Chapter VII: Part 7

Not only George and Alexander Parker, who were with him, but divers of the ancient Friends of that country, endeavoured to quiet that troublesome man and make him sensible of his error, but his unruly spirit would still be opposing what was said unto him and justifying himself in that practice. This brought a great weight and exercise upon me, who sat at a distance in the outward part of the meeting, and after I had for some time bore the burden thereof, I stood up in the constraining power of the Lord, and in great tenderness of spirit declared unto the meeting, and to that person more particularly, how it had been with me in that respect, how I had been betrayed into that wrong practice, how strong I had been therein, and how the Lord had been graciously pleased to show me the evil thereof, and recover me out of it.

This coming unexpectedly from me, a young man, a stranger, and one who had not intermeddled with the business of the meeting, had that effect upon the caviller, that if it did not satisfy him, it did at least silence him, and made him for the present sink down and be still, without giving any further disturbance to the meeting. And the Friends were well pleased with this unlooked-for testimony from me, and I was glad that I had that opportunity to confess to the truth, and to acknowledge once more, in so public a manner, the mercy and goodness of the Lord to me therein.

By the time we came back from this journey the summer was pretty far gone, and the following winter I spent with the children of the family as before, without any remarkable alteration in my circumstances, until the next spring, when I found in myself a disposition of mind to change my single life for a married state.

I had always entertained so high a regard for marriage, as it was a divine institution, that I held it not lawful to make it a sort of political trade, to rise in the world by. And therefore as I could not but in my judgment blame such as I found made it their business to hunt after and endeavour to gain those who were accounted great fortunes, not so much regarding what she is as what she has, but making wealth the chief if not the only thing they aimed at; so I resolved to avoid, in my own practice, that course, and how much soever my condition might have prompted me, as well as others, to seek advantage that way, never to engage on account of riches, nor at all to marry till judicious affection drew me to it, which I now began to feel at work in my breast.

The object of this affection was a Friend whose name was Mary Ellis, whom for divers years I had had an acquaintance with, in the way of common friendship only, and in whom I thought I then saw those fair prints of truth and solid virtue which I afterwards found in a sublime degree in her; but what her condition in the world was as to estate, I was wholly a stranger to, nor desired to know.

I had once, a year or two before, had an opportunity to do her a small piece of service, which she wanted some assistance in, wherein I acted with all sincerity and freedom of mind, not expecting or desiring any advantage by her, or reward from her, being very well satisfied in the act itself that I had served a Friend and helped the helpless.

That little intercourse of common kindness between us ended without the least thought I am verily persuaded on her part, well assured on my own, of any other or further relation than that of free and fair friendship, nor did it at that time lead us into any closer conversation or more intimate acquaintance one with the other than had been before.

But some time, and that a good while after, I found my heart secretly drawn and inclining towards her, yet was I not hasty in proposing, but waited to feel a satisfactory settlement of mind therein, before I made any step thereto.

After some time I took an opportunity to open my mind therein unto my much-honoured friends Isaac and Mary Penington, who then stood _parentum loco_ (in the place or stead of parents) to me. They having solemnly weighed the matter, expressed their unity therewith; and indeed their approbation thereof was no small confirmation to me therein. Yet took I further deliberation, often retiring in spirit to the Lord, and crying to Him for direction, before I addressed myself to her. At length, as I was sitting all alone, waiting upon the Lord for counsel and guidance in this—in itself and to me—so important affair, I felt a word sweetly arise in me, as if I had heard a voice which said, “Go, and prevail.” And faith springing in my heart with the word, I immediately arose and went, nothing doubting.

When I was come to her lodgings, which were about a mile from me, her maid told me she was in her chamber, for having been under some indisposition of body, which had obliged her to keep her chamber, she had not yet left it; wherefore I desired the maid to acquaint her mistress that I was come to give her a visit, whereupon I was invited to go up to her. And after some little time spent in common conversation, feeling my spirit weightily concerned, I solemnly opened my mind unto her with respect to the particular business I came about, which I soon perceived was a great surprise to her, for she had taken in an apprehension, as others also had done, that mine eye had been fixed elsewhere and nearer home.

I used not many words to her, but I felt a divine power went along with the words, and fixed the matter expressed by them so fast in her breast, that, as she afterwards acknowledged to me, she could not shut it out.

I made at that time but a short visit, for having told her I did not expect an answer from her now, but desired she would in the most solemn manner weigh the proposal made, and in due time give me such an answer thereunto as the Lord should give her, I took my leave of her and departed, leaving the issue to the Lord.

