CHAPTER VI.

1653. Travels in the northern counties-His prophecy respecting the Long Parliament-Imprisoned at Carlisle-Curious prediction about the Quakers.

"For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world."-2 Cor. i. 12.

"Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms."-James v. 13.

In the year 1653, G. Fox's attention was principally directed to the northern counties of Westmoreland, Cumberland, Durham, and Northumberland; travelling about and embracing every opportunity of holding religious meetings; exhorting people at markets and fairs, and at all places, and on all occasions where he found them assembled; calling all to repentance; expounding the parables of our Saviour and the doctrine of the Inward Light; and warning all against any reliance upon outward forms and empty professions of religion, which of themselves can afford neither solid comfort, nor peace of mind.

In these journeys, he was thrown much among Baptists, Presbyterians and Independents, all of whom were struggling with one another for mastery, during the wild commotions of these unsettled times; and their preachers were more hostile and more rancorous towards all opposing tenets, than the clergy of the national church had ever been. The two most powerful sects, the Presbyterians and Independents, had already begun to partake of the good things belonging to the Establishment, and naturally felt their appetites whetted for more, each party was extremely tenacious of securing for itself as much of its powers and emoluments as it could obtain, and was as jealous of all new doctrines, as it was fierce and hot in the persecution of their supporters. Thus the Quakers, by their instigation, were over

whelmed with buffetings, revilings, fines, and imprisonments; and yet in spite of all these persecutions, their opinions spread rapidly, and every where gained supporters, and large meetings of Friends were settled at various places, some of which remain to this day.

It is a sad reflection, that religious controversies, beyond all others, engender the greatest ill-will and bitterness of spirit. Had all parties divested religion of her temporalities, the same as we see the Quakers did, they would have no doubt destroyed one powerful motive to this kind of disputation. For as every church advanced dogmas, which its prelates were expected strenuously to support; so it naturally followed, that they should be prejudiced in favour of their own tenets, and shut up against the convictions of truth; because of the natural bias of the mind to favour that system, upon which its livelihood and expectations in a measure depend, besides its proneness to value, above all others, the opinions in which it has been educated. On the other hand, the same period affords many instances, where a mistaken religious zeal upon some point of doctrine, was itself a cause of great acrimony; and bad feelings were thus engendered, which might never have existed, had each christian pastor been as sincerely zealous in elucidating the everlasting truth of the gospel, as he had been in enforcing his own particular notions of it.

D'Aubignè says, "the passions, never more imperious than in religious controversies, overleap all forms of justice; and this not only in the Roman church, but in those Protestant churches, also, which have declined from the gospel, and in short, wherever the truth has disappeared."*

The Quakers conceived themselves called upon to bear testimony against tithes and a paid clergy; the first, as being ended by our Saviour's personal appearance; for the old Mosaic law, of which they formed a part, was both fulfilled and ended by his sacrifice. The second, as being contrary to his particular injunctions, when he sent forth his disciples to preach the gospel. From hence they were stigmatized by the clergy and other

* Reformation, vol. i. book iv. chap. ii. p. 110.

opponents, as the false prophets who were to come in the latter days. Which charge, in their own defence, they retorted upon their accusers; proving out of the gospel, that those false prophets were such as preached its glad tidings for hire; and who spoke of spiritual things, being themselves out of the spirit in which the gospel was written: an imputation which many of the clergy by their evil lives and unchristian conduct established.

G. Fox informs us, that he had "great openings from the Lord," not only of spiritual, but also of temporal matters; and in the beginning of this year, while he was yet at Swarthmore, and was walking in the hall there, his friends, Judge Fell and Justice Benson, chancing to be conversing upon the important political events then in agitation, and also of the doings of the Long Parliament, he says, "he was moved in spirit" to tell them, "that before that day two weeks the Long Parliament would be broken up, and the speaker plucked out of his chair." This prediction was literally fulfilled; for on that day two weeks, the news arrived at Swarthmore, that Oliver Cromwell had broken up the parliament, had dismissed the members, and had himself assumed the absolute sway. And the speaker of the house being unwilling to give up his authority, declared, he would not leave the chair unless he were forced. Upon which General Harrison said, "Sir I will lend you my hand;" and thereupon taking him by the hand, the speaker came down out of the chair.

