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self, was whipped, beaten, and finally turned out of doors, in 1662. The father, however, either relenting, or hoping to gain his point by other means, sent his son to Paris, in company with some persons of quality who were travelling that way. In France he continued some time, and returned so well skilled in the language, and in the embellishments of a polite behaviour, that he was joyfully received by his father. During his residence in Paris he was assaulted in the street one evening by a person with a drawn sword, on account of a supposed affront; but, among other accomplishments of a gay man, he had become so good a swordsman as to disarm his antagonist. In one of his writings he very rationally condemns this barbarous practice, reflecting how small a proportion the omission of a piece of respect bears to the loss of life; which in this case might have been consequent upon the

rencounter.

After his return from France, he was admitted of Lincoln's Inn, with the view of studying the law, and continued there till the memorable year 1665, when the plague raged in London. In 1666, his father committed to him the care of a considerable estate in Ireland, which occasioned him, for a time, to reside in that kingdom. At Cork he was informed, by one of the people called Quakers, that Thomas Loe, whose preaching had affected him so early in life, was shortly to be at a meeting in that city. To this meeting he went. It is said that Loe, who preached in the meeting, began his declaration with these words: "There is a faith that overcomes the world, and there is a faith that is overcome by the world." The manner in which Loe enlarged. upon this exordium is not known; but the effect was the conviction of young Penn, who afterwards constantly attended the meetings of the Quakers, notwithstanding all obstacles. The year after his arrival in Ireland he was, with many others, taken from a meeting at Cork, and carried before the mayor, by whom he was committed to prison; but was soon released, on application to the earl of Orrery. This was his first imprisonment, at which time he was about twenty-three years of age; and it tended to strengthen the ties of his union with a people whom he believed to suffer innocently. His father, understanding his attachment to the Quakers, remanded him home; and though there was yet no great alteration in his dress, yet his serious deportment evincing the religious state of his

mind, confirmed the fears of his father, and gave occasion to a species of conflict between them not easily described. The father felt great affection for an accomplished and dutiful son, and ardently desired the promotion of his temporal interests, which he feared would be obstructed by the way of life he had embraced. The son was sensible of the duty he owed to his parent, and afflicted in believing that he could not obey him but at the risk of his eternal welfare. At length the father would have compounded with the son, and suffered him to retain the simplicity of his manners to all others, if he would consent to be uncovered before the king, the duke (afterwards James II.), and himself. Penn desired time to consider of this requisition; and having employed it in fasting and supplication, in order, as he conceived, to know the divine will, he humbly signified to his father that he could not comply with it. After this, the father being utterly disappointed in his expectations, could no longer endure the sight of his son, and a second time drove him from his family. In this seclusion he comforted himself with the promise of Christ, to those who leave house or parents for his sake. His support, outwardly, was the charity of his friends, and some supplies privately sent him by his mother; but, by degrees, his father, becoming convinced of his integrity by his perseverance, permitted him to return to the family; and, though he did not give him open countenance, he privately used his interest to get him released, when imprisoned for his attendance at the Quakers' meetings.

In 1668, he first appeared both as a minister and an author among the Quakers. We shall not pretend to give the titles of all his numerous tracts. His first piece has this title, which is very characteristic of the man: "Truth exalted, in a short but sure testimony against all those religions, faiths, and worships, that have been formed and followed in the darkness of apostacy; and for that glorious light which is now risen and shines forth in the life and doctrine of the despised Quakers, as the alone good old way of life and salvation; presented to princes, priests, and people, that they may repent, believe, and obey. By William Penn; whom Divine love constrains, in an holy contempt, to trample on Egypt's glory, not fearing the king's wrath, having beheld the majesty of him who is invisible." The same year, on occasion of a dispute with Thomás Vincent, a Presbyterian, Penn wrote his "Sandy

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foundation shaken; which occasioned him to be imprisoned a second time in the Tower of London, where he remained about seven months; and from which he obtained his release also, by another book entitled "Innocency with her open face," in which he vindicated himself from the charges which had been cast on him for the former treatise. In the Tower also he wrote his famous "No Cross no Crown," or rather, probably, the first edition of it, of which the title was different. It may be esteemed his master-piece, and contains a strong picture of Christian morality. The complete title is, "No Cross, no Crown; a Discourse, shewing the nature and discipline of the holy Cross of Christ; and that the denying of Self, and daily bearing of Christ's Cross, is the alone way to the Rest and Kingdom of God. To which are added, the living and dying testimonies of many persons of fame and learning, both of ancient and modern times, in favour of this treatise." It has gone through several editions, and has been lately translated into French. After his release, he again visited Ireland, where his time was employed, not only in his father's business, but in his own function as a minister among the Quakers, and in applications to the government for their relief from suffering; in which application he succeeded so well, as to obtain, in 1670, an order of council for their general release from prison. The same year he returned to London, and experienced that suffering from which his influence had rescued his friends in Ireland. The Conventicle-act came out this year, by which the meetings of Dissenters were forbidden under severe penalties. The Quakers, however, believing it their religious duty, continued to meet as usual; and when sometimes forcibly kept out of their meeting-houses, they assembled as near to them as they could in the street. one of these open and public meetings in Gracechurchstreet, Penn preached, for which he was committed to Newgate, his third imprisonment; and at the next session at the Old Bailey, together with William Mead, was indicted for "being present at, and preaching to an unlawful, seditious, and riotous assembly." He pleaded his own cause, made a long and vigorous defence, though menaced and ill treated by the recorder, and was finally acquitted by the jury, who first brought in a verdict of "Guilty of speaking in Gracechurch-street;" and when that was not admitted, a verdict of "Not guilty." He was, nevertheVOL. XXIV. U

