omitted, that on the afternoon of his arrival he assembled all his family for worship, thus making the first fruits of his domestic meeting an oblation to the Father of all mercies. This little meeting is described by him to have been "a sweet meeting, in which the divine presence made them glad together," and in which he was sensible, whatever sacrifices he had made by his journey, that "they were blessed who could cheerfully give up their all to serve the Lord."

Having rested for two or three weeks with his family, he went to London, from whence he addressed a letter to John Pennyman on the subject of his apostasy. In about a month after this we find him at Bristol. Here he, G. Fox, C. Marshall, and others, held a great dispute with William Rogers, and some of the separatists, on the subject of church discipline.

After the controversy, Penn returned to London, and from thence to Worminghurst. While he was at home, he wrote letters to his friends in Germany, such as to J. Claus, and P. Hendricks, who were in part companions of his late travels, and to others who belonged to the Quaker Churches which had been established there.

CHAPTER XIII.

A. 1678.

WE COME now again to view PENN in his station as a trustee for Byllinge. He had, as we have seen before, in conjunction with his colleagues, sent off Fenwick in the ship Griffith, accompanied by several families, to take possession of the land in West New Jersey, which had been purchased of the Lord Berkeley. This was in 1676. In 1677, he had dispatched commissioners, and three vessels, carrying no less than four hundred and fourteen passengers, proprietors, with their servants and children, to the same parts. In the early part of the present year,

1678, he had freighted two other ships, one from London, and the other from Hull, with persons on the same errand; so that now about eight hundred settlers, mostly Quakers and persons of property and character, had set sail for the new land.

But while he was thus occupied in foreign concerns, his attention was called to the situation of things at home, and particularly as they related to his own religious society. In the early part of this year, the different acts which had been enacted against the Roman Catholics, began to be enforced with extraordinary rigour. Only a few years before, the great fire in London had taken place, for which the Catholics were blamed by some. The fires on St. Margaret's Hill, and in Southwark, which followed, had been attributed to them also. And now, to add to the public consternation, a design on the part of the Papists to blow up both houses of parliament was said to have been discovered. Hence both parliament and people were so incensed against the Roman Catholics, that all the laws which had been passed against them, were pressed to their full length. It happened that the Protestant Dissenters, against whom these laws were never intended, became unexpectedly the objects of them. This was especially the case with the Quakers. It happened that many considered William Penn to be a Jesuit, and this led them to consider the Quakers, to whom he belonged, as Jesuits also. Hence they were almost immediately prosecuted the same as the Roman Catholics, for penalties of twenty pounds a month for absence from the national worship, or of two thirds of their estates for the like offence, The evil had been carried to an alarming length. Indeed the Parliament itself had become so sensible of the greatness of the evil, that it proposed to add a clause to the bill against Popery, distinguishing Protestant Dissenters from Papists, enacting that they who would take a certain oath should not suffer by the laws against the Catholics. But this measure was of no use to the Quakers. They were unable to swear at all, so that they had no way of

escape. William Penn therefore drew up a petition in their behalf, which was presented to both Houses of Parliament, in which he set forth their hard case, and requested that in the discriminating clause then in agitation, the word of a Quaker might be taken instead of his oath, with this proviso, that if any Quaker should utter a falsehood on such an occasion, he should be liable to the same punishment as if he had taken a false oath.

The petition was presented, and he was admitted to a hearing before a Committee of the House of Commons, when he delivered the following speech.