I had a journey then at hand, which I foresaw would take me up two weeks’ time. Wherefore, the day before I was to set out I went to visit her again, to acquaint her with my journey, and excuse my absence, not yet pressing her for an answer, but assuring her that I felt in myself an increase of affection to her, and hoped to receive a suitable return from her in the Lord’s time, to whom in the meantime I committed both her, myself, and the concern between us. And indeed I found at my return that I could not have left it in better hands; for the Lord had been my advocate in my absence, and had so far answered all her objections that when I came to her again she rather acquainted me with them than urged them.

From that time forward we entertained each other with affectionate kindness in order to marriage, which yet we did not hasten to, but went on deliberately. Neither did I use those vulgar ways of courtship, by making frequent and rich presents, not only for that my outward condition would not comport with the expense, but because I liked not to obtain by such means, but preferred an unbribed affection.

While this affair stood thus with me, I had occasion to take another journey into Kent and Sussex, which yet I would not mention here, but for a particular accident which befell me on the way.

The occasion of this journey was this. Mary Penington’s daughter Guli, intending to go to her Uncle Springett’s, in Sussex, and from thence amongst her tenants, her mother desired me to accompany her, and assist her in her business with her tenants.

We tarried at London the first night, and set out next morning on the Tunbridge road, and Seven Oaks lying in our way we put in there to bait; but truly we had much ado to get either provisions or room for ourselves or our horses, the house was so filled with guests, and those not of the better sort. For the Duke of York being, as we were told, on the road that day for the Wells, divers of his guards and the meaner sort of his retinue had near filled all the inns there.

I left John Gigger, who waited on Guli in this journey and was afterwards her menial servant, to take care of the horses, while I did the like as well as I could for her. I got a little room to put her into, and having shut her into it, went to see what relief the kitchen would afford us, and with much ado, by praying hard and paying dear, I got a small joint of meat from the spit, which served rather to stay than satisfy our stomachs, for we were all pretty sharp set.

After this short repast, being weary of our quarters, we quickly mounted and took the road again, willing to hasten from a place where we found nothing but rudeness; a knot of [rude people] soon followed us, designing, as we afterwards found, to put an abuse upon us, and make themselves sport with us. We had a spot of fine smooth sandy way, whereon the horses trod so softly that we heard them not till one of them was upon us. I was then riding abreast with Guli, and discoursing with her, when on a sudden hearing a little noise, and turning mine eye that way, I saw a horseman coming up on the further side of her horse, having his left arm stretched out, just ready to take her about the waist and pluck her off backwards from her own horse to lay her before him upon his. I had but just time to thrust forth my stick between him and her, and bid him stand off, and at the same time reining my horse to let hers go before me, thrust in between her and him, and being better mounted than he my horse ran him off. But his horse being, though weaker than mine, yet nimble, he slipped by me and got up to her on the near side, endeavouring to offer abuse to her, to prevent which I thrust in upon him again, and in our jostling we drove her horse quite out of the way and almost into the next hedge.

While we were thus contending I heard a noise of loud laughter behind us, and turning my head that way I saw three or four horsemen more, who could scarce sit their horses for laughing to see the sport their companion made with us. From thence I saw it was a plot laid, and that this rude fellow was not to be dallied with; wherefore I bestirred myself the more to keep him off, admonishing him to take warning in time and give over his abusiveness, lest he repented too late. He had in his hand a short thick truncheon, which he held up at me, on which laying hold with a strong grip, I suddenly wrenched it out of his hand, and threw it at as far a distance behind me as I could.

While he rode back to fetch his truncheon, I called up honest John Gigger, who was indeed a right honest man, and of a temper so thoroughly peaceable that he had not hitherto put in at all; but now I roused him, and bade him ride so close up to his mistress’s horse on the further side that no horse might thrust in between, and I would endeavour to guard the near side. But he, good man, not thinking it perhaps decent enough for him to ride so near his mistress, left room enough for another to ride between. And indeed so soon as our brute had recovered his truncheon, he came up directly thither, and had thrust in again, had not I, by a nimble turn, chopped in upon him, and kept him at bay.

I then told him I had hitherto spared him, but wished him not to provoke me further. This I spoke with such a tone as bespoke a high resentment of the abuse put upon us, and withal pressed so close upon him with my horse that I suffered him not to come up any more to Guli.

This his companions, who kept an equal distance behind us, both heard and saw, and thereupon two of them advancing, came up to us. I then thought I might likely have my hands full, but Providence turned it otherwise; for they, seeing the contest rise so high, and probably fearing it would rise higher, not knowing where it might stop, came in to part us, which they did by taking him away, one of them leading his horse by the bridle, and the other driving him on with his whip, and so carried him off.

One of their company stayed yet behind; and it so happening that a great shower just then fell, we betook ourselves for shelter to a thick and well-spread oak which stood hard by. Thither also came that other person, who wore the Duke’s livery, and while we put on our defensive garments against the weather, which then set in to be wet, he took the opportunity to discourse with me about the man that had been so rude to us, endeavouring to excuse him by alleging that he had drank a little too liberally. I let him know that one vice would not excuse another; that although but one of them was actually concerned in the abuse, yet both he and the rest of them were abettors of it and accessories to it; that I was not ignorant whose livery they wore, and was well assured their lord would not maintain them in committing such outrages upon travellers on the road, to our injury and his dishonour; that I understood the Duke was coming down, and that they might expect to be called to an account for this rude action.

