It seemed to both the Churchmen and the Puritans that these Quakers were breaking away from all forms of religion; they did not believe in baptism nor in the communion service; they would not listen to clergymen or hired preachers, and often they sat silent in their meetings, only speaking when one of them felt inspired to address them. Quietness was their watchword, and so they condemned all sports and games, theaters, dancing, card playing; they disapproved of soldiers and of fighting; they kept out of politics, and they dressed as soberly as possible. Their leader, George Fox, was a strange person, very brave but very excitable, and he managed to rouse discussion wherever he went. Again and again he was put in jail; he was stoned and abused and laughed at; but such was his power that more and more people came to follow him, and admired and reverenced and loved him. It may seem strange that the Quakers should have appealed so strongly to a youth like William Penn, who was a gentleman commoner at the most aristocratic college in England, a good-looking, popular, sport-loving fellow, surrounded by the sons of noblemen and courtiers. The answer must be that he was by nature serious-minded and very much interested in questions of religion. More than that, he had in him a strong streak of heroism which made it easy for him to throw his whole soul into a cause that appealed to him. Whatever Penn was he was never lukewarm, but ardent and fiery and always tremendously in earnest. He left Oxford after about two years, and there is a story that he was expelled because he and some friends refused to obey a college rule about the wearing of gowns and tore off the surplices that were worn by the Church of England students. He had heard the Quaker preacher Thomas Loe, and although he had not actually joined the Society of Friends he was already largely of a mind to. From college he went to his father's house in London, and then Admiral Sir William Penn found that his son was not at all the worldly-minded youth he had hoped, but a young man of quite a different sort. He did not care for the life of a cavalier or court gallant, but wanted to go to strange religious meetings. The Admiral begged and entreated, threatened and stormed, used arguments and even blows, and finally in a fit of rage drove his son from his house. But Lady Penn pleaded for her son, and the Admiral at length allowed William to return to his home. CHAPTER II THE EARLY QUAKERS