ing to us, to trace out the result of these prin- course, rather than take the trouble of imparciples, as exhibited in the examples of those tial investigation, that it is not surprising the who have gone before us.-To inquire what terms enthusiasts, fanatics, Jesuits, and others fruits of holiness they produced in their con-of similar or more odious import, should have duct and conversation, what support they de- been freely bestowed on Friends, and credited rived from them, amid the trials inseparable by too many. Those who have not had the from mortal existence, and what consolation opportunity, or who have disliked the task of and hope they yielded in the hours of disease ascertaining their real belief, and whose imand of death. If, in the course of our re- pressions have been chiefly derived from carisearches, we discover that they were remark-catures, drawn by persons whose object and able for their justice, their integrity, their interest it is to place them in the wrong, could meekness and humility-were patient under scarcely fail to form opinions unfavourable to suffering, even when wrongfully inflicted; them as a body, however they might respect zealously devoted to the cause of Christ, and the piety and sincerity of individual members. cheerfully given up to spend their time and Nor would it be surprising if the frequent and substance for its advancement; "blameless confident reiteration of grave, though unjust, and harmless, in the midst of a crooked and charges, should have the effect to awaken perverse generation, amongst whom they shone doubts even in the minds of the uninformed as lights in the world," we may be assured members themselves; to lessen their esteem that the tree whence these fruits of the Gos- for those devoted Christians, who were the inpel sprung could not be evil. The faith which struments, divinely fitted and made use of, in showed itself by such works of righteousness founding the Society; and to induce the apmust be that by which the saints of old "ob-prehension that the way, and the people, thus tained a good report," and which was their "everywhere spoken against," must indeed victory. If we follow them to the chamber have little claims to Christianity. of sickness and to the bed of death, witness the tranquility and composure of their spirits; their humble, yet steadfast, reliance on the mercy of God, through Christ Jesus; their peace and joy in believing; and their hope full of immortality and eternal life, we shall not only derive the strongest evidence of the soundness of their Christian belief, but, in admiration of its blessed and happy effects, be incited to follow them, as they followed Christ. Differing, as Friends do, in some points, from their fellow-professors of the Christian name, construing the requisitions of the Gospel with especial reference to the spiritual nature of true religion, and its non-conformity to the fashion of "the world which lieth in Happily for the Society, it has nothing to wickedness," their peculiarities in doctrine, fear from investigation conducted in the spirit manners, and phraseology, have, ever since of candor and fairness. The various accusatheir first rise, subjected them to greater or tions against it, have been fearlessly met and less degrees of misrepresentation and obloquy. refuted; and, of those who may entertain For, although they have uniformly appealed doubts respecting the soundness of its faith, it to the Holy Scriptures, as the standard and asks a calm and dispassionate attention to its test of all their doctrines and practices, freely authorized vindications, and to its official derejecting whatever should be proved to be in-clarations of faith. Whatever ambiguity may consistent with their Divine Testimony, yet, hang over the essays of some of its writers, either through ignorance, or prejudice, or the arising either from the heat of controversy, force of sectarian attachments, their repeated the redundant and loose phraseology of the declarations have been disregarded or pervert- times, or from unduly pressing an argument, ed, in order to represent them as slighting in order to discredit the premises of an antagthose Sacred Writings, and their principles as scarcely deserving the name of Christian.

It may not be inappropriate to remind the reader, that the Son of God himself was "set for a sign that should be spoken against ;" and such has been the lot of his Church, from the earliest periods of its existence. Had the propagation of the Gospel in the days of the apostles depended on the estimation in which they were held by the wise, the learned, and powerful of this world, or on the report which they gave of its character and design, it must have made little progress; but there were many others beside the Bereans, who were more noble than to be influenced by such means, and who searched for themselves "whether these things were so."

onist, by exposing the consequences deducible from them; the declarations of faith and the It is often more easy to disparage the char- official acts of the Society, prove conclusively, acter of an opponent, by loading him with that on the points where they have been most opprobrious epithets, than to refute his posi- questioned, their views are clear and Scriptions by sound and solid arguments; and tural. The records of the Society also show mankind are generally so prone to adopt this a long list of worthies, whose dying hours and

sayings bear ample testimony that the princi- He who finds that he has little relish for seriples in which they had lived, and by which ous things, and that it is difficult to fix his they endeavoured to regulate their actions, attention upon them, may safely infer that his did not fail them in the near prospect of death and eternity; but administered all that support, consolation, and animating hope, which give to the death-bed of the Christian its peculiar interest.

MEMOIR

OF THE

LIFE OF
OF GEORGE FOX.

It would seem improper to enter on the publication of other works, until some notice had been taken of GEORGE Fox, the founder of the Society. As his Journal has recently been stereotyped, and an edition of it circulated, the Editors thought it not necessary to reprint it, at present. They have therefore prepared a short memoir of this eminent man, for the purpose of bringing into view his remarkable life and character, and exhibiting, succinctly, the rise of the Society, its principles and discipline.

very young, he refused to join in vain and childish sports, or to mingle in the company of rude or irreligious persons; and when he saw any behaving themselves lightly, it excited sorrow, and occasioned him to say within himself, "If ever I come to be a man, surely

GEORGE FOX was born in the month called | watchful and tender over him; endeavouring July, old style, now the fifth month, in the to cherish his religious impressions and to year 1624, at Drayton in the Clay, Leicester- strengthen him in good resolutions. When shire, England, which appears to be the same as is now called Fenny Drayton.* His parents were Christopher and Mary Fox, who, though in humble circumstances, were highly esteemed by their neighbours for piety and uprightness. His father was a weaver, and was called Righteous Christer, in consequence I shall not do so; nor be so wanton." of the strictness and sobriety of his life. Both "While I was a child," says he, "I was he and his wife endeavoured to bring up their taught how to walk so as to be kept pure. children in an exemplary manner, according The Lord taught me to be faithful in all to the religion of the Episcopal Church, to things; to act faithfully two ways, viz., inwhich they belonged. But it suited neither wardly to God, and outwardly to man, and to their circumstances nor situation in life, to keep to yea and nay in all things. For the give their children much learning, and George Lord showed me, though the people of the enjoyed no other literary advantages than world have mouths full of deceit and changethose of a plain English education. From a able words, that I was to keep to yea and nay child he was of a religious and observing turn in all things; that my words should be few of mind; and such were the gravity and inno- and savoury, seasoned with grace, and that I cency of his spirit, that his relations were de- might not eat and drink to make myself wansirous he should be educated for the ministry.ton, but for health, using the creatures in their His mother taking notice of his serious tem- service, as servants in their places, to the glory per, and of his piety and stability, was very of Him that created them.'

Some of his relations objecting to his being *This sketch of the life of George Fox is chiefly made a priest, he was apprenticed to a shoecompiled from his Journal, of which, Sir James Macintosh says, it is "one of the most extraordi- maker, who also dealt in wool. George's nary and instructive narratives in the world-business was principally in the fields, tending which no reader of competent judgment can pe- the flocks of sheep, an employment well suited ruse without revering the virtue of the writer." to his retiring and contemplative disposition,