"If we ought to believe that it is our duty, according to the doctrine of the apostle, to be always ready to give an account of the hope that is in us, and this to every sober and private inquirer, certainly much more ought we to hold ourselves obliged to declare with all readiness, when called to it by so great an authority, what is not our hope; especially when our very safety is eminently concerned in so doing, and when we cannot decline this discrimination of ourselves from Papists without being conscious to ourselves of the guilt of our own sufferings, for so must every man needs be, who suffers mutely un-, der another character than that which truly belongeth to him and his belief. That which giveth me a more than ordinary right to speak at this time, and in this place, is the great abuse which I have received above any other of my profession; for of a long time I have not only been supposed a Papist, but a Seminary, a Jesuit, an emissary. of Rome, and in pay from the Pope; a man dedicating my endeavours to the interest and advancements of that party. Nor hath this been the report of the rabble, but the jealousy and insinuation of persons otherwise sober and discreet. Nay, some zealots for the Protestant religion have been so far gone in this mistake, as not only to think ill of us, and decline our conversation, but to take courage to themselves to prosecute us for a sort of concealed Papists; and the truth is, that, what with one thing and what with another, we have been as the woolsacks and common whipping-stock of the kingdom: all

laws have been let loose upon us, as if the design were not to reform, but to destroy us; and this not for what we are, but for what we are not. It is hard that we must thus bear the stripes of another interest, and be their proxy in punishment; but it is worse, that some men can please themselves in such a sort of administration. But mark: I would not be mistaken. I am far from thinking it fit, because I exclaim against the injustice of whipping Quakers for Papists, that Papists should be whipped for their consciences. No; for though the hand pretended to be lifted up against them, hath, I know not by what discretion, lighted heavily upon us, and we complain, yet we do not mean that any should take a fresh aim at them, or that they should come in our room; for we must give the liberty we ask; we cannot be false to our principles, though it were to relieve ourselves; for we have good will to all men, and would have none suffer for a truly sober and conscientious dissent on any hand. And I humbly take leave to add, that those methods against persons so qualified do not seem to me to be convincing, or indeed adequate to the reason of mankind; but this I submit to your consideration. To conclude: I hope we shall be held excused of the men of that (the Roman Catholic) profession in giving this distinguishing declaration, since it is not with design to expose them, but, first, to pay that regard we owe to the inquiry of this Committee, and, in the next place, to relieve ourselves from the daily spoil and ruin which now attend and threaten many hundreds of families, by the execution of laws which, we humbly conceive, were never made against us.”

Such was the speech of William Penn. He did not ask liberty for himself, and yet seek to impose fetters on others. He was consistent in his advocacy of freedom. Like a true friend of liberty, he would exclude none from its blessings. That portion which he desired to enjoy himself, he wished to be communicated to all others. He would confine it to no climate. He would limit it to

no complexion or color. He was anxious that it should fly from region to region, and visit evey portion of the globe. Such was the disposition manifested in this speech. Penn had the courage to declare, and this before persons in authority, persons dreadfully prejudiced against the Catholics, that it was unlawful to occasion any, even Catholics, to suffer, on account of a conscientious religious dissent. This broad principle he would not deny or falsify, either to relieve himself or his friends; nor did he or they wish to enjoy the privileges it contained at the expense or suffering of others, much less did they wish that this their intercession for themselves should occasion the Catholics to be marked afresh. Yet, bold as his language was, he offended no one. That which would have been of itself an offensive sentiment, was lost or overlooked in the nobleness of those which followed it. The committee heard him with extraordinary attention. Their attention indeed was such, as to have made a most favourable impression upon Penn himself; and therefore, by way of grateful return, thinking he could do no less than unbosom himself to them on certain other subjects, by which he and they whose cause he had then pleaded might be better known to them, he spoke a second time, explaining at length his principles, and defending the character of the Quaker Society generally, from aspersions cast on them by persecuting priests and sectarians.

This speech had also a considerable effect upon the committee. The Quakers at that time laboured under the suspicion, in common with other dissenters, that they were hostile to the Government. William Penn, to do away this suspicion, laid before them the creed of the Quakers on this subject. These, when called upon by magistrates to do what their consciences disapproved, refused obedience to their order. No threats could intimidate them. But, satisfied with such refusal, they bore with fortitude the sufferings which followed, and left to their oppressors the feelings only of remorse for their conduct. By such means they performed their duty to God in a quiet and peaceable manner, that is, they made no