Who are the Quakers, and what does the Friends Church believe?

The impression made on me by all this was intensified by its utter contrast with all I had known and shared in all my life as corporate worship. The points of contrast presented themselves one by one to my thoughts. Instead of the great building having everything that art and man's device could contrive to make it in a material and sensuous way worthy of God, I knew the simplest of buildings within and without devoid of ornament of any kind, having neither cross nor symbol to proclaim them houses of God. There I had known no priest, clergy nor minister as a separate class and with special powers and privileges; any man might speak in his prayer or praise or hymn. There all was spontaneous and extempore: there was no instrumental music—indeed no music at all in the sophisticated and trained sense. When no person felt the urge to open his mouth, there was silence.

My earliest memories included observing these gatherings of men and women of all ages, classes and rank in society, sitting silent and with eyes closed until someone was moved to speak. I soon learned that their eyes were closed for the deliberate purpose of excluding the diversions of sense, so that there might be less to impair the inner activity of mind, heart and spirit opened up to God. What they said in prayer and worship followed no liturgy; it was the free rising of the spirit in worship. What any person said was eagerly followed by the others, and quiet murmurs of agreement and support were constantly to be heard. The substance of their prayers was permeated with Bible allusions and quotations. These people knew their Bibles intimately and thoroughly, and the quiet responses to the speaker showed that by the shared knowledge of this one Book, heart answered to heart and spirit to spirit, moved by these allusions. Above all, it seemed that the Persons they addressed and spoke about in prayer and worship were Persons they knew, the Father and the Son, and with whom they simply knew themselves to be in a settled relationship never to be broken.

But, further, the Holy Ghost comes down from heaven to act in this new order of things, in this new creation that God has thus produced, founded on Christ the Lord. Therefore the notion of a clergy, an especially consecrated class, distinct from God's children, thoroughly carried out in popery, is utterly false. There one sees the pretensions of man to act as God. On the other hand, we have the opposite error in what is commonly called quakerism, that is, the Holy Ghost given to man as man; and of the two I think quakerism is, if possible, the more revolting. The whole theory is fundamentally evil and erroneous. I am speaking now not of the moral qualities of many Friends but only of the system of quakerism. It is well known that their doctrine on this grave subject is that the Holy Ghost is given to all mankind, to a Jew or a heathen, to an infidel, a Turk, or anybody else.* Now I call this of all doctrines professed by Christians the most opposed to the truth of Christianity. Can any view be more offensive? For the teaching of the New Testament as to this is plain: namely, the Spirit is given neither to a man, nor to a caste of men, on the one hand, nor to the race universally on the other; but to those only who stand in Christ. Again, the Spirit, who is the seal and earnest of the individual Christian, baptizes them into one body. Thus may all see that there is "one body and one Spirit."

*A Christian, who thinks better of the doctrine of the Society of Friends than I can, sent me a recent document which sounds more than usually Evangelical. But even here those good words only disguise their unquestionable belief that Christ's redemption procures the Spirit for all men without exception, apart from the new birth or faith of the gospel. This is exactly what I tax them with and maintain to be evil and heterodox.

It will be said that there are excellent persons, and good preaching, etc., at any rate among orthodox persons. Is this denied? Does it supply the lack? Perhaps it may be urged by some that at least the society of Friends, or Quakers, as they are commonly called, do make a great deal of the Holy Ghost. They are the very class which, with all respect to themselves personally, are, in my judgment, and unwittingly on their own part, most ignorant of the truth of the Holy Ghost's presence. The reason is manifest why they are so thoroughly distant from, and so antagonistic to, the truth of the personal presence of the Holy Ghost. Their doctrine, which I surely ought to explain after having given so strong an opinion about that society, — Quaker doctrine is wholly inconsistent with the truth the Lord lays down here. They hold that the Spirit of God dwells in every man without exception; that, whether a Jew or a Turk, whether an infidel or a believer, not a single soul is without His indwelling. The consequence is, that they cannot believe in any special personal presence of the Holy Ghost; for they conceive that as it has always been, so it is the essential means whereby he who makes a right use of it can be saved. Thus evidently along with this error goes another: they make justification to be gradual and progressive, not complete by faith of Christ and His work, but in proportion as men follow the inward light. I do not speak of all the members of that society: no doubt gospel truth has penetrated among not a few of them; and there are those (I do not care to name such now) who have lately preached without as well as within them, and are much to be respected, and have been somewhat used of God to the conversion of souls. But what they received for their own souls, and preached to the blessing of others, was not the proper doctrine of the Friends as set forth in the remains of their founders or Barclay's Apology, but a certain measure of evangelical testimony which penetrated their enclosure, and was thence given out to others.

