it was our preservation from manysnares, to which others were continually exposed, by the prevalency ofthe lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life, thatwanted no occasions or temptations to excite them abroad in the converseof the world. 

I cannot forget the humility and chaste zeal of that day. O! howconstant at meetings, how retired in them; how firm to truth's life, aswell as truth's principles; and how entire and united in our communion, as, indeed, became those that profess one head, even Christ Jesus theLord. 

This being the testimony and example the man of God before mentioned wassent to declare and leave amongst us, and we having embraced the same, asthe merciful visitation of God to us, the word of exhortation, at thistime, is that we continue to be found in the way of this testimony, withall zeal and integrity, and so much the more, by how much the day drawethnear. And first, as to you my beloved and much honoured brethren inChrist, that are in the exercise of the ministry: O! feel life in yourministry. Let life be your commission, your well-spring and treasury onall such occasions; else, you well know, there can be no begetting toGod: since nothing can quicken or make people alive to God, but the lifeof God; and it must be a ministry in and from life, that enlivens anypeople to God. We have seen the fruit of all other ministries, by thefew that are turned from the evil of their ways. It is not our parts, ormemory, the repetition of former openings, in our own will and time, thatwill do God's work. A dry doctrinal ministry, however sound in words, can reach but the ears, and is but a dream at the best. There is anothersoundness that is soundest of all, viz. Christ the power of God. This isthe key of David, that opens, and none shuts; and shuts and none canopen: as the oil to the lamp, and the soul to the body, so is that to thebest of words: which made Christ to say, "My words, they are Spirit, andthey are life;" that is, they are from life, and therefore they make youalive, that receive them. If the disciples that had lived with Jesus, were to stay at Jerusalem till they received it; much more must we waitto receive before we minister, if we will turn people from darkness tolight, and from satan's power to God. 

I fervently bow my knees to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you may always be like-minded; that you may ever wait reverently forthe coming and opening of the word of life, and attend upon it in yourministry and service, that you may serve God in his Spirit. And be itlittle, or be it much, it is well; for much is not too much, and theleast is enough, if from the motion of God's Spirit; and without it, verily, never so little is too much, because to no profit. 

For it is the Spirit of the Lord immediately, or through the ministry ofhis servants, that teacheth his people to profit; and to be sure, so faras we take him along with us in our services, so far we are profitable, and no further. For if it be the Lord that must work all things in usfor our salvation, much more is it the Lord that must work in us for theconversion of others. If therefore it was once a cross to us to speak, though the Lord required it at our hands, let it never be so to besilent, when he does not. 

It is one of the most dreadful sayings in the book of God, "That he thatadds to the words of the prophecy of this book, God will add to him theplagues written in this book. " To keep back the counsel of God, is asterrible; "For he that takes away from the words of the book of thisprophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life. " Andtruly, it has great caution in it, to those that use the name of theLord, to be well assured the Lord speaks; that they may not be found ofthe number of those that add to the words of the testimony of prophecy, which the Lord giveth them to bear; nor yet to mince or diminish thesame, both being so very offensive to God. 

Wherefore, Brethren, let us be careful, neither to out-go our guide, noryet loiter behind him; since he that makes haste may miss his way, and hethat stays behind lose his guide. For even those that have received theword of the Lord, had need wait for wisdom, that they may see how todivide the word aright: which plainly implieth, that it is possible forone that hath received the word of the Lord, to miss in the dividing andapplication of it; which must come from an impatiency of spirit, and aself-working, which makes an unsound and dangerous mixture, and willhardly beget a right-minded living people to God. 

I am earnest in this, above all other considerations, as to brethren inthe ministry, (well knowing how much it concerns the present and futurestate and preservation of the church of Christ Jesus, that has beengathered and built up by a living and powerful ministry, ) that theministry be held, preserved, and continued in the manifestations, motions, and supplies of the same life and power, from time to time. 

And wherever it is observed, that any do minister more from gifts andparts, than life and power, though they have an enlightened and doctrinalunderstanding, let them in time be advised and admonished for theirpreservation, because insensibly such will come to depend upon aself-sufficiency; to forsake Christ the living Fountain, and hew out untothemselves cisterns, that will hold no living waters: and, by degrees, such will come to draw others from waiting upon the gift of God inthemselves, and to feel it in others, in order to their strength andrefreshment, to wait upon them, and to turn from God to man again, and somake shipwreck of the faith once delivered to the saints, and of a goodconscience towards God: which are only kept by that divine gift of lifethat begat the one, and awakened and sanctified the other in thebeginning. 

