afraid of them, for I was sensible they did not possess what they professed. Now during the time that I was at BARNET, a strong temptation to despair came upon me. Then I saw how Christ was tempted, and mighty troubles I was in; sometimes I kept myself retired in my chamber, and often walked solitary in the chace,* to wait upon the Lord.

I wondered why these things should come to me; and I looked upon myself and said, "Was I ever so before?" Then I thought, because I had forsaken my relations, I had done amiss against them; so I was brought to call to mind all the time that I had thus spent, and to consider whether I had wronged any. But temptations grew more and more, and I was tempted almost to despair; and when Satan could not effect his design upon me that way, he laid snares for me, and baits to draw me to commit some sin, whereby he might take advantage to bring me to despair. I was about twenty years of age when these exercises came upon me; and I continued in that condition some years, in great trouble, and fain would have put it from me. I went to many a priest to look for comfort, but found no comfort from them.

From BARNET I went to LONDON, where I took a lodging, and was under great misery and trouble there; for I looked upon the great professors of the city, and I saw all was dark and under the chain of darkness. I had an uncle there, one Pickering, a Baptist (and they were tender then), yet I could not impart my mind to him, nor join with them; for I saw all young and old, where they were. Some tender people would have had me stay, but I was fearful, and returned homewards into LEICESTERSHIRE again, having a regard upon my mind unto my parents and relations, lest I should grieve them; who, I understood, were troubled at my absence.

When I was come down into Leicestershire, my relations would have had me marry, but I told them I was but a lad, and I must get wisdom. Others would have had me into the auxiliary band among the soldiery, but I refused; and I was grieved that they proffered such things to me, being a tender youth. Then I went to COVENTRY, where I took a chamber for a while at a professor's house, till people began to be acquainted with me; for there were many tender people in that town. After some time I went into my own country again, and was there about a year, in great sorrows and troubles, and walked many nights by myself.

Then the priest of DRAYTON, the town of my birth, whose name was Nathaniel Stevens, came often to me, and I went often to him; and another priest sometimes came with him; and they would give place to me to hear me, and I would ask them questions, and reason with them. And this priest Stevens asked me a question, viz., Why Christ cried out upon the cross, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ?" and why he said, "If it be possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not my will, but thine be done ?" I told him that at that time the sins of all mankind were upon him, and their iniquities and transgressions with which he was wounded, which he was to bear, and to be an offering for, as he was man, but he died not as he was God; and so, in that he died for all men, and

• Open fields.

tasted death for every man, he was an offering for the sins of the whole world. This I spoke, being at that time in a measure sensible of Christ's sufferings, and what he went through. And the priest said, "It was a very good, full answer, and such a one as he had not heard." (At that time he would applaud and speak highly of me to others; and what I said in discourse to him on the week-days, he would preach on the first-days; for which I did not like him. This priest afterwards became my great persecutor.

After this I went to another ancient priest at MANCETTER, in Warwickshire, and reasoned with him about the ground of despair and temptations; but he was ignorant of my condition; he bade me take tobacco and sing psalms. Tobacco was a thing I did not love, and psalms I was not in a state to sing; I could not sing. Then he bid me come again, and he would tell me many things; but when I came he was angry and pettish, for my former words had displeased him. He told my troubles, sorrows, and griefs to his servants; which grieved me that I had opened my mind to such a one. I saw they were all miserable comforters; and this brought my troubles more upon me. Then I heard of a priest living about TAMWORTH, who was accounted an experienced man, and I went seven miles to him; but I found him only like an empty hollow cask. I heard also of one called Dr. Cradock, of COVENTRY, and went to him. I asked him the ground of temptations and despair, and how troubles came to be wrought in man? He asked me, Who was Christ's father and mother? I told him, Mary was his mother, and that he was supposed to be the Son of Joseph, but he was the Son of God. Now, as we were walking together in his garden, the alley being narrow, I chanced, in turning, to set my foot on the side of a bed, at which the man was in a rage, as if his house had been on fire. Thus all our discourse was lost, and I went away in sorrow, worse than I was when I came. I thought them miserable comforters, and saw they were all as nothing to me; for they could not reach my condition. After this I went to another, one Macham, a priest in high account. He would needs give me some physic, and I was to have been let blood; but they could not get one drop of blood from me, either in arms or head (though they endeavoured to do so), my body being, as it were, dried up with sorrows, grief and troubles, which were so great upon me that I could have wished I had never been born, or that I had been born blind, that I might never have seen wickedness or vanity; and deaf, that I might never have heard vain and wicked words, or the Lord's name blasphemed. When the time called Christmas came, while others were feasting and sporting themselves, I looked out poor widows from house to house, and gave them some money. When I was invited to marriages (as

I sometimes was), I went to none at all, but the next day, or soon after, I would go and visit them; and if they were poor, I gave them some money; for I had wherewith both to keep myself from being chargeable to others, and to administer something to the necessities of those who were in need.