He then begged hard that we would pass by the offence, and make no complaint to their lord; for, he knew, he said, the Duke would be very severe, and it would be the utter ruin of the young man. When he had said what he could, he went off before us, without any ground given him to expect favour; and when we had fitted ourselves for the weather we followed after our own pace.

When we came to Tunbridge I set John Gigger foremost, bidding him lead on briskly through the town, and placing Guli in the middle, I came close up after her that I might both observe and interpose if any fresh abuse should have been offered her. We were expected, I perceived, for though it rained very hard, the street was thronged with men, who looked very earnestly on us, but did not put any affront upon us.

We had a good way to ride beyond Tunbridge and beyond the Wells, in byeways among the woods, and were the later for the hindrance we had had on the way. And when, being come to Harbert Springett’s house, Guli acquainted her uncle what danger and trouble she had gone through on the way, he resented it so high that he would have had the persons prosecuted for it; but since Providence had interposed, and so well preserved and delivered her, she chose to pass by the offence.

When Guli had finished the business she went upon, we returned home, and I delivered her safe to her glad mother. From that time forward I continued my visits to my best beloved Friend until we married, which was on the 28th day of the eighth month, called October, in the year 1669. We took each other in a select meeting of the ancient and grave Friends of that country, holden in a Friend’s house, where in those times not only the monthly meeting for business but the public meeting for worship was sometimes kept. A very solemn meeting it was, and in a weighty frame of spirit we were, in which we sensibly felt the Lord with us, and joining us; the sense whereof remained with us all our lifetime, and was of good service and very comfortable to us on all occasions.

My next care after marriage was to secure my wife what moneys she had, and with herself bestowed upon me; for I held it would be an abominable crime in me, and savour of the highest ingratitude, if I, though but through negligence, should leave room for my father, in case I should be taken away suddenly, to break in upon her estate, and deprive her of any part of that which had been and ought to be her own. Wherefore with the first opportunity—as I remember, the very next day, and before I knew particularly what she had—I made my will, and thereby secured to her whatever I was possessed of as well all that which she brought, either in moneys or in goods, as that little which I had before I married her; which indeed was but little, yet more by all that little than I had ever given her ground to expect with me.

She had indeed been advised by some of her relations to secure before marriage some part at least of what she had, to be at her own disposal; which, though perhaps not wholly free from some tincture of self-interest in the proposer, was not in itself the worst of counsel. But the worthiness of her mind, and the sense of the ground on which she received me, would not suffer her to entertain any suspicion of me; and this laid on me the greater obligation, in point of gratitude as well as of justice, to regard and secure her; which I did.

I had not been long married before I was solicited by my dear friends Isaac and Mary Penington, and her daughter Guli, to take a journey into Kent and Sussex to account with their tenants and overlook their estates in those counties, which before I was married I had had the care of; and accordingly the journey I undertook, though in the depth of winter.

My travels into those parts were the more irksome to me from the solitariness I underwent, and want of suitable society. For my business lying among the tenants, who were a rustic sort of people of various persuasions and humours, but not Friends, I had little opportunity of conversing with Friends, though I contrived to be with them as much as I could, especially on the first day of the week.

But that which made my present journey more heavy to me was a sorrowful exercise which was newly fallen upon me from my father.

He had, upon my first acquainting him with my inclination to marry, and to whom, not only very much approved the match, and voluntarily offered, without my either asking or expecting, to give me a handsome portion at present, with assurance of an addition to it hereafter. And he not only made this offer to me in private, but came down from London into the country on purpose, to be better acquainted with my friend, and did there make the same proposal to her; offering also to give security to any friend or relation of hers for the performance. Which offer she most generously declined, leaving him as free as she found him. But after we were married, notwithstanding such his promise, he wholly declined the performance of it, under pretence of our not being married by the priest and liturgy. This usage and evil treatment of us thereupon was a great trouble to me; and when I endeavoured to soften him in the matter, he forbade my speaking to him of it any more, and removed his lodging that I might not find him.

The grief I conceived on this occasion was not for any disappointment to myself or to my wife, for neither she nor I had any strict or necessary dependence upon that promise; but my grief was for the cause assigned by him as the ground of it, which was that our marriage was not by priest or liturgy.

And surely hard would it have been for my spirit to have borne up under the weight of this exercise, had not the Lord been exceeding gracious to me, and supported me with the inflowings of his love and life, wherewith he visited my soul in my travail. The sense whereof raised in my heart a thankful remembrance of his manifold kindnesses in his former dealings with me; and in the evening, when I came to my inn, while supper was getting ready, I took my pen and put into words what had in the day revolved in my thoughts. And thus it was

A SONG OF PRAISE.

