When we were quite out of the town I told Friends that it was upon
me from the Lord that I must go back into the town again; and if any
one of them felt anything upon him from the Lord he might follow me;
the rest, that did not, might go on to Dun-Cow. So I passed through
the market in the dreadful power of God, declaring the Word of life
to them; and John Crook followed me. Some struck at me; but the
Lord's power was over them, and gave me dominion over all. I showed
them their unworthiness to claim the name of Christians, and the
unworthiness of their teachers, that had not brought them into more
sobriety; and what a shame they were to Christianity.
Having cleared myself, I turned out of the town again, and passed
to Coventry, where we found the people closed up with darkness. I
went to the house of a professor, where I had formerly been, and
he was drunk; which grieved my soul so that I did not go into any
house in the town; but rode into some of the streets, and into the
market-place. I felt that the power of the Lord was over the town.
Then I went on to Dun-Cow, and had a meeting in the evening, and some
were turned to the Lord by His Spirit, as some also were at Warwick
and at Tewkesbury. We lay at Dun-Cow that night; we met with John
Camm, a faithful minister of the everlasting gospel. In the morning
there gathered a rude company of priests and people who behaved more
like beasts than men, for some of them came riding on horseback into
the room where we were; but the Lord gave us dominion over them.
Thence we passed into Leicestershire, and after that to Baddesley in
Warwickshire. Here William Edmundson, who lived in Ireland, having
some drawings upon his spirit to come into England to see me, met
with me; by whom I wrote a few lines to Friends then convinced in the
north of Ireland.[82]
Friends:
In that which convinced you, wait; that you may have that
removed you are convinced of. And all my dear Friends, dwell in
the life, and love, and power, and wisdom of God, in unity one
with another, and with God; and the peace and wisdom of God fill
all your hearts that nothing may rule in you but the life which
stands in the Lord God.
G. F.
[82] This William Edmundson was one of the first persons to
espouse and proclaim the principles of the Quakers in Ireland.
He had been a soldier in Cromwell's army, and he carried the
spirit and courage of an Ironside into the new service. He had
strange and unspeakably difficult experiences to endure in those
trying days of unsettlement in Ireland, but he was enabled to do
a great work for the cause which he served. He also had large and
valuable service in America.
When these few lines were read amongst the Friends in Ireland at
their meeting, the power of the Lord came upon all in the room.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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