XVI in every age; and the French revolution was a result CHAP of the same principles as those of George Fox, gaining dominion over the mind of Europe. They are expressed in the burning and often profound eloquence of Rousseau; they reappear in the masculine philosophy of Kant. The professor of Konigsberg, like Fox, and Barclay, and Penn, derived philosophy from the voice in the soul; like them, he made the oracle within the categorical rule of practical morality, the motive to disinterested virtue; like them, he esteemed the Inner Light, which discerns universal and necessary truths, an element of humanity; and therefore his philosophy claims for humanity the right of ever-renewed progress and reform. If the Quakers disguised their doctrine under the form of theology, Kant concealed it for a season under the jargon of a nervous but unusual dic tion. But Schiller has reproduced the great idea in beautiful verse; Chateaubriand avows himself its advocate; Coleridge has repeated the doctrine in misty language. It beams through the poetry of Lamartine1 and Wordsworth; while, in the country of beautiful prose, the eloquent Cousin, listening to the same eternal voice which connects humanity with universal reason, has gained a wide fame for "the divine principle," and, in explaining the harmony between that light and the light of Christianity, has often uncon 2 Raison, for the Inner Light. And XVI. CHAP. Sciously borrowed the language' and employed the arguments of Barclay and of Penn. Every where in Europe the Quakers were exposed to persecution. Their seriousness was called melancholy enthusiasm; their boldness, self-will; their frugality, covetousness; their freedom, infidelity; their conscience, rebellion. In England, the general laws against dissenters, the statute against Papists, and special statutes against themselves, put them at the mercy of every malignant informer. They were hated by the church and the Presbyterians, by the peers and the king. The codes of that day describe them as "an abominable sect;" "their principles as inconsistent with any kind of government." During the Long Parliament, in the time of the protectorate, at the restoration, in England, in New England, in the Dutch colony of New Netherlands, every where, and for long, wearisome years, they were exposed to perpetual dangers and griefs. They were whipped, crowded into jail among felons, kept in dungeons foul and gloomy beyond imagination; fined, exiled, sold into colonial bondage. They bore the brunt of the persecution of the dissenters. Imprisoned in winter without fire, Sewel, they perished from frost. Some were victims to the barbarous cruelty of the jailer; twice George Fox 534. 1 «La vérité absolue est donc une révélation même de Dieu à l'homme par Dieu lui-même; et comme la vérité absolue est perpétuellement aperçue par l'homme et éclaire tout homme à son entrée dans la vie, il suit que la vérité absolue est une révélation perpétuelle et universelle de Dieu à l'homme." Cousin, Fragmens Phil. 2de ed. p. 310, 311. Now Barclay. "The object of the saints' faith is the same in all ages." "The testimony of the Spirit is that alone by which the true knowledge of God hath been, is, and can be only revealed." "This divine revelation forces assent." "It enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world." Barclay, Prop. ii. and v "There is no true knowledge of God, but that which is revealed inwardly by his own Spirit." Barclay, p. 20. On this point I can see no difference between Cousin and the Quakers. I have already quoted Penn's assertion of their agreement with Plotinus and Plato. XVI. 483, 484, $56. narrowly escaped death. The despised people braved CHAP. every danger to continue their assemblies. Haled out by violence, they returned. When their meeting-houses Br were torn down, they gathered openly on the ruins. They could not be dissolved by armed men; and when their opposers took shovels to throw rubbish on them, they stood close together, "willing to have been buried alive, witnessing for the Lord." They were exceeding great sufferers for their profession, and in some cases treated worse than the worst of the race. They were as poor sheep appointed to the slaughter, and as a people killed all day long. Fox, Pref. vii. 10 Mar. Is it strange that they looked beyond the Atlantic 1674. for a refuge? When New Netherlands was recovered from the United Provinces, Berkeley and Carteret entered again into possession of their province. For Berkeley, already a very old man, the visions of colonial fortune had not been realized; there was nothing before him but contests for quitrents with settlers resolved on governing themselves; and in March, 1674, a few 1674. months after the return of George Fox from his pil- 18. grimage to all our colonies from Carolina to Rhode Island, the haughty peer, for a thousand pounds, sold the moiety of New Jersey to Quakers, to John Fenwick in trust for Edward Byllinge and his assigns. A dispute between Byllinge and Fenwick was allayed by the benevolent decision of William Penn; and in 1675, 1675 Fenwick, with a large company and several families, set sail in the Griffith for the asylum of Friends. Ascending the Delaware, he landed on a pleasant, fertile spot, and as the outward world easily takes the hues of men's minds, he called the place Salem, for it seemed the dwelling-place of peace. Byllinge was embarrassed in his fortunes; Gawen XVI: CHAP. Laurie, William Penn, and Nicholas Lucas, became his assigns as trustees for his creditors, and shares in the undivided moiety of New Jersey were offered for sale. As an affair of property, it was like our land companies of to-day; except that in those days speculators bought acres by the hundred thousand. But the Quakers wished more; they desired to possess a territory where they could institute a government; and Carteret readily agreed to a division, for his partners left him the best 1676. of the bargain. And now that the men who had 26. about to turn the world upside down, were possessed Aug. gone of a province, what system of politics would they adopt? The light, that lighteth every man, shone brightly in the Pilgrims of Plymouth, the Calvinists of Hooker and Haynes, and in the freemen of Virginia, when the transient abolition of monarchy compelled even royalists to look from the throne to a surer guide in the heart; the Quakers, following the same exalted instincts, could but renew the fundamental legislation of the men of the Mayflower, of Hartford, and of the Old Dominion. "The CONCESSIONS are such as Friends approve of;" this is the message of the Quaker proprietaries in England to the few who had emigrated: "We lay a foundation for after ages to understand their liberty as Christians and as men, that they may not be brought into bondage, but by their own consent; for we put THE POWER IN THE 1677. PEOPLE." And on the third day of March, 1677, the 3. charter, or fundamental laws, of West New Jersey Mar. were perfected and published. They are written with almost as much method as our present constitutions, and recognize the principle of democratic equality as unconditionally and universally as the Quaker society itself. XVI. Smith, 528-539 81. No man, nor number of men, hath power over con- CHAP. science. No person shall at any time, in any ways, or on any pretence, be called in question, or in the least 1677. punished or hurt for opinion in religion.-The general assembly shall be chosen, not by the confused way of cries and voices, but by the balloting box.-Every man is capable to choose or be chosen.-The electors shall give their respective deputies instructions at large, which these, in their turn, by indentures under hand and seal, shall bind themselves to obey. The disobedient deputy may be questioned before the assembly by any one of his electors. Each member is to be allowed one shilling a day, to be paid by his immediate constituents, "that he may be known as the servant of the people."-The executive power rested with ten commissioners, to be appointed by the assembly; justices and constables were chosen directly by the people; the judges, appointed by the general assembly, retained office but two years at the most, and sat in the courts but as assistants to the jury. In the twelve men, and in them only, judgment resides; in them and in the general assembly rests discretion as to punishments. "All and every person in the province, shall, by the help of the Lord and these fundamentals, be free from oppression and slavery." No man can be imprisoned for debt. Courts were to be managed without the necessity of an attorney or counsellor. The native was protected against encroachments; the helpless orphan educated by the state. Immediately the English Quakers, with the good wishes of Charles II., flocked to West New Jersey, and commissioners, possessing a temporary authority, were sent to administer affairs, till a popular government could be instituted. When the vessel, freighted with |