[8] He did not at once adopt the Quaker dress, and continued for some time to wear a sword. When this non-compliance with Quaker customs was reported to George Fox, it is said that he simply replied, "let him wear it as long as he can." He mentioned years afterwards how the peculiar garb was a stumbling-block to some, "It telleth tales, it is blowing a trumpet and visibly crossing the world; and this the fear of man cannot abide" (Travels, p. 121). Probably this very fact commended the peculiarity to his bold and decided spirit.
Henceforth William Penn's time and strength were given to Quakerism. There was neither hesitation nor half-heartedness. The welfare, work, and sufferings of Friends he made his own. He wrote and preached with untiring energy, and suffered, counting it joy.
Though turned out of doors by his father, he was not allowed to want. His mother privately supplied his needs to the utmost of her ability, and what she could not do was made up by several kind friends. The situation was painful in the extreme; separated from home and parents, his father grieved and mortified at his conduct. He tells pathetically afterwards of "the bitter mockings and scornings that fell upon me, the displeasure of my parents, the invectiveness and cruelty of the priests, the strangeness of all my companions, what a sign and wonder they made of me." But his conscience approved of the line he had adopted, and his resolute nature was troubled by no waverings. He set himself earnestly to do his duty. He united himself closely to the Friends, and took up his pen on their behalf. His first work was entitled "Truth exalted."
"The Guide Mistaken," soon followed. It was a reply to "A Guide to the true Religion," in which the Quakers were treated with great severity.
Shortly afterwards he was drawn into a public discussion with the Rev. Thomas Vincent, a Presbyterian minister in Spitalfields. Some of his congregation having become converts to Quakerism, Vincent said some slanderous things about the Friends. So George Whitehead and Wm. Penn waited upon him, and insisted that as he had publicly misrepresented them, he was bound in fairness to give them an opportunity publicly to set themselves right. After some demur, Vincent agreed to meet them in his own chapel on a certain day. The discussion lasted until midnight, and turned principally upon the question of the Trinity. Friends have always asserted that the doctrine, as taught by the orthodox, is an attempt to explain the inexplicable, and goes beyond what is revealed in the Scriptures. This contention in their early days cost them much reproach; now the chief remnant of it is the annoyance of having their authors, especially Penn, quoted as believers in the Unitarianism of to-day.
The debate was one-sided and bitter, and the Friends only retired at last on condition of having another opportunity to vindicate themselves. But as Vincent plainly showed that he had no intention of redeeming his promise, the only satisfaction left was the press. In "The Sandy Foundation Shaken," Penn gave the public his view of the matter. But he did not stop with the doctrine of the Trinity, he went on to the Atonement. He advanced such arguments against "Imputed Righteousness" as Barclay has elaborated in his Apology. He also produced arguments against the method in which in those days the necessity of a satisfaction to the Divine justice was taught. His expressions unfortunately resemble those of modern Unitarians, but his position is vitally different. Penn believed the death of Our Saviour on the cross a real Sacrifice, that "Jesus Christ was our holy sacrifice, atonement and propitiation, that he bore our iniquities," but that Christ is not the cause but the effect of God's love. (See his "Primitive Christianity revived.")
This book brought down on Penn the anger of Dr. Sanderson, Bishop of London, and led to his being sent to the Tower. But that only "added one more glorious book to the literature of the Tower," "No Cross, No Crown," of which Hepworth Dixon, more trustworthy in literature than in religion, says, "Had the style been more condensed, it would have been well entitled to claim a high place in literature." Whilst there he also replied in a treatise entitled "Innocency with her open face," to many strictures on the "Sandy Foundation Shaken."
This imprisonment revealed in two ways the stuff of which William Penn was made. First severity was tried, and one day his servant brought him the report that the bishop was determined he should recant or die in prison. He only smiled and said, "They are mistaken in me; I value not their threats. I will weary out their malice. Neither great nor good things were ever attained without loss and hardship." Then they sent Stillingfleet, the future bishop, to try his powers of persuasion, but they, too, utterly failed. "Tell my father, who I know will ask thee, that my prison shall be my grave before I will budge a jot, for I owe my conscience to no mortal man." Such spirit, combined with the ability his books were revealing, revived the admiral's pride in his son. The court, too, began to take interest in him, and shortly after Stillingfleet's visit he was released, having been in the Tower more than eight months.
He at once resumed his preaching, and having been partially reconciled to his father, was employed by him to attend to his Irish estates. On his return home, his father received him fully into his favour, to the great delight of his mother's heart.