Yet I have not thought myself bound to take notice of every odd case that may have happened among the Quakers, so called: for there have conversed among them such who acted some particular things that were not approved of by those of that society. And if any one, swayed by human passion, commits any excess which is disapproved of by his fellow members of the church, such an act may not be duly imputed to the people he makes profession with. Among such particulars may be reckoned the case of one Hester Biddle, which Croese makes mention of about the end of his history. For though it was told him from the relation she gave of it at Amsterdam, not with any intention that he should publish it, yet this was a particular case which she herself must be responsible for; since experience hath taught that imagination sometimes works so powerfully on the mind, that one thinks himself obliged to do a thing which were better left undone.
Yet for all that, it is true, that men fearing God, may mistake, and through ignorance do something, which others not without reason might judge not commendable. Also it may happen that some again, from a godly fear, have omitted what others, no less pious, would not have scrupled. And though some among the Quakers, in the beginning of their rise, for fear of transgressing Christ’s command, “Be not ye called Rabbi, for one is your Master, even Christ,” speaking to persons in authority, called them by the name of Friend; yet others of the same persuasion have not therefore thought themselves bound to refuse to magistrates their distinguishing titles of magistracy. Nay, if any, for some special reason, may not have given a full or direct answer to a query, yet others of the same society have not looked upon this as a pattern to imitate. For the most eminent valiants among this people in the beginning, were not men of note or learning, though of great courage: insomuch that their immoveable steadfastness sometimes so exasperated their enemies, that their fear of doing or omitting any thing which they judged would displease God, often hath been stamped with the odious denomination of stubbornness and stiffneckedness; but they have borne this patiently, believing that it was their duty to persevere immoveably in minding their Christian profession, and in frequenting their religious assemblies. And that such a steadfastness was the duty of a Christian, seems also to have been the judgment of the authors of the confession of faith of the reformed churches in the Netherlands, Art. xxviii. where it is said, that it is the office or duty of all believers, to separate themselves according to the word of God, from those that are not of the church; and to join to this congregation, in what place soever God hath placed them, though the magistrates and edicts of princes were against it; and that death or any corporeal punishment was annexed to it.
It is true, there have been such among the Quakers, who were exceeding bold in representing to their enemies their evil behaviour and deportment; but this hath been a peculiar talent of pious men, of whom examples are extant in the book of martyrs, viz. that some of them in very plain terms told their persecutors of their wickedness. Very remarkable in that respect is the speech of John Molleus, who about the year 1653, being prisoner at Rome, without any dissimulation exposed to public view the wicked lives of the cardinals and bishops, who were ordered by the pope to examine him. The like boldness appears also in the letter of Hans van Ovendam, to the magistrates of Ghent in Flanders, as may be seen in the Mirror of Martyrs of the Baptists; from whence it appears, that the Quakers have not been the only people who have told their persecutors very boldly of their wicked deportment and cruelty.
It cannot be denied that there have been at times among this society some people of an odd behaviour, who in process of time embraced strange opinions and perverse notions; but that is no new thing, since this hath happened also among those of other persuasions, though none of these would allow that this was the consequence or effect of their doctrine. We find in Sacred Writ, that even in the primitive Christian church there were apostates; either such as maintained strange doctrine, as the Nicholatians; or such who finding the straight way too narrow for them, left it, and like Demas, falling in love again with the world, entered into the broad way. And therefore it can now, no more than then, be argued from thence, that the exorbitancies to which some launched out, were the effects of the doctrine they forsook.
Since in this history some predictions are also mentioned, and some biassed by prejudice will perhaps look upon them as frivolous, imagining that the Quakers pretend to have the spirit of prophecy; I will answer to this, that though among thousands of them there may have been one that prophetically foretold a thing, which afterwards truly, happened; yet others of that society presumed to have that gift no more than to have that of being a preacher; and are not called to that work. There must be antecessors and leaders in the religious economy, as well as in the politic state; for if every one not qualified should assume the office of governing, things would soon run into confusion. Now though some have had this false conceit, that to be able to predict future things was a quality the Quakers attributed to themselves; as proceeding from their doctrine, that Christians ought to be led by the Spirit of God; yet this is a very sinister and preposterous conceit; for what they say concerning the leading and guiding of the Spirit of God, is agreeable with the doctrine of the apostle, who saith, “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” And this was also the doctrine of the first reformers. What must we think then of those who will not be led by this spirit, but call this doctrine by the odious denomination of enthusiasm? The same apostle tells us also, “If any have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his.” And he saith also, “The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.” But from thence it doth in no wise follow that the spirit of prophecy is given to every one; neither that although it might please God to reveal to one a thing which yet was to come, such an one therefore was endued with such a prophetical spirit, that he was able at any time to predict future things.
If this position be true, then those of other persuasions might also lay claim to that prerogative; because among them sometimes there have been pious men who predicted remarkable things, which afterwards really happened; as among the rest, James Usher, archbishop of Armagh, and primate of Ireland, who foretold the rebellion in Ireland forty years before it came to pass; besides the intestine war and miseries that befel England, and other things that were fulfilled: which leads us not to reject as frivolous his prediction of the dreadful persecution that would fall upon all the Protestant churches by the Papists; for though one of his friends once objected to him, that since Great Britain and Ireland had already suffered so deeply, there was reason to hope that the judgments of God in respect of these kingdoms might have been past; yet he replied to it, ‘Fool not yourselves with such hopes, for I tell you all you have yet seen hath been but the beginning of sorrows, to what is yet to come upon the Protestant churches of Christ, who will ere long fall under a sharper persecution than ever yet hath been upon them. And therefore look you be not found in the outward court, but a worshipper in the temple before the altar: for Christ will measure all those that profess his name, and call themselves his people; and the outward worshippers he will leave out, to be trodden down by the Gentiles. The outward court is the formal Christian, whose religion lies in performing the outside duties of Christianity, without having an inward life and power of faith and love, uniting them to Christ: and these God will leave to be trodden down and swept away by the Gentiles. But the worshippers within the temple and before the altar, are those who indeed worship God in spirit and in truth: whose souls are made his temples, and he is honoured and adored in the most inward thoughts of their hearts; and they sacrifice their lusts and vile affections, yea, and their own wills to him; and these God will hide in the hollow of his hand,