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Shattered Expectations? George Fox, the Quakers, and the Restoration State, 1660-1685*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

Richard L. Greaves
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Extract

The prevailing view of Quakers in the Restoration era depicts them as a defeated movement no longer on the attack but henceforth under siege. They institutionalized, in the words of Richard Bauman, a strategy “of disengagement from the world's affairs” and embraced “a social policy founded on quietism.” Defeated politically, they were forced, according to this view, to relinquish their efforts to advance the cause of liberty “by militant, political means.” Thus the adoption of the peace principle as a hallmark of the Society of Friends emerged, according to Barry Reay, as a response to political defeat and as a stratagem for survival. This interpretation of Restoration Quakerism is similar in many respects to the stereotypical depiction of the Friends in terms of withdrawal and quiescence. I would like to suggest some modifications in this view by reexamining Quaker expectations at the Restoration, the Friends' involvement in political and legal matters, and the emergence and enforcement of the peace principle. The dominant characteristics of Restoration Quakerism are not withdrawal and quiescence but engagement and vigor.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 24 , Issue 2 , Summer 1992 , pp. 237 - 259
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1992

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Footnotes

*

A slightly modified version of this paper was presented as a plenary address to the George Fox tercentenary conference at the University of Lancaster, April 1991. I am grateful to J. William Frost, Michael Mullett, Ted Underwood, and Robert Zaller for their suggestions.

References

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26 CRO, MSS EFC 1/1/1 (entry for 3 June 1684); Dorset Record Office, MSS NQ1/A19, fols. 9v-10r.

27 SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/4, fol. 3r. Cook erroneously cited the 29th clause of Magna Carta, but intended the 39th, which stipulated that no free man should be imprisoned, disseised, or exiled except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

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42 LF, Spence MSS, vol. 3, nos. 118-19; SRO, MSS DD/SFR 8/2, p. 72; LF, Barclay MSS, 2: 165.

43 CRO, MSS EFC 1/1/1 (entries for 1 March 1679; 2 March, 1 June, 7 Sept. 1686; 13 March, 12 June, 11 Sept. 1688); EFC 2/1/1 (entry for 2 Jan. 1678); EFC 4/1/1 (entries for 3 Nov. 1680; 2 Feb., 5 April, 5 July, 3 Aug. 1681; 3 Jan., 7 Feb., 2 May, 6 June, 4 July, 5 Sept. 1682; 1 Feb., 11 March, 1 April 1684); EFC 5/1/1 (entry for 8 Oct. 1679); EFC 5/2/1 (undated entry, c. 1679).

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49 Fell, Margaret, A Declaration, p. 7Google Scholar. Brock too underscores the emergence of the peace principle prior to the declaration of 1661 but does not link its widespread adoption among Friends to their disillusionment with the interregnum regimes (Quaker Peace Testimony, pp. 22-25).

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63 Kingdomes Intelligencer 50 (8-15 December 1662), pp. 804–06Google Scholar; Greaves, , Deliver Us from Evil, pp. 177-78, 180-81, 190, 200–01Google Scholar; PRO, SP 29/84/28.

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74 Greaves, , Enemies Under His Feet, pp. 136-37, 156Google Scholar.

75 CRO, MSS EFC 1/1/1 (entry for 5 June 1683); EFC 4/1/1 (entries for 3 and 12 June, 7 Aug. 1683); PRO, SP 29/428/60, p. 97; 29/430/111, pp. 29, 33, 53; 29/431/15, 30.

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77 Whiting, , Persecution, p. 32Google Scholar.

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79 BL, Lansdowne MSS 1152, fol. 243v.

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81 SRO, MSS DD/SFR(w) 1, p. 95; SRO, DD/SFR 10/2, fol. 48r–v; LF, Meeting for Sufferings Minutes 1684–85, pp. 87, 90, 96, 98; Whiting, , Persecution, pp. 141–43Google Scholar. One of the ships used by the defeated rebels to escape to the Netherlands was apparently provided by a Quaker (BL, Add. MSS 41,812, fol. 171v).

82 LF, Meeting for Sufferings Minutes 1684-85, pp. 96-97, 103, 113, 138, 173, 196.

83 Reay has identified only twelve Quakers who supported Monmouth; The Quakers, p. 110. Wokey, Bishop, Paul, and Bryant were clearly not active Friends.

84 LF, Meeting for Sufferings Minutes 1684-85, pp. 121-22, 125; cf. pp. 84, 87, 90, 93, 96-97, 100-01, 110-12, 116, 120, 123-24, 128, 131, 134, 143, 154A, 164, 185, 206, 260; SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/2, fols. 57r–57Av.

85 SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/2, fol. 48r–v. Cf. LF, Dix MSS H2S; Meeting for Sufferings Minutes 1684-85, p. 139; Whiting, , Persecution, pp. 157–58Google Scholar.

86 SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/2, fol. 49r.

87 SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/2, fols. 49r, 50v; LF, Dix MSS H2S. Efforts were also made to secure the repentance of Francis Scott and John Hellier. SRO, MSS DD/SFR(w) 1, p. 95.

88 SRO, MSS DD/SFR 10/2, fol. 69r.