CHAPTER IV.

Penn's serious Tendencies renewed. Sent to Ireland. Manages his Father's Estates there. -Arrested and imprisoned. His Letter thereLiberated and ordered Home by his

upon. Father.

Befriended by his Mother. - Becomes a Preacher, and an Author.- · His first Books. Has a public Disputation. Publishes his "Sandy Foundation Shaken." - Imprisoned for it. Other Writings. Is liberated. Sent again to Ireland. - Reconciled to his Father on his Return.

On the return of Admiral Penn from sea, in 1666, he found, to his bitter disappointment, that the lively and fashionable air which travel had imparted to his son was but temporary, and had yielded, in his absence, to the seriousness which was inherent in his nature. Intimacy with grave persons, and interest in the grave subjects of the times, had had their natural effect upon his manners and conversation. The difference was extreme between what the young man was and what his father would have had him to be. Indeed, one remarkable characteristic of the age was, that its men and manners, its theory and its practice, were whol

ly uncontrolled by moderation. Scarce a single prominent character seems to have stood between the utmost freedom of licentiousness on the one hand, with all its variety of wickedness, and the ungenial moroseness of a sour pietism on the other. The Admiral would have been pleased to converse with his son about the court and its gay pleasures, and to have had him share his own interest in obtaining some place of honor or profit. The society which he entertained at his own house, and which he visited in town, was of a kind which would be least congenial to his son, whose demure looks, and formal language, and serious conversation, would rather excite their ridicule, than win their respect.

The Admiral, determined to eradicate the extreme religious tendency of his son, sent him over to the court of the Duke of Ormond, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, with whom he was intimately acquainted. This was then the next best school to Paris for learning the ways of pleasure, frivolity, and dissipation. The Duke received his visitor with kindness, and readily admitted him to the society of the lively and fashionable. But what Penn witnessed served only to disgust him. The very attempt to win him from seriousness, by exposing him to the fascinations of vice, served

most effectually to confirm him in the more sombre and exaggerated views, which associated themselves with religion in his mind.

His father, being possessed of two large estates in the county of Cork, resolved upon committing the entire management of them to him, hoping that close and absorbing employment would work an effect upon him, which social frivolities had failed to accomplish. William readily assumed the responsible charge committed to him, and sustained it so as to win the entire approval and the commendation of his father. On a visit of business to Cork, he learned that Thomas Loe, whom he regarded as his spiritual father, was to speak at a meeting of the Quakers in that city. As might be expected, Penn resolved to remain. and hear. Whether or not the zealous preacher knew that his young disciple at Oxford was in the crowd which he addressed, he could not have chosen introductory words more suited to affect that listener. His first sentence was, "There is a faith which overcomes the world, and there is a faith which is overcome by the world." The discourse, conformed to this motto, deeply impressed William Penn, calling back and deepening his earliest religious impressions, and enlisted his feelings once for all in that sect to which the speaker

belonged. Conscience seems to have made a special application to himself of the doctrine taught.

But though he did not yet join the Society of Friends, nor assume their garb, he began to attend their meetings. At one of these, September 3d, 1667, he was apprehended, with others, and carried before the Mayor, on the strength of a proclamation, which had been published seven years before, against tumultuous assemblies. The Mayor, noticing that his dress did not mark him as a Quaker, offered him his liberty if he would give a bond for his good behavior. As Penn had not failed of good behavior, he refused to accept his liberty on this condition, and was therefore imprisoned, with eighteen others. He soon availed himself of the acquaintance which he had

made with men of station in Ireland, to write a letter, from his prison, to the Earl of Orrery, Lord President of the Council of Munster. It is a strong, dignified, and courteous remonstrance, stating his apprehension, not by an act of Parliament or state, but by an antiquated order, designed to suppress "Fifth Monarchy killing spirits,' ," and presenting the folly of such persecution, to one, who, he says, was "not long since a good solicitor for the liberty I now crave.' This letter procured his immediate discharge.

Another bond of union was thus formed between him and the new sect, and he soon identified himself with the Quakers, with the exception of his dress. His father received tidings of his son's course, in a letter from a nobleman, and at once ordered him to return home. He complied; and, as his dress did not betray him, his father did not at once discover his frame of mind. But this was soon revealed in his language and deportment; and when his neglect of common courtesies, especially that of the hat, and his exclusive intimacies with Quakers, made his father aware of the full truth, he at once sought an explanation from William.

The interview must have been distressing to both father and son, who showed an equal degree of resolution and pertinacity in their respective positions. The father, with a parent's love, with worldly hopes, and an utter scorn of all sanctimoniousness, implored his son to regard his wishes and his own interest. The son, moved, as he believed, by a divine impulse, and knowing no motive higher than that of conscience, gently resisted alike the commands and entreaties of his parent. Anger on the one part, and fixed determination on the other, brought the interview to a close. The father offered to give his son no further