Thy love, dear Father, and thy tender care,
Have in my heart begot a strong desire
To celebrate Thy Name with praises rare,
That others too Thy goodness may admire,
And learn to yield to what Thou dost require.
Many have been the trials of my mind,
My exercises great, great my distress;
Full oft my ruin hath my foe designed,
My sorrows then my pen cannot express,
Nor could the best of men afford redress.
When thus beset to Thee I lift mine eye,
And with a mournful heart my moan did make;
How oft with eyes o’erflowing did I cry,
“My God, my God, oh do me not forsake!
Regard my tears! Some pity on me take!”
And to the glory of Thy holy name,
Eternal God, whom I both love and fear,
I hereby do declare I never came
Before Thy throne, and found Thee loth to hear,
But always ready, with an open ear.
And though sometimes Thou seem’st Thy face to hide,
As one that had withdrawn Thy love from me,
’Tis that my faith may to the full be tried,
And that I thereby may the better see
How weak I am when not upheld by Thee.
For underneath Thy holy arm I feel,
Encompassing with strength as with a wall,
That, if the enemy trip up my heel,
Thou ready art to save me from a fall:
To Thee belong thanksgivings over all.
And for Thy tender love, my God, my King,
My heart shall magnify Thee all my days,
My tongue of Thy renown shall daily sing,
My pen shall also grateful trophies raise,
As monuments to Thy eternal praise.

T. E.

KENT, _the Eleventh Month_, 1669.

Having finished my business in Kent, I struck off into Sussex, and finding the enemy endeavouring still more strongly to beset me, I betook myself to the Lord for safety, in whom I knew all help and strength was, and thus poured forth my supplication, directed

TO THE HOLY ONE.

Eternal God! preserver of all those
(Without respect of person or degree)
Who in Thy faithfulness their trust repose,
And place their confidence alone in Thee;
Be Thou my succour; for Thou know’st that I
On Thy protection, Lord, alone rely.
Surround me, Father, with Thy mighty power,
Support me daily by Thine holy arm,
Preserve me faithful in the evil hour,
Stretch forth Thine hand to save me from all harm.
Be Thou my helmet, breast-plate, sword, and shield,
And make my foes before Thy power yield.
Teach me the spiritual battle so to fight,
That when the enemy shall me beset,
Armed cap-a-pie with the armour of Thy light,
A perfect conquest o’er him I may get;
And with Thy battle-axe may cleave the head
Of him who bites that part whereon I tread.
Then being from domestic foes set free,
The cruelties of men I shall not fear;
But in Thy quarrel, Lord, undaunted be,
And for Thy sake the loss of all things bear;
Yea, though in dungeon locked, with joy will sing
An ode of praise to Thee, my God, my King.

T. E.

SUSSEX, _the Eleventh Month_, 1669.

As soon as I had dispatched the business I went about, I returned home without delay, and to my great comfort found my wife well, and myself very welcome to her; both which I esteemed as great favours.

Towards the latter part of the summer following I went into Kent again, and in my passage through London received the unwelcome news of the loss of a very hopeful youth who had formerly been under my care for education. It was Isaac Penington, the second son of my worthy friends Isaac and Mary Penington, a child of excellent natural parts, whose great abilities bespoke him likely to be a great man, had he lived to be a man. He was designed to be bred a merchant, and before he was thought ripe enough to be entered thereunto, his parents, at somebody’s request, gave leave that he might go a voyage to Barbadoes, only to spend a little time, see the place, and be somewhat acquainted with the sea, under the care and conduct of a choice friend and sailor, John Grove, of London, who was master of a vessel, and traded to that island; and a little venture he had with him, made up by divers of his friends and by me among the rest. He made the voyage thither very well, found the watery element agreeable, had his health there, liked the place, was much pleased with his entertainment there, and was returning home with his little cargo, in return for the goods he carried out, when on a sudden, through unwariness, he dropped overboard, and, the vessel being under sail with a brisk gale, was irrecoverably lost, notwithstanding the utmost labour, care, and diligence of the master and sailors to have saved him.

This unhappy accident took from the afflicted master all the pleasure of his voyage, and he mourned for the loss of this youth as if it had been his own, yea only, son; for as he was in himself a man of a worthy mind, so the boy, by his witty and handsome behaviour in general, and obsequious carriage towards him in particular, had very much wrought himself into his favour.

As for me, I thought it one of the sharpest strokes I had met with, for I both loved the child very well and had conceived great hopes of general good from him; and it pierced me the deeper to think how deeply it would pierce his afflicted parents.

