"Yea, verily, dear child. Nought but the strength that God alone can give can help even a Friend to bear testimony to the truth before such cruel enemies; but dost thou not see that, while some are called to be martyrs for the truth, others are commanded to take up the cross of everyday life, and bear it meekly and patiently, though it lead not to such honour and renown as the martyr may claim? This is what we are called to, dear child. Thou and I must take care of the little ones at home, not denying our faith if any ask us concerning it, but seeking not to thrust it before the eyes of men; content to be unnoticed and unknown, but ever listening to the voice that will not fail to make itself heard in our hearts, if we will but listen with a simple mind." Bessie bowed her head, but she was only half convinced of the truth her friend had spoken. Her father had declared again and again that they had no right to sit calmly doing the everyday work of life, while sinners were perishing for lack of the word of life. He had not scrupled to denounce his neighbours who went to church as formalists and hypocrites, and even in the church itself had stood up and warned parson and people alike, telling them that God could be worshipped in the open fields, in the house or shop, better than in a steeple-house; and he had gathered crowds around him in the fields beyond Southwark, and taught them the truth as he had received it from the lips of George Fox, the founder of their Society. He was a true and ardent disciple of Fox, counting nothing dear so that he might proclaim the truth, the whole truth—as he thought—for in the tenacity with which he held to the little bit he had been able to grasp, he failed to see that he could not grasp the whole. That those whom he denounced so unsparingly also held the truth as they perceived it, or at least another facet of the precious gem, casting its inspiring light upon them, was dark to him. This had not been heeded by the authorities at first, and Westland, like many another earnest man, was allowed to preach and teach sinners the error of their ways, and warn them of the wrath to come. For to make men tremble and quake, and cry to God for mercy through the Lord Jesus Christ, was the object of all the Quakers' preaching, and the term "Quaker" had been given them in derision on account of this. For a time these people had been allowed to follow their own way without much interference from the authorities; but their unsparing denunciation of vice and wickedness, whether practised by rich or poor, doubtless raised the resentment of the king, though a political reason was the one put forward for their persecution. The safety of the throne, it was pretended, called for the suppression of these illegal meetings, as sedition was being taught under cover of religion.