A Book of Quaker SaintsHodgkin, L. V. (Lucy Violet)
Religion
A Book of Quaker Saints
Hodgkin, L. V. (Lucy Violet)
Society of Friends
You feel somehow as if you were in the presence of some one who is
very big, and that you yourself are very small, smaller perhaps than
you ever felt in your life. Yet you feel ready to do anything for him,
and, at the same time, you believe that, if only you could make him
know that you are there, he would be ready to do anything for you.
Even in this wretched den he carries himself with an air of authority,
as if he were accustomed to command. Now, at last he is looking up;
and we can see his eyes. Most wonderful eyes they are! Eyes that look
as if they could pierce through all sorts of disguises, and read the
deepest secrets of a man's heart. They are kind eyes too; and look as
if they could be extraordinarily tender at times. They are something
like a shepherd's eyes, as if they were accustomed to gazing out far
and wide in search of strayed sheep and lost lambs. Yet they are also
like the eyes of a Judge; thoroughly well able to distinguish right
from wrong. It would be terrible to meet those eyes after doing
anything the least bit crooked or shabby or untrue. They look as if
they would know at the first glance just how much excuses were worth;
and what was the truth. No wonder that once, when those eyes fell on a
man who was arguing on the wrong side, he felt ashamed all of a sudden
and cried out in terror: 'Do not pierce me so with thine eyes! Keep
thine eyes off me!' Another time when this same prisoner was reasoning
with a crowd of people, who did not agree with him, they all cried out
with one accord: 'Look at his eyes, look at his eyes!' And yet another
time when he was riding through an angry mob, in a city where men were
ready to take his life, they dared not touch him. 'Oh, oh,' they
cried, 'see, he shines! he glisters!'
Then what happened next? We do not want to look at the prisoner in
fancy any longer. We want really to know about him: to hear the
beginnings and endings of those stories and of many others. And that
is exactly what we are going to do. The prisoner is going to tell us
his own true story in his own real words. There is no need for our
fancy wings any longer. They may shrivel up and drop off unheeded. For
that prisoner is GEORGE FOX, and he belongs to English history. He has
left the whole story of his life and adventures written in two large
folio volumes that may still be seen in London. The pages are so old
and the edges have worn so thin in the two hundred and fifty years
since they were written, that each page has had to be most carefully
framed in strong paper to keep it from getting torn. The ink is faded
and brown, and the writing is often crabbed and difficult to read. But
it can be read, and it is full of stories. In olden times, probably,
the book was bound in a brown leather cover, but now, because it is
very old and valuable, it has been clothed with beautiful red leather,
on which is stamped in gold letters, the title:
GEORGE FOX'S JOURNAL.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account