Sorrow for this disaster was my companion in this journey, and I travelled the roads under great exercise of mind, revolving in my thoughts the manifold accidents which the life of man was attended with and subject to, and the great uncertainty of all human things; I could find no centre, no firm basis, for the mind of man to fix upon but the divine power and will of the Almighty. This consideration wrought in my spirit a sort of contempt of what supposed happiness or pleasure this world, or the things that are in and of it, can of themselves yield, and raised my contemplation higher; which, as it ripened and came to some degree of digestion, I breathed forth in mournful accents thus:—

SOLITARY THOUGHTS ON THE UNCERTAINTY OF HUMAN THINGS.

OCCASIONED BY THE SUDDEN LOSS OF A HOPEFUL YOUTH.

_Transibunt cito_, _quæ vos mansura putatis_.

Those things soon will pass away
Which ye think will always stay.

What ground, alas! has any man
To set his heart on things below,
Which, when they seem most like to stand,
Fly like an arrow from a bow?
Things subject to exterior sense
Are to mutation most propense.
If stately houses we erect,
And therein think to take delight,
On what a sudden are we checked,
And all our hopes made groundless quite!
One little spark in ashes lays
What we were building half our days.
If on estate an eye we cast,
And pleasure there expect to find,
A secret providential blast
Gives disappointment to our mind:
Who now’s on top ere long may feel
The circling motion of the wheel.
If we our tender babes embrace,
And comfort hope in them to have,
Alas! in what a little space
Is hope, with them, laid in the grave!
Whatever promiseth content
Is in a moment from us rent.
This world cannot afford a thing
Which, to a well-composed mind,
Can any lasting pleasure bring,
But in its womb its grave will find.
All things unto their centre tend;
What had {230} beginning will have end.
But is there nothing then that’s sure
For man to fix his heart upon—
Nothing that always will endure,
When all these transient things are gone?
Sad state! where man, with grief oppressed
Finds nought whereon his mind may rest.
O yes; there is a God above,
Who unto men is also nigh,
On whose unalterable love
We may with confidence rely,
No disappointment can befall
Us, having him that’s All in All.
If unto Him we faithful be,
It is impossible to miss
Of whatsoever He shall see
Conducible unto our bliss.
What can of pleasure him prevent
Who hath the fountain of content?
In Him alone if we delight,
And in His precepts pleasure take,
We shall be sure to do aright—
’Tis not His nature to forsake.
A proper object’s He alone,
For man to set his heart upon.

_Domino mens nixa quieta est_.

The mind which upon God is stayed
Shall with no trouble be dismayed.

T. E.

KENT, _the 4th of the Seventh Month_, 1650.

A copy of the foregoing lines, enclosed in a letter of condolence, I sent by the first post into Buckinghamshire, to my dear friends the afflicted parents; and upon my return home, going to visit them, we sat down, and solemnly mixed our sorrows and tears together.

About this time, as I remember, it was that some bickerings happening between some Baptists and some of the people called Quakers, in or about High Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire, occasioned by some reflecting words a Baptist preacher had publicly uttered in one of their meetings there, against the Quakers in general, and William Penn in particular, it came at length to this issue, that a meeting for a public dispute was appointed, to be holden at West Wycombe, between Jeremy Ives, who espoused his brother’s cause, and William Penn.

To this meeting, it being so near me, I went, rather to countenance the cause than for any delight I took in such work; for indeed I have rarely found the advantage equivalent to the trouble and danger arising from those contests; for which cause I would not choose them, as, being justly engaged, I would not refuse them.

The issue of this proved better than I expected; for Ives, having undertaken an ill cause, to argue against the Divine light and universal grace conferred by God on all men, when he had spent his stock of arguments which he brought with him on that subject, finding his work go on heavily and the auditory not well satisfied, stepped down from his seat and departed, with purpose to have broken up the assembly. But, except some few of his party who followed him, the people generally stayed, and were the more attentive to what was afterwards delivered amongst them; which Ives understanding, came in again, and in an angry, railing manner, expressing his dislike that we went not all away when he did, gave more disgust to the people.

After the meeting was ended, I sent to my friend Isaac Penington, by his son and servant, who returned home, though it was late, that evening, a short account of the business in the following distich:—

_Prævaluit veritas_: _inimnici terga dedere_;
_Nos sumus in tuto_; _laus tribuenda Deo_.

Which may be thus Englished:

Truth hath prevailed; the enemies did fly;
We are in safety; praise to God on high.

But both they and we had quickly other work found us: it soon became a stormy time. The clouds had been long gathering and threatening a tempest. The Parliament had sat some time before, and hatched that unaccountable law which was called the Conventicle Act; if that may be allowed to be called a law, by whomsoever made, which was so directly contrary to the fundamental laws of England, to common justice, equity, and right reason, as this manifestly was. For,

_First_, It broke down and overrun the bounds and banks anciently set for the defence and security of Englishmen’s lives, liberties, and properties—viz., trial by juries; instead thereof, directing and authorizing justices of the peace, and that too privately out of sessions, to convict, fine, and by their warrants distrain upon offenders against it; directly contrary to the Great Charter.