Nor is it enough, that we have known the divine gift, and in it havereached to the spirits in prison, and been the instruments of theconvincing of others of the way of God, if we keep not as low and poor inourselves, and as depending upon the Lord, as ever: since no memory, norepetitions of former openings, revelations, or enjoyments, will bring asoul to God, or afford bread to the hungry, or water to the thirsty, unless life go with what we say, and that must be waited for. 

O that we may have no other fountain, treasure, or dependence! That nonemay presume at any rate to act of themselves for God, because they havelong acted from God; that we may not supply want of waiting, with our ownwisdom, or think that we may take less care and more liberty in speakingthan formerly; and that where we do not feel the Lord by his power, toopen us and enlarge us, whatever be the expectation of the people, or hasbeen our customary supply and character, we may not exceed or fill up thetime with our own. 

I hope we shall ever remember, who it was that said, "Of yourselves youcan do nothing;" our sufficiency is in him. And if we are not to speakour own words, or take thought what we should say to men in our defence, when exposed for our testimony; surely, we ought to speak none of our ownwords, or take thought what we shall say in our testimony and ministry, in the name of the Lord, to the souls of the people: for then, of alltimes, and of all other occasions, should it be fulfilled in us, "For itis not you that speak, but the Spirit of my Father that speaketh in you. "

And, indeed, the ministry of the Spirit must and does keep its analogyand agreement with the birth of the Spirit: that as no man can inheritthe kingdom of God, unless he be born of the Spirit; so no ministry canbeget a soul to God, but that which is from the Spirit. For this, as Isaid before, the disciples waited before they went forth; and in this ourelder brethren and messengers of God in our day, waited, visited, andreached to us; and having begun in the Spirit, let none ever hope or seekto be made perfect in the flesh: for what is the flesh to the Spirit, orthe chaff to the wheat? And if we keep in the Spirit, we shall keep inthe unity of it, which is the ground of true fellowship. For by drinkinginto that one Spirit, we are made one people to God, and by it we arecontinued in the unity of the faith, and the bond of peace. No envying, no bitterness, no strife, can have place with us. We shall watch alwaysfor good, and not for evil, one over another; and rejoice exceedingly, and not begrudge at one another's increase in the riches of the gracewith which God replenisheth his faithful servants. 

And Brethren, as to you is committed the dispensation of the oracles ofGod, which give you frequent opportunities, and great place with thepeople among whom you travel, I beseech you, that you would not think itsufficient to declare the word of life in their assemblies, howeveredifying and comfortable such opportunities may be to you and them: but, as was the practice of the man of God before mentioned, in great measure, when among us, inquire the state of the several churches you visit; whoamong them are afflicted or sick, who are tempted, and if any areunfaithful or obstinate; and endeavour to issue those things in thewisdom and power of God, which will be a glorious crown upon yourministry. As that prepares your way in the hearts of the people, toreceive you as men of God, so it gives you credit with them to do themgood by your advice in other respects; the afflicted will be comforted byyou, the tempted strengthened, the sick refreshed, the unfaithfulconvicted and restored, and such as are obstinate, softened and fittedfor reconciliation; which is clinching the nail, and applying andfastening the general testimony, by this particular care of the severalbranches of it, in reference to them more immediately concerned in it. 

For though good and wise men, and elders too, may reside in such places, who are of worth and importance in the general, and in other places; yetit does not always follow, that they may have the room they deserve inthe hearts of the people they live among; or some particular occasion maymake it unfit for him or them to use that authority. But you that travelas God's messengers, if they receive you in the greater, shall theyrefuse you in the less? And if they own the general testimony, can theywithstand the particular application of it in their own cases? Thus yewill show yourselves workmen indeed, and carry your business before you, to the praise of his name that hath called you from darkness to light, that you might turn others from satan's power unto God and his kingdom, which is within. And O that there were more of such faithful labourersin the vineyard of the Lord!--Never more need since the day of God. 