"About this time," he says, "I was in a fast for about ten days, my spirit being greatly exercised on Truth's behalf; for James Milner and Richard Myer, went out into imaginations, and a company followed them," but they were soon led to see their error, and to condemn it, "and to come into the way of truth again." Soon afterwards, he was at a meeting at Arn-side, at which the same R. Myer was present, who had long been lame of one arm. "He was moved of the Lord to say unto him, amongst all the people, 'stand up upon thy legs:' and he stood up, and stretched out his arm that had been lame a long time, and said, 'Be it known unto you, all people, that this day I am healed.' Yet his parents could hardly believe it; but after the meeting was done, they had him aside, took off his doublet, and then saw that it was true. He came soon after to

Swarthmore meeting, and declared how that the Lord had healed him. Yet after this, the Lord commanded him to go to York with a message from him, but he disobeyed the Lord; and the Lord struck him again, so that he died about three-quarters of after."

a year

In the neighbourhood of Cockermouth, he held several meetings in various churches, where the clergymen were friendly disposed; but others denied him any accommodation in their parishes, spoke against his tenets, and forbade their parishioners to listen to him. Being much pressed by the clergyman at Bingham, to go into the church, for he generally preferred the open air, or the spreading branches of some great tree, he followed the people in, and soon after they were settled in silence, he stood up on a seat. "The Lord opened his mouth, and he declared his everlasting truth, and the word of life to the people, directing them to the Spirit of God in themselves, by which they might know God and Christ. And if they came to walk in his Light, they might therein see Christ to be the author of their faith, and the finisher thereof; their Shepherd to feed them, their Priest to teach them, their Prophet to open divine mysteries unto them, and to be always present with them. He explained also to them, in the openings of the Lord, the first Covenant, shewing them the figures, and the substance of those figures, bringing them down to Christ the new covenant. He also manifested to them, that there had been a night of apostacy since the apostles' days; but that now the everlasting gospel was preached again, which brought life and immortality to light, and the day of the Lord was come, and Christ was come to teach his people himself by his light, grace, power, and Spirit."

"The Lord," he says, "had given him a spirit of discerning, by which he could often see the inward states and conditions of people, and could try their spirits." And thus, being seated in a private dwelling, where he had been addressing a large assembly, he suddenly perceived a woman there to be "under the influence of an unclean spirit," and speaking "sharply to her," she got up and left the company, all of whom expressed themselves astonished, because he had discovered her character, although a stranger to him.

"Not long before, as he was going to a meet

ing, he saw some women in a field, and discerned an evil spirit in them; and he was moved to go out of his way into the field to them, to declare unto them their conditions." Upon another occasion, casting his eyes upon a woman, he said to her, "thou hast been an harlot," for he perfectly perceived the condition and life of the woman. He then told her, "her heart was not right before the Lord, and that from the inward came the outward. This woman came afterwards to be convinced of God's truth, and became a Friend."

At Carlisle, he held a large meeting in the Abbey, where the pastor of the Baptists and his flock came to hear him. "After the meeting, the pastor, a high notionist, and a flashy man, came to him, and asked him, 'What must be damned?' He was moved immediately to tell him, that which spoke in him was to be damned.' This stopped the pastor's mouth, and the witness of God was raised up in him. He also came afterwards to be convinced."

He then went up to the castle, was cordially received by the soldiers, and the garrison was assembled by beat of drum to hear him. After expounding his chief doctrines and directing them to the light of Christ, "he warned them all, that they should do no violence to any man, but should show forth a christian life; for he who was to be their Teacher, would be their condemner, if they were disobedient to him."

His next concern was to preach at the Market Cross; the magistrates threatened to prevent him by their officers; and their wives declared, that they would tear the hair off his head, if he dared to attempt it. Upon the market day, he repaired to the cross, attended by a great concourse, whither these women also came, and abused him with much scurrility, because he was so surrounded by the people and soldiers, that they could not carry their threat into execution. G. Fox wore his hair long and flowing over his shoulders; and in one part of his journal, he states, "he was not to cut it," intimating that in so doing he was obeying some internal command. The Presbyterians and Independents were all crops, and thought much of this badge of sanctity; and G. Fox by wearing his hair unshorn, was a sign to them that true religion does not consist in a tonsure, or any