Whether Quakerism be, as some Friends believe, destined to any considerable revival or not, it seems at least certain that any important revival of religion must be the result of a fresh recognition and acceptance of the very principles upon which the Society of Friends is built. What these principles and the practices resulting from them really are, is a subject on which there is a surprising amount of ignorance amongst us, considering how widely spread is the connection with and interest about

The actual organization of the Society of Friends is, I believe, by no means familiarly known outside its own borders, and a slight sketch of it may be neither uninteresting in itself, nor out of place as a preliminary to the endeavour to explain our general position. I propose, therefore, to give such an outline of our constitution as a Society, so far as I have become acquainted with it. The fullest details respecting it are to be found in the “Book of Discipline,” which is the authorized expo

The one corner-stone of belief upon which the Society of Friends is built is the conviction that God does indeed communicate with each one of the spirits He has made, in a direct and living inbreathing of some measure of the breath of His own life; that He never leaves Himself without a witness in the heart as well as in the surroundings of man; and that in order clearly to hear the Divine voice thus speaking to us we need to be still; to be alone with Him in the secret place of His presence; th

Our manner of worship is the natural (as it seems to me even the inevitable) result of the full recognition of the reality of Divine inspiration—of the actual living present sufficient fulness of intercourse between the human spirit and Him who is the Father of spirits. Who that truly expects to hear the voice of God can do otherwise than bow in silence before Him? “Devotion,” says Bishop Butler in one of his sermons, [8] “is retirement from the world He has made, to Him alone; it is to withdraw

Our ministry may be said to be free in several distinct senses. 1. It is open to all. 2. Its exercise is not subject to any pre-arrangement. 3. It is not paid. We believe that the one essential qualification for the office of a minister is the anointing of the Holy Spirit; and that this anointing is poured out without respect of persons upon men and women, upon old and young, upon learned and unlearned. The gift is, we believe, a purely spiritual one, as much beyond our control as the rain from

There are certain points of Christian practice upon which we have been accustomed to lay a degree of stress amounting to peculiarity, although our “testimony” in regard to them does not involve any opposition to the beliefs of other Christian bodies, as does that which we have just been considering respecting the freedom of the ministry and the disuse of ordinances. The idea of “testimony,” or practical witness-bearing to a stricter obedience to the teaching of Jesus Christ than is thought neces

I have endeavoured to explain what are those principles and practices into which we as a body have been led through what we believe to be obedience to the Spirit of Truth. I know that in some respects we seem to our fellow-Christians to have mistaken the voice of our Guide, and to be, through ignorance perhaps, but yet lamentably, excluding ourselves from the most precious privileges, if not consciously disregarding the most sacred injunctions. It is a very solemn question upon which we thus joi

1. What is the religious state of your meeting? Are you individually giving evidence of true conversion of heart, and of loving devotedness to Christ? 2. Are your meetings for worship regularly held; and how are they attended? Are they occasions of religious solemnity and edification, in which, through Christ, our ever-living High Priest and Intercessor, the Father is worshipped in spirit and in truth? 3. Do you “walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us”? Do you cherish a forgiving spirit? Are

The desire felt by many Friends that the Society should, in a more systematic manner than was formerly thought necessary, recognize and provide for what is called “evangelistic” and “pastoral” work, led, in 1882, to the appointment of a Committee of the Yearly Meeting on “Home Missions.” This Committee began its work by inviting the co-operation of the Monthly and Quarterly Meetings, and in its first Annual Report it mentions that ten of the Quarterly Meetings had appointed Committees to corresp

In the introduction by J. G. Whittier to a recent edition of John Woolman’s “Journal,” [33] there is a remarkable account of the manner in which our Society in America was gradually freed from all complicity with slavery, long before the struggle for its abolition was begun elsewhere; from which I venture to make some extracts, for the sake of the illustration it affords of the working both of our principles and of our machinery. From the time of George Fox himself, who in 1671 visited Barbadoes