_Secondly_, By that Act the informers, who swear for their own advantage, as being thereby entitled to a third part of the fines, were many times concealed, driving on an underhand private trade; so that men might be, and often were, convicted and fined, without having any notice or knowledge of it till the officers came and took away their goods, nor even then could they tell by whose evidence they were convicted; than which what could be more opposite to common justice, which requires that every man should be openly charged and have his accuser face to face, that he might both answer for himself before he be convicted, and object to the validity of the evidence given against him?

_Thirdly_, By that Act the innocent were punished for the offences of the guilty. If the wife or child was convicted of having been at one of those assemblies which by that Act was adjudged unlawful, the fine was levied on the goods of the husband or father of such wife or child, though he was neither present at such assembly, nor was of the same religious persuasion that they were of, but perhaps an enemy to it.

_Fourthly_, It was left in the arbitrary pleasure of the justices to lay half the fine for the house or ground where such assembly was holden, and half the fine for a pretended unknown preacher, and the whole fines of such and so many of the meeters as they should account poor, upon any other or others of the people who were present at the same meeting, not exceeding a certain limited sum; without any regard to equity or reason. And yet, such blindness doth the spirit of persecution bring on men, otherwise sharp-sighted enough, that this unlawful, unjust, unequal, unreasonable, and unrighteous law took place in almost all places, and was rigorously prosecuted against the meetings of Dissenters in general, though the brunt of the storm fell most sharply on the people called Quakers; not that it seemed to be more particularly levelled at them, but that they stood more fair, steady, and open, as a butt to receive all the shot that came, while some others found means and freedom to retire to coverts for shelter.

No sooner had the bishops obtained this law for suppressing all other meetings but their own, but some of the clergy of most ranks, and some others too who were overmuch bigoted to that party, bestirred themselves with might and main to find out and encourage the most profligate wretches to turn informers, and to get such persons into parochial offices as would be most obsequious to their commands, and ready at their beck to put it into the most rigorous execution. Yet it took not alike in all places, but some were forwarder in the work than others, according as the agents intended to be chiefly employed therein had been predisposed thereunto.

For in some parts of the nation care had been timely taken, by some not of the lowest rank, to choose out some particular persons—men of sharp wit, close countenances, pliant tempers, and deep dissimulation—and send them forth among the sectaries, so called, with instructions to thrust themselves into all societies, conform to all or any sort of religious profession, Proteus-like change their shapes, and transform themselves from one religious appearance to another as occasion should require. In a word, to be all things to all—not that they might win some, but that they might, if possible, ruin all; at least many.

The drift of this design was, that they who employed them might by this means get a full account what number of Dissenters’ meetings, of every sort, there were in each county, and where kept; what number of persons frequented them, and of what rank; who amongst them were persons of estate, and where they lived; that when they should afterwards have troubled the waters, they might the better know where with most advantage to cast their nets.

He of these emissaries whose post was assigned him in this county of Bucks adventured to thrust himself upon a Friend under the counterfeit appearance or a Quaker, but being by the Friend suspected, and thereupon dismissed unentertained, he was forced to betake himself to an inn or alehouse for accommodation. Long he had not been there ere his unruly nature, not to be long kept under by the curb of a feigned society, broke forth into open profaneness; so true is that of the poet,

_Naturam expellas furca licet_, _usque recurret_.

To fuddling now falls he with those whom he found tippling there before, and who but he amongst them in him was then made good the proverb, _in vino veritas_, for in his cups he out with that which was no doubt to have been kept a secret. ’Twas to his pot companions that, after his head was somewhat heated with strong liquors, he discovered that he was sent forth by Dr. Mew, the then Vice-Chancellor of Oxford, on the design before related, and under the protection of Justice Morton, a warrant under whose hand and seal he there produced.

Sensible of his error too late, when sleep had restored him to some degree of sense, and discouraged with this ill success of his attempt upon the Quakers, he quickly left that place, and crossing through the country, cast himself among the Baptists at a meeting which they held in a private place, of which the over-easy credulity of some that went among them, whom he had craftily insinuated himself into, had given him notice. The entertainment he found amongst them deserved a better return than he made them; for, having smoothly wrought himself into their good opinion, and cunningly drawn some of them into an unwary openness and freedom of conversation with him upon the unpleasing subject of the severity of those times, he most villainously impeached one of them, whose name was — Headach, a man well reputed amongst his neighbours, of having spoken treasonable words, and thereby brought the man in danger of losing both his estate and life, had not a seasonable discovery of his abominable practices elsewhere, imprinting terror, the effect of guilt, upon him, caused him to fly both out of the court and country at that very instant of time when the honest man stood at the bar ready to be arraigned upon his false accusation.