About the beginning of the year 1646, as I was going to COVENTRY, and approaching towards the gate, a consideration arose in me, how it was

said that "all Christians are believers, both Protestants and Papists;" and the Lord opened to me that, if all were believers, then they were all born of God, and passed from death to life, and that none were true believers but such; and though others said they were believers, yet they were not. At another time, as I was walking in a field on a first-day morning, the Lord opened unto me, "that being bred at Oxford or Cambridge was not enough to fit and qualify men to be ministers of Christ ;" and I wondered at it, because it was the common belief of people. But I saw it clearly as the Lord opened it to me, and was satisfied, and admired the goodness of the Lord who had opened this thing unto me that morning. This struck at priest Steven's ministry, namely, "that to be bred at Oxford or Cambridge was not enough to make a man fit to be a minister of Christ." So that which opened in me, I saw struck at the priest's ministry. But my relations were much troubled that I would not go with them to hear the priest; for I would get into the orchards, or the fields, with my Bible, by myself. I asked them, Did not the apostle say to believers, that they needed no man to teach them, but as the anointing teacheth them ?” And though they knew this was Scripture, and that it was true, yet they were grieved because I could not be subject in this matter, to go to hear the priest with them. I saw that to be a true believer was another thing than they looked upon it to be: and I saw that being bred at Oxford or Cambridge did not qualify or fit a man to be a minister of Christ: what then should I follow such for? So neither these, nor any of the Dissenting people, could I join with, but was a stranger to all, relying wholly upon the Lord Jesus Christ.

At another time it was opened in me, “That God, who made the world, did not dwell in temples made with hands." This at first seemed a strange word, because both priests and people used to call their temples or churches, dreadful places, holy ground, and the temples of God. But the Lord showed me clearly, that he did not dwell in these temples which men had commanded and set up, but in people's hearts: for both Stephen and the apostle Paul bore testimony, that he did not dwell in temples made with hands, not even in that which he had once commanded to be built, since he put an end to it; but that his people were his temple, and he dwelt in them. This opened in me as I walked in the fields to my relations' house. When I came there, they told me that Nathaniel Stevens, the priest, had been there, and told them "he was afraid of me, for going after new lights." I smiled in myself, knowing what the Lord had opened in me concerning him and his brethren; but I told not my relations, who though they saw beyond the priests, yet they went to hear them, and were grieved because I would not go also. But I brought them Scriptures, and told them, there was an anointing within man to teach him, and that the Lord would teach his people himself. I had also great openings concerning the things written in the Revelations; and when I spoke of them, the priests and professors would say that was a sealed book, and would have kept me out of it: but I told them, Christ could open the seals, and that they were the nearest things to us; for the epistles were written to the saints that lived in former ages, but the Revelations were written of things to come.

After this, I met with a sort of people that held, women have no souls, (adding in a light manner,) no more than a goose. But I reproved them, and told them that was not right; for Mary said, "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour."

Removing to another place, I came among a people that relied much on dreams. I told them, except they could distinguish between dream and dream, they would confound all together; for there were three sorts of dreams; multitude of business sometimes caused dreams; and there were whisperings of Satan in man in the night-season; and there were speakings of God to man in dreams. But these people came out of these things, and at last became Friends.

Now though I had great openings, yet great trouble and temptation came many times upon me; so that when it was day, I wished for night, and when it was night, I wished for day: and by reason of the openings I had in my troubles, I could say as David said, "Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge." When I had openings, they answered one another, and answered the Scriptures; for I had great openings of the Scriptures: and when I was in troubles, one trouble also answered to another.