Wherefore I cannot but cry and call aloud to you, that have been longprofessors of the truth, and know the truth in the convincing power ofit, and have had a sober conversation among men; yet content yourselvesonly to know truth for yourselves, to go to meetings, and exercise anordinary charity in the church, and an honest behaviour in the world, andlimit yourselves within those bounds; feeling little or no concern uponyour spirits, for the glory of the Lord in the prosperity of his truth inthe earth, more than to be glad that others succeed in such service. Arise ye in the name and power of the Lord Jesus! Behold how white thefields are unto harvest, in this and other nations, and how few able andfaithful labourers there are to work therein! Your country-folks, neighbours, and kindred, want to know the Lord and his truth, and to walkin it. Does nothing lie at your door upon their account! Search andsee, and lose no time, I beseech you, for the Lord is at hand. 

I do not judge you; there is one that judgeth all men, and his judgmentis true. You have mightily increased in your outward substance, may youequally increase in your inward riches, and do good with both, while youhave a day to do good. Your enemies would once have taken what you had, from you, for his name's sake in whom you have believed; wherefore he hasgiven you much of the world, in the face of your enemies. But O, let itbe your servant, and not your master! your diversion rather than yourbusiness! let the Lord be chiefly in your eye, and ponder your ways, andsee if God has nothing more for you to do: and if you find yourselvesshort in your account with him, then wait for his preparation, and beready to receive the word of command, and be not weary of well-doing, when you have put your hand to the plough; and, assuredly, you shallreap, if you faint not, the fruit of your heavenly labour in God'severlasting kingdom. 

And you, young convinced ones, be you entreated and exhorted to adiligent and chaste waiting upon God, in the way of his blessedmanifestation and appearance of himself to you. Look not out, butwithin: let not another's liberty be your snare: neither act byimitation, but by sense and feeling of God's power in yourselves: crushnot the tender buddings of it in your souls, nor over-run, in yourdesires and warmness of affections, the holy and gentle motions of it. Remember it is a still voice that speaks to us in this day, and that itis not to be heard in the noises and hurries of the mind; but isdistinctly understood in a retired frame. Jesus loved and chosesolitudes, often going to mountains, gardens, and sea sides, to avoidcrowds and hurries: to show his disciples it was good to be solitary, andsit loose to the world. Two enemies lie near your states, imaginationand liberty; but the plain, practical, living, holy truth, that hasconvinced you, will preserve you, if you mind it in yourselves, and bringall thoughts, inclinations, and affections, to the test of it, to see ifthey are wrought in God, or of the enemy, or of your ownselves: so will atrue taste, discerning, and judgment, be preserved to you, of what youshould do and leave undone. And in your diligence and faithfulness inthis way, you will come to inherit substance; and Christ, the eternalwisdom, will fill your treasury. And when you are converted, as well asconvinced, then confirm your brethren; and be ready to every good wordand work, that the Lord shall call you to: that you may be to his praise, who has chosen you to be partakers, with the saints in light, of akingdom that cannot be shaken, an inheritance incorruptible in eternalhabitations. 

And now, as for you that are the children of God's people, a greatconcern is upon my spirit for your good and often are my knees bowed tothe God of your fathers for you, that you may come to be partakers of thesame divine life and power, that have been the glory of this day: that ageneration you may be to God, a holy nation, and a peculiar people, zealous of good works, when all our heads are laid in the dust. O! youyoung men and women, let it not suffice you, that you are the children ofthe people of the Lord; you must also be born again, if you will inheritthe kingdom of God. Your fathers are but such after the flesh, and couldbut beget you into the likeness of the first Adam; but you must bebegotten into the likeness of the second Adam, by a spiritual generation, or you will not, you cannot, be of his children or offspring. Andtherefore look carefully about you, O ye children of the children of God;consider your standing, and see what you are in relation to this divinekindred, family, and birth. Have you obeyed the light, and received andwalked in the Spirit, which is the incorruptible seed of the word andkingdom of God, of which you must be born again? God is no respecter ofpersons. The father cannot save or answer for the child, or the childfor the father; but in the sin thou sinnest thou shalt die; and in therighteousness thou doest, through Christ Jesus, thou shalt live: for itis the willing and obedient that shall eat the good of the land. Be notdeceived, God is mocked. Such as all nations and people sow, such theyshall reap at the hand of the just God. And then your many and greatprivileges, above the children of other people, will add weight in thescale against you, if you choose not the way of the Lord. For you havehad line upon line, and precept upon precept, and not only good doctrinebut good example; and which is more, you have been turned to, andacquainted with, a principle in yourselves, which others too generallyhave been ignorant of: and you know you may be as good as you please, without the fear of frowns and blows, or being turned out of doors, andforsaken of father and mother, for God's sake and his holy religion; ashas been the case of some of your fathers in the day they first enteredinto this holy path. And if you, after hearing and seeing the wondersthat God has wrought in the deliverance and preservation of them, througha sea of troubles, and the manifold temporal, as well as spiritual, blessings that he has filled them with, in the sight of their enemies, should neglect and turn your backs upon so great and near a salvation, you would not only be most ungrateful children to God and them, but mustexpect that God will call the children of those that knew him not, totake the crown out of your hands, and that your lot will be a dreadfuljudgment at the hand of the Lord: but, O that it may never be so with anyof you! The Lord forbid, saith my soul. 