This his false charge against the Baptist left him no further room to play the hypocrite in those parts; off therefore go his cloak and vizor. And now he openly appears in his proper colours, to disturb the assemblies of God’s people, which was indeed the very end for which the design at first was laid.

But because the law provided that a conviction must be grounded upon the oaths of two witnesses, it was needful for him, in order to the carrying on his intended mischief, to find out an associate who might be both sordid enough for such an employment and vicious enough to be his companion.

This was not an easy task, yet he found out one who had already given an experiment of his readiness to take other men’s goods, being not long before released out of Aylesbury gaol, where he very narrowly escaped the gallows for having stolen a cow.

The names of these fellows being yet unknown in that part of the country where they began their work, the former, by the general voice of the country, was called the Trepan; the latter, the Informer, and from the colour of his hair Red-hair. But in a little time the Trepan called himself John Poulter, adding withal that Judge Morton used to call him John for the King, and that the Archbishop of Canterbury had given him a deaconry. That his name was indeed John Poulter, the reputed son of one — Poulter, a butcher in Salisbury, and that he had long since been there branded for a fellow egregiously wicked and debauched, we were assured by the testimony of a young man then living in Amersham, who both was his countryman and had known him in Salisbury, as well as by a letter from an inhabitant of that place, to whom his course of life had been well known.

His comrade, who for some time was only called the Informer, was named Ralph Lacy, of Risborough, and surnamed the Cow-stealer.

These agreed between themselves where to make their first onset, which was to be, and was, on the meeting of the people called Quakers, then holden at the house of William Russell, called Jourdan’s, in the parish of Giles Chalfont, in the county of Bucks; that which was wanting to their accommodation was a place of harbour, for assistance wherein recourse was had to Parson Philips, none being so ready, none so willing, none so able to help them as he.

A friend he had in a corner, a widow woman, not long before one of his parishioners; her name was Anne Dell, and at that time she lived at a farm called Whites, a bye-place in the parish of Beaconsfield, whither she removed from Hitchindon. To her these fellows were recommended by her old friend the parson. She with all readiness received them; her house was at all times open to them; what she had was at their command.

Two sons she had at home with her, both at man’s estate. The younger son, whose name was John Dell, listed himself in the service of his mother’s new guests, to attend on them as their guide, and to inform them (who were too much strangers to pretend to know the names of any of the persons there) whom they should inform against.

Thus consorted, thus in a triple league confederated, on the 24th day of the fifth month, commonly called July, in the year 1670, they appeared openly, and began to act their intended tragedy upon the Quakers’ meeting at the place aforesaid, to which I belonged, and at which I was present. Here the chief actor, Poulter, behaved himself with such impetuous violence and brutish rudeness as gave occasion for inquiry who or what he was? And being soon discovered to be the Trepan, so infamous and abhorred by all sober people, and afterwards daily detected of gross impieties and the felonious taking of certain goods from one of Brainford, whom also he cheated of money—these things raising an outcry in the country upon him, made him consult his own safety, and leaving his part to be acted by others, quitted the country as soon as he could.

He being gone, Satan soon supplied his place by sending one Richard Aris, a broken ironmonger of Wycombe, to join with Lacy in this service, prompted thereto in hopes that he might thereby repair his broken fortune.

Of this new adventurer this single character may serve, whereby the reader may make judgment of him as of the lion by his paw; that at the sessions held at Wycombe in October then last past he was openly accused of having enticed one Harding, of the same town, to be his companion and associate in robbing on the highway, and proof offered to be made that he had made bullets in order to that service; which charge Harding himself, whom he had endeavoured to draw into that heinous wickedness, was ready in court to prove upon oath had not the prosecution been discountenanced and smothered.

Lacy, the cow-stealer, having thus got Aris, the intended highwayman, to be his comrade, they came on the 21st of the month called August, 1670, to the meeting of the people called Quakers, where Lacy, with Poulter, had been a month before; and taking for granted that the same who had been there before were there then, they went to a justice of the peace called Sir Thomas Clayton, and swore at all adventure against one Thomas Zachary and his wife, whom Lacy understood to have been there the month before, that they were then present in that meeting; whereas neither the said Thomas Zachary nor his wife were at that meeting, but were both of them at London, above twenty miles distant, all that day, having been there some time before and after; which notwithstanding, upon this false oath of these false men, the Justice laid fines upon the said Thomas Zachary of £10 for his own offence, £10 for his wife’s, and £10 for the offence of a pretended preacher, though indeed there was not any that preached at that meeting that day; and issued forth his warrant to the officers of Beaconsfield, where Thomas Zachary dwelt, for the levying of the same upon his goods.