About the beginning of the year 1647, I was moved of the Lord to go into DERBYSHIRE, where I met with some friendly people, and had many discourses with them. Then passing further into the PEAK-COUNTRY, I met with more friendly people, and with some in empty, high notions. Travelling on through some parts of LEICESTERSHIRE and into NOTTINGHAMSHIRE, I met with a tender people, and a very tender woman, whose name was Elizabeth Hooton;* and with these I had some meetings and discourses. But my troubles continued, and I was often under great temptations; I fasted much, and walked abroad in solitary places many days, and often took my Bible, and went and sat in hollow trees and lonesome places till night came on; and frequently, in the night, walked mournfully about by myself: for I was a man of sorrows in the times of the first workings of the Lord in me.

* Elizabeth Hooton was born at Nottingham about the year 1600; was the wife of a person who occupied a respectable position in society. In 1647, when George Fox first met with her, she formed one of a company of serious persons, who occasionally met together. Little is known of her, but "the meetings and discourses" she had with George Fox appear to have been the means of convincing her of the spiritual views of Friends. Sewel says in 1650-"From a true experience of the Lord's work in man, she felt herself moved publicly to preach the way of salvation to others." She was therefore not only the first of her sex, but the second individual who appeared in the character of a minister amongst the newly-gathered society. The preaching of women was not at this period considered singular, several being thus engaged among the various religious sects then in England. Elizabeth Hooton had not long publicly testified as a minister, before her sincerity and faithfulness were tested by persecution. Besides suffering in other ways, she endured several imprisonments, sometimes for months together. As a gospel minister, she stood high in the estimation of her friends, and in advanced life performed two religious visits to America and the West Indies, the latter of which occupied her several years. She was one who travelled with George Fox amongst the West India Islands, as related elsewhere in these volumes, being suddenly taken ill in Jamaica, where she died the day following, aged about 71 years, a minister 21 years.

During all this time I was never joined in profession of religion with any, but gave myself up to the Lord, having forsaken all evil company, and taken leave of father and mother, and all other relations, and travelled up and down as a stranger in the earth, which way the Lord inclined my heart; taking a chamber to myself in the town where I came, and tarrying sometimes a month, more or less in a place; for I durst not stay long in any place, being afraid both of professor and profane, lest, being a tender young man, I should be hurt by conversing much with either. For which reason I kept myself much as a stranger, seeking heavenly wisdom and getting knowledge from the Lord; and was brought off from outward things, to rely wholly on the Lord alone. Though my exercises and troubles were very great, yet were they not so continual but that I had some intermissions, and was sometimes brought into such a heavenly joy, that I thought I had been in Abraham's bosom. As I cannot declare the misery I was in, it was so great and heavy upon me; so neither can I set forth the mercies of God unto me in all my misery. O, the everlasting love of God to my soul, when I was in great distress! when my troubles and torments were great, then was his love exceedingly great. "Thou, Lord, makest a fruitful field a barren wilderness, and a barren wilderness a fruitful field; thou bringést down and settest up; thou killest and makest alive; all honour and glory be to thee, O Lord of glory; the knowledge of thee in the Spirit, is life; but that knowledge which is fleshly, works death." While there is this knowledge in the flesh, deceit and self-will conform to anything, and will say yes, yes, to that it doth not know. The knowledge which the world hath of what the prophets and apostles spoke, is a fleshly knowledge; and the apostates from the life, in which the prophets and apostles were, have gotten their words, the Holy Scriptures, in a form, but not in their life nor Spirit that gave them forth. So they all lie in confusion, and are making provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof; but not to fulfil the law and command of Christ in his power and Spirit: this, they say, they cannot do; but to fulfil the lusts of the flesh, that they can do with delight.

Now after I had received that opening from the Lord, that "to be bred at Oxford or Cambridge was not sufficient to fit a man to be a minister of Christ," I regarded the priests less, and looked more after the Dissenting people. Among them I saw there was some tenderness; and many of them came afterwards to be convinced, for they had some openings. But as I had forsaken the priests, so I left the separate preachers also, and those esteemed the most experienced people; for I saw there was none among them all that could speak to my condition. When all my hopes in them and in all men, were gone, so that I had nothing outwardly to help me, nor could I tell what to do; then, O! then I heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition;" and when I heard it, my heart did leap for joy. Then the Lord let me see why there was none upon the earth that could speak to my condition, namely, that I might give Him all the glory; for all are concluded under sin, and shut up in unbelief, as I had been, that Jesus Christ might have the pre-eminence, who enlightens, and gives grace, and faith, and power. Thus when