Wherefore, O ye young men and women! look to the rock of your fathers:there is no other God but him, no other light but his, no other grace buthis, nor spirit but his, to convince you, quicken, and comfort you; tolead, guide, and preserve you to God's everlasting kingdom. So will yoube possessors as well as professors of the truth, embracing it, not onlyby education, but judgment and conviction; from a sense begotten in yoursouls, through the operation of the eternal Spirit and power of God; bywhich you may come to be the seed of Abraham, through faith, and thecircumcision not made with hands; and so heirs of the promise made to thefathers, of an incorruptible crown. That, as I said before, a generationyou may be to God, holding up the profession of the blessed truth in thelife and power of it. For formality in religion is nauseous to God andgood men; and the more so, where any form or appearance has been new andpeculiar, and begun and practised, upon a principle, with an uncommonzeal and strictness. Therefore I say, for you to fall flat and formal, and continue the profession, without that salt and savour by which it iscome to obtain a good report among men, is not to answer God's love, oryour parents' care, or the mind of truth in yourselves, or in those thatare without: who, though they will not obey the truth, have sight andsense enough to see if they do that make a profession of it. For wherethe divine virtue of it is not felt in the soul, and waited for and livedin, imperfections will quickly break out, and show themselves, and detectthe unfaithfulness of such persons; and that their insides are notseasoned with the nature of that holy principle which they profess. 

Wherefore, dear children, let me entreat you to shut your eyes at thetemptations and allurements of this low and perishing world, and notsuffer your affections to be captivated by those lusts and vanities thatyour fathers, for the truth's sake, long since turned their backs upon:but as you believe it to be the truth, receive it into your hearts, thatyou may become the children of God: so that it may never be said of you, as the evangelist writes of the Jews in his time, that Christ, the truelight, "came to his own, but his own received him not; but to as many asreceived him, to them he gave power to become the children of God; whichwere born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will ofman, but of God;" a most close and comprehensive passage to thisoccasion. You exactly and peculiarly answer to those professing Jews, inthat you bear the name of God's people, by being the children, andwearing of the form of God's people: and he, by his light in you, may bevery well said to come to his own, and if you obey it not, but turn yourbacks upon it, and walk after the vanities of your minds, you will be ofthose that received him not; which I pray God may never be your case andjudgment. But that you may be thoroughly sensible of the many and greatobligations you lie under to the Lord for his love, and to your parentsfor their care: and with all your heart, and all your soul, and all yourstrength, turn to the Lord, to his gift and Spirit in you; and hear hisvoice, and obey it, that you may seal to the testimony of your fathers, by the truth and evidence of your own experience: that your children'schildren may bless you, and the Lord for you, as those that delivered afaithful example, as well as record of the truth of God unto them. Sowill the grey hairs of your dear parents, yet alive, go down to the gravewith joy, to see you the posterity of truth, as well as theirs: and thatnot only their nature, but spirit, shall live in you when they are gone. 

* * * * *

I shall conclude this account with a few words to those who are not ofour communion, into whose hands this may come; especially those of ourown nation. 

