Kiffin and Thomas Paul were advocates of strict communion; Jessy, Tombes, and Bunyan were advocates of open communion.[249]
DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.
The records of the Baptist Church assembling in Broadmead, Bristol, furnish a complete history of its Christian fellowship. The mode of admission is fully described. Candidates gave an account of the work of God upon their souls before the whole congregation. Three are on one occasion mentioned as giving satisfaction, but two of the brethren desired further time to discourse with one Mary Skinker about her principles, whether she was sound in the doctrine of the Gospel, concerning the person and human nature of Christ our Lord; and time also to discourse with one Elizabeth Jordan somewhat further, for their satisfaction concerning the truth of the work of grace upon her soul. Persons, “hoped to be in the truth,” were baptized in the river Frome—this was done once, amidst frost and snow, and a sharp, piercing wind, so that a wet handkerchief was frozen round the neck of one of the women; although one person was sick, and another had tooth-ache, and a third had sprained his leg, and a fourth was consumptive, the Lord, it is said, “to declare His power, did, as it were, work a miracle, to give a precedent to others,” lest, from the coldness of the season, they should fear to do His will. He preserved them all, and not so much as one was ill; each was the better for being baptized, and all were alive ten years afterwards to speak of the Lord’s goodness, and have it recorded in the Church Book. Discipline was rigidly maintained. Letters were written to members suspected of improper conduct, and the answers they returned of confession, or denial, or excuse, are carefully preserved. Instances of answers to prayer are recorded—one of a bachelor, who fell distracted, so that he was forced to be bound to his bed, but after days of prayer the Lord cast out, “as it were, three spirits, visible to be seen”—a spirit of uncleanness for rage and blasphemy, a spirit of horror and fear, and a spirit of shame and dumbness. Allusion is made to the occurrence of a fiery apparition on the north-west side of the City, like a boy’s kite, with a fiery oval head, and a long white tail. These records abound in stories of persecution and disturbance; but whatever may be thought of the superstitious tinge, so apparent in the character of these simple-hearted and pious people, every reader must be touched by the following entries:—
“On the 2nd of July [1682], Lord’s Day, our pastor preached in another place in the Wood. Our friends took much pains in the rain, because many informers were ordered out to search, and we were in peace, though there were near twenty men and boys in search.” “On the 16th brother Fownes first, and brother Whinnell after, preached under a tree, it being very rainy.” “On the 13th [of August] our pastor preached in the Wood, and afterwards broke bread at Mr. Young’s in peace. But Hellier and the rest were busy that day, and shut up the gates, and kept watch at the Weir, and behind St. Philip’s in the morning, to prevent any going out, and in the evening to catch them coming in, and took up several in the evening as vagrants on the Lord’s Day, and sent some to Newgate, and some to Bridewell, watching till seven in the evening for that purpose.” “On the 20th met above Scruze Hole, in our old place, and heard brother Fownes preach twice in peace. Brother Terrill had caused workmen to make banks on the side of the hill to sit down on, several of them like a gallery. And there we met also on the 27th in peace. And both days we sang a psalm in the open wood.”[250] No doubt if other Congregational Church books, Baptist and Pædo-baptist, had been as minute and copious in detail, and had been as safely handed down to us as the Broadmead Records have happily been, we should have found in them somewhat similar information, touching different kinds of Independent communities.
DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.
The history of the Quakers, throughout the period under review, is a history of spiritual life, of intense suffering, of calm endurance, of inflexible adherence to principle, of heroic zeal, of indefatigable activity, and of large success, both as to the increase of numbers, and the moral improvement of mankind. It is also a history of organic ecclesiastical development. So spiritual an impulse worked out a graduated system of co-operation and discipline. Quakers differed from the Presbyterians, from the Independents, and from the Baptists in doctrinal opinions, and they also rejected the celebration of sacraments, which all the others reverentially observed; but in ecclesiastical government the Quakers were much less unlike the Presbyterians than the other two denominations. Quakers’ Societies were not distinct Churches, independent of each other, but they formed one large spiritual aggregate, the various parts being united, not only in sympathy and general action, but in certain definite social arrangements. In respect to corporate unity, Quakers attained to a perfection at which the Presbyterians of the Commonwealth aimed in vain, and which the Presbyterians of the Restoration never attempted. After the first few years of struggle and suffering, Quakerism consolidated itself into the following shape, as described by Sewell, the historian of the sect:—
“As to Church government, both for looking to the orderly conversation of the members, and for taking care of the poor, and of indigent widows and orphans, and also for making inquiry into marriages solemnized among them, they have particular meetings, either weekly, or every two weeks, or monthly, according to the greatness of the Churches. They have also quarterly meetings in every county, where matters are brought that cannot well be adjusted in the particular meetings. To these meetings come not only the ministers and elders, but also other members, that are known to be of sober conversation; and what is agreed upon there is entered into a book belonging to the meeting. Besides these meetings, a general annual assembly is kept at London in the Whitsun Week so-called, not for any superstitious observation the Quakers have for that more than any other time, but because that season of the year best suits the general accommodation. To this yearly meeting, which sometimes lasteth four, five, or more days, are admitted such as are sent from all Churches of that Society in the world, to give an account of the state of the particular Churches, which from some places is done only by writing, and from that meeting is sent a general epistle to all the Churches, which commonly is printed, and sometimes particular epistles are also sent to the respective Churches. By which it may be known every year in what condition the Churches are, and in the said epistle generally is recommended a godly life and conversation, and due care about the education of children. If it happen that the poor anywhere are in want, then that is supplied by others who have in store, or sometimes by an extraordinary collection.”
DEVELOPMENT OF NONCONFORMITY.
He supplies the following particulars respecting another subject:—
“In their method of marriage they also depart from the common way, for in the Old Testament they find not that the joining of a couple in marriage ever was the office of a priest, nor in the Gospel any preacher among Christians appointed thereto. Therefore it is their custom, that when any intend to enter into marriage, they first having the consent of parents or guardians, acquaint the respective men’s and women’s meetings of their intention, and after due inquiry, all things appearing clear, they in a public meeting solemnly take each other in marriage, with a promise of love and fidelity, and not to leave one another before death separates them. Of this a certificate is drawn, mentioning the names and distinctions of the persons thus joined, which, being first signed by themselves, those then that are present sign as witnesses. In the burying of their dead they mind decency, and endeavour to avoid all pomp, and the wearing of mourning is not approved among them, for they think that the mourning which is lawful may be showed sufficiently to the world by a modest and grave deportment.”[251]