It will be said that there are excellent persons, and good preaching, etc., at any rate among orthodox persons. Is this denied? Does it supply the lack? Perhaps it may be urged by some that at least the society of Friends, or Quakers, as they are commonly called, do make a great deal of the Holy Ghost. They are the very class which, with all respect to themselves personally, are, in my judgment, and unwittingly on their own part, most ignorant of the truth of the Holy Ghost's presence. The reason is manifest why they are so thoroughly distant from, and so antagonistic to, the truth of the personal presence of the Holy Ghost. Their doctrine, which I surely ought to explain after having given so strong an opinion about that society, — Quaker doctrine is wholly inconsistent with the truth the Lord lays down here. They hold that the Spirit of God dwells in every man without exception; that, whether a Jew or a Turk, whether an infidel or a believer, not a single soul is without His indwelling. The consequence is that they cannot believe in any special personal presence of the Holy Ghost; for they conceive that as it has always been, so it is the essential means whereby he who makes a right use of it can be saved. Thus evidently along with this error goes another: they make justification to be gradual and progressive, not complete by faith of Christ and His work, but in proportion as men follow the inward light. I do not speak of all the members of that society: no doubt gospel truth has penetrated among not a few of them; and there are those (I do not care to name such now) who have lately preached without as well as within them, and are much to be respected, and have been somewhat used of God to the conversion of souls. But what they received for their own souls, and preached to the blessing of others, was not the proper doctrine of the Friends as set forth in the remains of their founders or Barclay's Apology, but a certain measure of evangelical testimony which penetrated their enclosure, and was thence given out to others.

I have already remarked that Mr. Wolff is completely mistaken about Quakers. Gurney himself is an innovator among Quakers, and judged as such by the "Conservatives" — an epithet which indicates the old Quakers. Here is the doctrine of the Quakers: —

The Holy Ghost is in every man without exception. If they listen to His voice, they are justified by degrees. The Quakers reject justification by faith; a great number even reject the resurrection of the body. They reject the sacraments. They have a recognized ministry, and elders. They prefer their inward light to the written word: they hold absolutely that the Scriptures are not to be called the word of God, and only receive, as coming from God, that portion which may have been applied to them. There has lately been a revival among them, and several have sounder views; several even have left the society. The elders are appointed and established; they have an elevated seat, facing all the others; and nowhere else is a more complete authority exercised. The members of the flocks have an extraordinary fear of them. In many respects there is not more authority among the Roman Catholics themselves. As to practical customs, the Quakers have several things which are very estimable. I do not think I have represented their system falsely; for I have known, loved, and respected very sincerely, several from among them.

313 It would be difficult to find between two bodies a more complete contrast than between the Quakers and those called "Plymouth Brethren," if one except the fact that they believe that ministry is of the Holy Ghost; but even in this they act altogether differently.

Having freely alluded to the doctrine of the inward light held by the Friends as derogatory to the revealed truth of the Holy Ghost, I am almost bound to add briefly some of the grounds on which a severe censure has been passed on this their fundamental peculiarity. It will be evident to the intelligent reader of G. Fox, W. Penn, I. Pennington, Sewel, and other so-called Quakers, that they call the same principle right reason, grace, the Spirit, the word of God, Christ within, and God in us. Confounding all these and more with that conscience, or knowledge of good and evil, which is the universal property of man since the fall, they thus extend to all, without exception, what Scripture says of Christians only. Mosheim's account is just and calm; and I shall quote no more than is incontrovertible. He had remarked that, though apparently novel, Quakerism was really but a modification of the mysticism of the second century, which had never died out of Christendom, fragments of which were floating about in books, tracts, and men's conversation when Fox wandered about moodily, laying claim to divine inspiration. What he expressed confusedly was systematized by his successors, especially Penn, Barclay, Keith and Fisher. "Their chief dogma then, on which depend all the rest, is that famous and very ancient burden of the mystics, that there lies hid in the minds of all men a certain part of reason and the divine nature, a spark of that wisdom which is in God Himself. Since this is overwhelmed with the weight of the body and the darkness of the flesh which surrounds us, whoever desires happiness and eternal salvation must, by retiring from external things into self, by contemplation and by enfeebling the sensual force, draw it out, kindle, and inflame it. He who does so will feel an admirable light to dawn on him, and a heavenly voice to burst forth from the inmost recesses of his mind, — a conductor into all divine truth, and the surest pledge of our union with the Supreme Being. This treasure, natural to the human race, they call by various names, most frequently 'divine light,' sometimes a 'ray of eternal wisdom,' at others 'the heavenly Sophia,' the dress of whom (married to a mortal) some of these writers set forth magniloquently. The terms more familiar to us are 'the internal word' and 'Christ within;' for since they hold with the ancient mystics and Origen that Christ is the very reason and wisdom of God, and they will have all men to be endowed with a portion of the divine wisdom, they necessarily conclude that Christ or the word of God is, dwells, and speaks in all men.*