* * * * *

Friends, as you are the sons and daughters of Adam, and my brethren afterthe flesh, often and earnest have been my desires and prayers to God onyour behalf, that you may come to know your Creator to be your Redeemer, and Restorer to the holy image that through sin you have lost, by thepower and Spirit of his Son Jesus Christ, whom he hath given for thelight and life of the world. And O that you, who are called Christians, would receive him into your hearts! for there it is you want him, and atthat door he stands knocking, that you might let him in; but you do notopen to him; you are full of other guests, so that a manger is his lotamong you now as well as of old. Yet you are full of profession, as werethe Jews when he came among them, who knew him not, but rejected andevily entreated him. So that if you come not to the possession andexperience of what you profess, all your formality and religion willstand you in no stead in the day of God's judgment. 

I beseech you ponder with yourselves your eternal condition, and see whattitle, what ground and foundation you have for your Christianity: if morethan a profession, and an historical belief of the gospel. Have youknown the baptism of fire, and the Holy Ghost, and the fan of Christ thatwinnows away the chaff in your minds, the carnal lusts, and affections;that divine leaven of the kingdom, that, being received, leavens thewhole lump of man, sanctifying him throughout in body, soul, and spirit?If this be not the ground of your confidence, you are in a miserablestate. 

You will say, perhaps, that though you are sinners, and live in dailycommission of sin, and are not sanctified, as I have been speaking, yetyou have faith in Christ, who has borne the curse for you, and in him youare complete by faith, his righteousness being imputed to you. 

But, my friends, let me entreat you not to deceive yourselves, in soimportant a point, as is that of your immortal souls. If you have truefaith in Christ, your faith will make you clean; it will sanctify you:for the saints' faith was their victory of old: by this they overcame sinwithin, and sinful man without. And if thou art in Christ, thou walkestnot after the flesh, but after the Spirit, whose fruits are manifest. Yea, thou art a new creature: new made, new fashioned, after God's willand mould. Old things are done away, and, behold, all things are becomenew: new love, desires, will, affections, and practices. It is not anylonger thou that livest; (thou disobedient, carnal, worldly one;) but itis Christ that liveth in thee; and to live is Christ, and to die is thyeternal gain: because thou art assured, that thy corruptible shall put onincorruption, and thy mortal, immortality, and that thou hast a glorioushouse, eternal in the heavens, that will never wax old or pass away. Allthis follows being in Christ, as heat follows fire, and light the sun. 

Therefore have a care how you presume to rely upon such a notion, as thatyou are in Christ, whilst in your old fallen nature. For what communionhath light with darkness, or Christ with Belial? Hear what the beloveddisciple tells you: "If we say we have fellowship with God, and walk indarkness, we lie, and do not the truth. " That is, if we go on in asinful way, are captivated by our carnal affections, and are notconverted to God, we walk in darkness, and cannot possibly in that statehave any fellowship with God. Christ clothes them with hisrighteousness, that receive his grace in their hearts, and denythemselves, and take up his cross daily, and follow him. Christ'srighteousness makes men inwardly holy; of holy minds, wills, andpractices. It is not the less Christ's, because we have it; for it isours, not by nature, but by faith and adoption: it is the gift of God. But, still, though not ours, as of or from ourselves, (for in that senseit is Christ's, for it is of and from him, ) yet it is ours, and must beours, in possession, efficacy, and enjoyment, to do us any good; orChrist's righteousness will profit us nothing. It was after this mannerthat he was made to the primitive Christians, righteousness, sanctification, justification, and redemption; and if ever you will havethe comfort, kernel, and marrow of the Christian religion, thus you mustcome to learn and obtain it. 

Now, my friends, by what you have read, you may perceive that God hasvisited a poor people among you, with this saving knowledge andtestimony, whom he has upheld and increased to this day, notwithstandingthe fierce opposition they have met withal. Despise not the meanness ofthis appearance: it was, and yet is, we know, a day of small things andof small account with too many; and many hard and ill names are given toit; but it is of God, it came from him, because it leads to him. This weknow, but we cannot make another to know it, unless he will take the sameway to know it that we took. The world talks of God, but what do theydo? They pray for power, but reject the principle in which it is. Ifyou would know God, and worship and serve God as you should do, you mustcome to the means he has ordained and given for that purpose. Some seekit in books, some in learned men; but what they look for is inthemselves, (though not of themselves, ) but they overlook it. The voiceis too still, the seed too small, and the light shineth in darkness; theyare abroad, and so cannot divide the spoil: but the woman that lost hersilver, found it at home, after she had lighted her candle, and swept herhouse. Do you so too, and you shall find what Pilate wanted to know, viz. Truth. Truth in the inward parts, so valuable in the sight of God. 