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less, detained in Newgate, and the jury fined. The trial was soon after published, under the title of "The People's ancient and just liberties asserted, in the Trial of William Penn and William Mead, at the Sessions held at the Old Bailey in London, the 1st, 3d, 4th, and 5th of September, 1670, against the most arbitrary procedure of that Court." This trial is inserted in his works, and at once affords a proof of his legal knowledge and firmness, and of the oppression of the times. The pretence for the detention of Penn in Newgate was for his fines, which were imposed on him for what was called contempt of court: but he was liberated by his father's privately paying these fines. His paternal kindness now seems to have returned, and flowed abundantly; for he died this year, fully reconciled to his son, and left him in possession of a plentiful estate it is said, about 1,500l. per annum. Penn, in his "No Cross, no Crown," p. 473, edit. xiii. 1789), has collected some of his father's dying expressions; among which we find this remarkable one, in the mouth of a man who had so much opposed the religious conduct of his son :-" Son William, let nothing in this world tempt you to wrong your conscience: I charge you, do nothing against your conscience. So will you keep peace at home, which will be a feast to you in a day of trouble,"

Near this time he held a public dispute at Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire, with a Baptist teacher, concerning the universality of the divine light. He also wrote a letter to the vice-chancellor of Oxford, on account of the abuse which his friends suffered there from the junior scholars. And during his residence this winter at Penn, in Buckinghamshire, he published his "Seasonable Caveat against Popery," though it was the religion of the queen and of the heir-apparent. This has been brought This has been brought to prove the unreasonableness of the clamour that was afterwards raised against him, that he favoured Popery: an aspersion to which Burnet gave some ear, but which Tillotson retracted. Near the close of the year, he was led to his fourth imprisonment. A serjeant and soldiers waited at a meeting until he stood up and preached; then the serjeant arrested him, and he was led before the lieutenant of the Tower, by whom, on the act for restraining nonconformists from inhabiting in corporations, he was again committed, for six months, to Newgate. During his confinement, he wrote several treatises; and also addressed the parliament,

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which was then about to take measures for enforcing the Conventicle Act with greater severity. Shortly after the release of Penn from this imprisonment, he travelled, in the exercise of his ministry, in Holland and Germany. Few particulars of this journey are preserved; but it is alluded to in the account of a subsequent one which he published.

In 1672, he married Gulielma Maria Springett, whose father having been killed at the siege of Bamber, in the civil wars, and her mother having married Isaac Penington of Chalfont, Bucks, in his family (which was a place of general resort for Quakers in that county) Gulielma had her education, and probably became acquainted with Penn. After his marriage he resided at Rickmansworth, in Hertfordshire. The same year he wrote several controversial pieces ; and, among the rest, one against Muggleton. In this employment, about this time, he seems to have spent much of his leisure. In 1674, he ventured to write to the king, complaining of the severity of some justices, and others, to the Quakers; and some time after he presented to the king, and to both houses of parliament, a book entitled "The continued Cry of the oppressed for Justice; giving an account of the cruel and unjust proceedings against the persons and estates of many of the people called Quakers." In 1675 he held a public dispute near Rickmansworth, with the famous Richard Baxter.

In 1677, in company with George Fox and Robert Barclay, he again set sail on a religious visit to the Continent. He travelled by Rotterdam, Leyden, and Haerlem, to Amsterdam, at which place, hearing of a persecution of the Quakers at Dantzick, he wrote to the king of Poland an expostulatory letter on their behalf. He then, after some further stay at Amsterdam, proceeded by Osnabrug to Herwerden, or Herford, the residence of the princess Elizabeth, daughter of the king of Bohemia, and granddaughter of James I.

It may not be amiss to mention, that the manner in which the ministers of the people called Quakers travel in the business of their ministry is simply this: Having a view of the country in which they believe themselves divinely required to minister, they proceed from place to place, according as their minds feel disposed, by the touches of the same influence which they conceived to have drawn them from their habitations. Their employment is visiting. the meetings, and often the families of their friends; and

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