But the modern Quakers, as appears from the latest writings of Martin and others, do not know the real sentiment of their ancestors, and perpetually confound that innate light with the Holy Spirit's light operating in the minds of the pious.

Take, I will not say the grossness of popery but, the Quaker system, as an instance which painfully reverses the truth. The reason is plain: the Spirit is practically severed from Christ, and the result is that, under colour of humility, their testimony constantly tends to exalt the first man. Every child of Adam is supposed to have the Spirit of God. The consequence is that the truth is darkened, impaired, and destroyed, and all due sense of the ruin of man destroyed by their extreme form of Pelagianism, deifying not ordinances indeed but conscience.

All this is false. Firstly, the Quakers have elders who form a separate class, and who adjoin to themselves such or such other grave person to be elder with them, but with the consent of the assembly. Those who speak or feed may, or may not, be elders. Even their ministers (for the Quakers also distinguish between elders and ministers) are recognized by the elders after a certain time for the probation of their gifts, and they always remain subject to the judgment of the elders.

306 I admit that teaching is a gift. I admit also that ruling, or presiding, as some versions translate, is a gift; but in the word this is never applied to an assembly, as would appear to be the case, if we kept to the French version generally used. They are the gifts (charismata) according to Romans 12. That the administration of the sacraments is a gift, this is a reverie of Mr. Wolff's. I have already remarked that Mr. Wolff is entirely ignorant of the principles of the Quakers. They have their elders who are in charge, and besides that a ministry. There are also some among them who exercise a gift before being yet recognized as ministers.

One is surprised that Mr. R. should see the least resemblance to Brethren any more than to scripture in the principle of the Friends, who, in fact, ignore God's assembly more than any community in Christendom. They really hold that the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man in the world! instead of understanding that this is to each in the church. This of itself falsifies all their action, and shows its fundamental opposition to God's assembly, not merely in practice, but in principle. Next, they avowedly set up what they call the living testimony of the Spirit above scripture, which accordingly is shut out of their meetings no less than hymns. Who can wonder? Men quarrel with the written word when it condemns them; and none offend worse in this way than Quakers. Even Popery, with all its worldliness and worse, does not deny the difference between the first man and the Second, between flesh and Spirit, between nature and grace, between the church and the world, so flagrantly as the Society of Friends; and yet their principle Mr. R, imagines to be so like Brethren's, that he cannot see the least difference! Why, Friends have not one true idea about the church as Christ's body, or God's house; still less do they acknowledge the Spirit's sovereign action in it, or the difference between this and individual ministry apart from it. They confess the necessity and reality of the Spirit's action; and no doubt, so far as godly men among them act in faith as to this, they are blessed. But there is otherwise the most complete contrast between Brethren and Friends. Does not Mr. R. know that in a proper meeting of Friends elders exercise control over those who speak? Is this the principle of 1 Corinthians 14, or of Brethren?

He will have it however, that Friends are more consistent in practice, because of eschewing hymns and tunes. But what saith the scripture? Do Friends in very deed bow to the word, as well as look for the power and guidance of the Spirit? We find the use of metrical compositions in singing contemplated, both in private and in public (Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; 1 Cor. 14:15, 26; James 5:13), These are clearly not the Psalms of David, but christian compositions, without a line of inspiration, yet open to and needing the direction of the Spirit in the assembly, like everything else. No doubt, if people have a mere theory of the Spirit's action apart from scripture, like the Friends, one can understand their exclusion of hymns from being sung in their meetings, and even of scripture itself, though it be inspired. But this is consistency with a delusion, not only without subjection to the word, but to its deep and open affront. And if Mr. R. knows the facts, I am surprised that he should write thus coolly of a course so systematically unscriptural as that of Friends, or that he should not perceive that Brethren have the authority of scripture for their procedure as to singing hymns in and out of the assembly.