I mention these things thus particularly, though not an immediate suffering of my own, because in the consequence thereof it occasioned no small trouble and exercise to me.

For when Thomas Zachary, returning home from London, understanding what had been done against him, and advising what to do, was informed by a neighbouring attorney that his remedy lay in appealing from the judgment of the convicting Justice to the general Quarter Sessions of the Peace, he thereupon ordering the said attorney to draw up his appeal in form of law, went himself with it, and tendered it to the Justice. But the Justice being a man neither well principled nor well natured, and uneasy that he should lose the advantage both of the present conviction and future service of such (in his judgment) useful men as those two bold informers were likely to be, fell sharply upon Thomas Zachary, charging him that he suffered justly, and that his suffering was not on a religious account.

This rough and unjust dealing engaged the good man to enter into further discourse with the Justice in defence of his own innocency; from which discourse the insidious Justice, taking offence at some expression of his, charged him with saying, “The righteous are oppressed, and the wicked go unpunished.” Which the Justice interpreting to be a reflection on the Government, and calling it a high misdemeanour, required sureties of the good man to answer it at the next Quarter Sessions, and in the meantime to be bound to his good behaviour. But he, well knowing himself to be innocent of having broken any law, or done in this matter any evil, could not answer the Justice’s unjust demand, and therefore was sent forthwith a prisoner to the county gaol.

By this severity it was thought the Justice designed not only to wreak his displeasure on this good man, but to prevent the further prosecution of his appeal; whereby he should at once both oppress the righteous by the levying of the fines unduly imposed upon him, and secure the informers from a conviction of wilful perjury and the punishment due therefor, that so they might go on without control in the wicked work they were engaged in.

But so great wickedness was not to be suffered to go unpunished, or at least undiscovered. Wherefore, although no way could be found at present to get the good man released from his unjust imprisonment, yet that his restraint might not hinder the prosecution of his appeal, on which the detection of the informer’s villainy depended, consideration being had thereof amongst some Friends, the management of the prosecution was committed to my care, who was thought with respect at least to leisure and disengagement from other business, most fit to attend it; and very willingly I undertook it.

Wherefore at the next general Quarter Sessions of the Peace, held at High Wycombe in October following, I took care that four substantial witnesses, citizens of unquestionable credit, should come down from London in a coach and four horses, hired on purpose.

These gave so punctual and full evidence that Thomas Zachary and his wife were in London all that day whereon the informers had sworn them to have been at an unlawful meeting, at a place more than twenty miles distant from London, that notwithstanding what endeavours were used to the contrary, the jury found them not guilty. Whereupon the money deposited for the fines at the entering of the appeal ought to have been returned, and so were ten pounds of it; but the rest of the money being in the hand of the Clerk of the Peace, whose name was Wells, could never be got out again.

Thomas Zachary himself was brought from Aylesbury gaol to Wycombe, to receive his trial, and though no evil could be charged upon him, yet Justice Clayton, who at first committed him, displeased to see the appeal prosecuted and the conviction he had made set aside, by importunity prevailed with the bench to remand him to prison again, there to lie until another sessions.

While this was doing I got an indictment drawn up against the informers Aris and Lacy for wilful perjury, and caused it to be delivered to the grand jury, who found the bill. And although the court adjourned from the town-hall to the chamber at their inn, in favour as it was thought to the informers, on supposition we would not pursue them thither, yet thither they were pursued; and there being two counsel present from Windsor—(the name of the one was Starky, and of the other, as I remember, Forster, the former of whom I had before retained upon the trial of the appeal)—I now retained them both, and sent them into court again, to prosecute the informers upon this indictment; which they did so smartly that, the informers being present as not suspecting any such sudden danger, were of necessity called to the bar and arraigned, and having pleaded _Not Guilty_, were forced to enter a traverse to avoid a present commitment: all the favour the court could show them being to take them bail one for the other, though probably both not worth a groat, else they must have gone to gaol for want of bail, which would have put them besides their business, spoiled the informing trade, and broke the design; whereas now they were turned loose again to do what mischief they could until the next sessions.

Accordingly, they did what they could, and yet could make little or no earnings at it; for this little step of prosecution had made them so known, and their late apparent perjury had made them so detestable, that even the common sort of bad men shunned them, and would not willingly yield them any assistance.

The next Quarter Sessions was held at Aylesbury, whither we were fain to bring down our witnesses again from London, in like manner and at like charge, at the least, as before. And though I met with great discouragements in the prosecution, yet I followed it so vigorously that I got a verdict against the informers for wilful perjury, and had forthwith taken them up, had not they forthwith fled from justice and hid themselves. However, I moved by my attorney for an order of court, directed to all mayors, bailiffs, high constables, petty constables, and other inferior officers of the peace, to arrest and take them up wherever they should be found within the county of Bucks, and bring them to the county gaol.