The light of Christ within, who is the light of the world, and so a lightto you, that tells you the truth of your condition, leads all, that takeheed unto it, out of darkness into God's marvellous light. For lightgrows upon the obedient; it is sown for the righteous, and their way is ashining light, that shines forth more and more to the perfect day. 

Wherefore, O friends, turn in, turn in, I beseech you: where is thepoison, there is the antidote. There you want Christ, and there you mustfind him; and blessed be God, there you may find him. Seek and you shallfind, I testify for God. But then you must seek aright, with your wholeheart, as men that seek for their lives, yea for their eternal lives:diligently, humbly, patiently, as those that can taste no pleasure, comfort, or satisfaction in any thing else, unless you find him whom yoursouls want to know and love above all. O it is a travail, a spiritualtravail! let the carnal, profane world, think and say as it will. Andthrough this path you must walk to the city of God, that has eternalfoundations, if ever you will come there. 

Well! and what doth this blessed light do for you? Why, first, it setsall your sins in order before you: it detects the spirit of this world inall its baits and allurements, and shows how man came to fall from God, and the fallen state he is in. Secondly, it begets a sense and sorrow, in such as believe in it, for this fearful lapse. You will then see himdistinctly whom you have pierced, and all the blows and wounds you havegiven him by your disobedience, and how you have made him to serve withyour sins; and you will weep and mourn for it, and your sorrow will be agodly sorrow. Thirdly, after this it will bring you to the holy watch, to take care that you do so no more, and that the enemy surprise you notagain. Then thoughts, as well as words and works, will come to judgment, which is the way of holiness, in which the redeemed of the Lord do walk. Here you will come to love God above all, and your neighbours asyourselves. Nothing hurts, nothing harms, nothing makes afraid on thisholy mountain. Now you come to be Christ's indeed; for you are his innature and spirit, and not your own. And when you are thus Christ's, then Christ is yours, and not before. And here you will know communionwith the Father and with the Son, and the efficacy of the blood ofcleansing, even the blood of Jesus Christ, that immaculate Lamb, whichspeaks better things than the blood of Abel; and which cleanseth from allsin, the consciences of those that, through the living faith, come to besprinkled with it, from dead works to serve the living God. 

* * * * *

To conclude; behold the testimony and doctrine of the people calledQuakers; behold their practice and discipline; and behold the blessed manand men, at least many of them, that were sent of God in this excellentwork and service; all which is more particularly expressed in the annalsof that man of God, which I do heartily recommend to my reader's mostserious perusal; and beseech Almighty God, that his blessing may go alongwith both, to the convincement of many, as yet strangers to this holydispensation, and also to the edification of God's church in general: whofor his manifold and repeated mercies and blessings to his people, inthis day of his great love, is worthy ever to have the glory, honour, thanksgiving, and renown; and be it rendered and ascribed, with fear andreverence, through him in whom he is well pleased, his beloved Son andLamb, our light and life, that sits with him upon the throne, worldwithout end. Amen. 

Says one that God has long since mercifully favoured with his fatherlyvisitation, and who was not disobedient to the heavenly vision and call;to whom the way of truth is more lovely and precious than ever, and thatknowing the beauty and benefit of it above all worldly treasures, haschosen it for his chiefest joy, and therefore recommends it to thy loveand choice, because he is with great sincerity and affection, Thy soul's friend, WILLIAM PENN. 

 FINIS. 

 PRINTED BY HARRISON AND CROSFIELD, MANCHESTER. 

BOOKS, &c. 

