[G] The Civil War was at its height.
[10] It was a settled custom, in fact, a matter of conscience with Fox, to avoid the names of the days and of the months. He disliked them because they commemorated heathen divinities, and he always makes a point of using numeral adjectives instead of the names. It was not an original scruple with him, but a similar position was taken by some of the leading "Separatists" before the Commonwealth period. (See Barrow's "False Churches," p. 204.)
[H] Richard Abell.
[I] Of Atherstone.
[11] It is difficult to find out where George Fox's money came from. He reports in the original MS. of the Journal, p. 17, a remark his relatives made about him when he left home: "When hee went from us hee had a greate deale of gould and sillver about him." He is always well supplied. He goes to inns, always has a good horse, wears clean linen and frequently gives to charity. In signed papers in the Spence collection he gives orders for the disposal of money invested "in ships and trade," as well as of a thousand acres of land in Pennsylvania which William Penn had assigned to him.
[12] This expression "opened" has a mystical import, and will be of frequent occurrence. He means to say that it was directly revealed in his soul so that he assuredly knew it to be true. Often he uses the expression in reference to some truth which he might easily have discovered in the Scriptures or have learned from contemporary sources. But in this solemn way he announces that this truth has now at length come to be a living truth for him. It is no longer a mere statement of fact—it is a principle, the truth of which he sees.
[J] That is, gave them Scripture references.
[13] This was one of the many curious religious sects with which the England of the Commonwealth was overrun. (See Edwards's "Gangræna.")
[14] "Friends" is here used for the first time in the Journal as the name of the new denomination. It is not possible to determine when the name was adopted or why it was chosen. When the Journal was written the term had already become fixed and Fox uses it without comment or explanation, referring it back to a period before it came into use as the name of the Society. At first the word "friends" was probably used in an untechnical sense for those who were friendly, and little by little it hardened into a name. At the very beginning they called themselves "Children of the Light."
[15] In the northern part of Derbyshire.