_On sale_, _at reduced prices_; _the property of the Society_: _to be hadof_ William Manley, 86, _Houndsditch_, _London_; _and at the_ Manchesterand Stockport Tract Depository, (_for particulars of which see itsannexed List_. ) _Pounds. _ _s. _ _d. _Robert Barclay's Apology for the 0 4 6True Christian Divinity, _octavo_ Universal Love 0 0 3 Discipline 0 0 6 Theses 0 0 2E. Bates on the Doctrines of 0 4 0FriendsElizabeth Bathurst's Truth 0 1 6VindicatedW. Shewen's True Christian's 0 1 3Faith briefly stated Counsel to the Christian 0 0 3TravellerE. Pugh's Salutation or Call, 0 1 6from the Many Things to the OneThing Needful. 12mo. BoundH. Turford's Grounds of a Holy 0 1 0Life. 19th edit. William Penn's Fruits of a 0 0 4Father's Love Key to distinguish the 0 0 3Religion professed by Friendsfrom perversion &misrepresentationB. Holme's Serious Call, in 0 0 6Christian Love to all People. 17th editionC. Marshall's Way of Life 0 0 3revealedM. Brook on Silent Waiting 0 0 3J. Crook's Truth's Principles on 0 0 2Doctrine, &c. G. Whitehead's Epistle on True 0 0 1Christian LoveJ. Griffith's Remarks on 0 0 6Important SubjectsM. Leadbeater's Biographical 0 3 0Notices of Friends who wereresident in IrelandG. Fox's Journal of Travels, 0 12 0Sufferings, and Labours of Love, in the Work of the Ministry. 2vols. 8vo. BoardsWilliam Edmundson's Journal of 0 3 0his Life, Travels, &c. I. Pennington's Memoirs, and 0 2 6Review of his Writings, by J. G. Bevan, 12mo. BoardsT. Ellwood's Life 0 3 0T. Chalkley's Journal and Works 0 3 0J. Woolman's Journal and Works 0 4 0 Serious Considerations 0 1 0J. Churchman's Journal, 12mo. 0 3 0clothS. Crisp, Memoirs of, by S. Tuke 0 3 0J. Gratton's Journal 0 1 0James Gough's Memoirs, Religious 0 1 6Experience, &c. D. Hall's Life and Epistles 0 1 6R. Jordan's Life 0 1 6G. Latey's Life 0 1 0Jane Pearson, Memoirs of 0 1 0C. Story's Life 0 0 6John Alderson, Memoirs of 0 0 2Abiah Darby's Catechism 0 0 4T. Carrington's Exhortation 0 0 2Selection of G. Fox's Epistles, 0 3 6by S. TukeYearly Epistles to 1817, calf 0 7 0Selection of Advices 0 1 6SEWEL'S HISTORY OF FRIENDS, (_newedition_. )Rules and Advices of the YearlyMeeting, _just published_. Penn's Rise and Progress of the 0 0 8People called Quakers, in whichtheir Fundamental Principle, Doctrines, Worship, Ministry, andDiscipline, are plainly declared. _Stiff cover_ _Cloth_ 0 1 0

There is an Association of Friends in London, for the printing anddistribution of TRACTS on Moral and Religious Subjects, chiefly such ashave a tendency to elucidate and support the Principles of Christianityas held by the Society of Friends; in which there are _sixty two_different Tracts, price from 3_d. _ to 2_s. _ 6_d. _ per doz. Sold byEDMUND FRY, 73, Houndsditch; and by HARVEY and DARTON, 55, GracechurchStreet, London: also at the Manchester and Stockport TRACT DEPOSITORY. 

Footnotes

{25} Instead of being asked those questions, the present practice is toproduce the needful certificates of consent. 

{26} This second attendance is not now required. 

{27} This hardly describes the present practice. It is not _during_ thegathering only, if at all, that exhortation takes place. If the corpsebe conveyed to a meeting-house, the meeting is held like any other; andwhat is here called 'Exhortation, ' takes place or not, as any ministerpresent believes him or herself influenced. The usage at the burialground is still as here described. Interments often take place withoutany previous meeting. 

{28} The collective sense and judgment of the church, herein, remainsthe same, as is manifest by the frequent advices given forth from theiryearly and other meetings. 

{43a} At present (1834) there are eight yearly meetings on the Americancontinent, which correspond with the yearly meeting in London, andmutually with each other; they are united in doctrine, and theirdiscipline is similar. 

{43b} They are thus particularized in a more recent publication of thesociety:--This is an occasional voluntary contribution, expended inprinting books; house-rent for a clerk, and his wages for keepingrecords; the passage of ministers who visit their brethren beyond sea;and some small incidental charges; but not, as has been falsely supposed, the reimbursement of those who suffer distraint for tithes, and otherdemands, with which they scruple to comply. 

{44} This is not now quite correct. A committee still draws up theGeneral Epistle; but the minutes of the transactions of the meeting aremade as matters occur during its several sittings. 

{57} Called the Meeting for Sufferings, and now held monthly, exceptexigencies require more frequent sittings.