QUAKER CONFESSIONS.
The Quakers are more radical than the Independents and the Baptists. They utterly broke with historical Christianity, and reject its visible ordinances, which the Independents and the Baptists retained. They kept aloof from the Puritans, and would have nothing whatever to do with the national English or any other Church or sect in Christendom. They oppose all outward authority in religion, though it be the letter of the Bible itself.
With such views they can not consistently recognize any binding standards of doctrine which might obstruct the freedom of interpretation of the divine Word under the direct illumination of the Spirit.
Nevertheless, with all their radicalism, the Quakers retained the substance of the Christian faith, and, following the example of the early Christians, they set forth their tenets in a number of apologies against the misrepresentations of their enemies. The first 'Confession and Profession of Faith in God' was published by Richard Farnsworth in 1658. Similar apologetic documents followed in 1659 and 1661 by George Fox the Younger, in 1662 by John Crook, in 1664 by William Smith, in 1668 by William Penn, in 1671 by Whitehead and Perm, in 1698 by Penn and others, in 1671, 1675, and 1682 by George Fox. [1653]
The ablest and most authoritative exposition of the belief of the Quakers is the 'Apology' of Robert Barclay, written in his quiet retreat in Ury, Scotland, 1675, and addressed to Charles II. It is his most elaborate work, and is still held in the highest estimation by the orthodox Friends. He pays the school-divinity the compliment that, although it takes up almost a man's whole life-time to learn, it 'brings not a whit nearer to God, neither makes any man less wicked or more righteous.' 'Therefore,' he continues, 'hath God laid aside the wise and the learned and the disputers of this world, and hath chosen a few despicable and unlearned instruments as he did fishermen of old, to publish his pure and naked truth, and to free it of those mists and fogs wherewith the clergy hath clouded it.' Nevertheless, Barclay makes use of a considerable amount of learning--classical, patristic, and modern--for the defense of his views.
The 'Catechism' of Barclay (written in 1673) treats in fourteen chapters of the doctrines of the Christian faith, and answers the questions in the language of the Bible, without addition or comment, evidently for the purpose of showing the entire harmony of the Quakers with the written Word of God. Their distinctive peculiarities are skillfully put into the question, and the Scripture passages are so selected as to confirm them. [1654] To the Catechism is added a brief 'Confession of Faith,' in twenty-three Articles, which is almost entirely composed of Scripture passages.
THE DISTINCTIVE PRINCIPLES OF THE FRIENDS.
The Friends are few in number, but honorably distinguished for their philanthropy, their consistent advocacy of religious freedom and the universal rights of men, their zeal in behalf of prison reform, the abolition of slavery and war. In private and social life they excel in simplicity, honesty, neatness, temperance, self-control, industry, and thrift. Their oddities in dress and habits are the shadows of virtues.
In theology and religion they are on the extreme border of Protestant orthodoxy, and reject even a regular ministry and the visible sacraments; yet they strongly believe in the supernatural and the constant presence and power of the Holy Spirit. They hold the essentials of the evangelical faith, the divine inspiration and infallibility of the Scriptures (though they disparage the letter and the human means of interpretation), the doctrine of the Trinity (in substance, though not in name), [1655] the incarnation, the divinity of Christ, the atonement by his blood, the regeneration and sanctification by the Spirit, everlasting life and everlasting punishment. And while they deny the necessity of water baptism and the Lord's Supper as a participation of the elements of bread and wine, and regard such rites as a relapse into the religion of forms and shadows, they believe in the inward substance or invisible grace of the sacraments, viz., the baptism of the Spirit and fire, and the vital communion with Christ by faith. They belong to the supernaturalistic line of Protestant dissenters, while the Socinians and Unitarians tend in the opposite rationalistic direction.
Several of the peculiar views and practices of the Quakers were anticipated by Carlstadt, the Zwickau Prophets, the Mennonites, and especially by Caspar von Schwenkfeld, a pious and retiring nobleman of Silesia (born 1490, banished 1548, d. 1561 at Ulm). Schwenkfeld embraced and preached the doctrines of the Lutheran Reformation with zeal till 1524, when he adopted, as by a higher revelation, a peculiar view of the Lord's Supper, explaining the words of institution to mean, My body is this bread, i.e., spiritual nourishment for the soul. [1656] He also taught the deification of Christ's flesh, and opposed bibliolatry and all outward ecclesiasticism. A small remnant of his sect that was banished from Germany still survives in the eastern counties of Pennsylvania. [1657] There is, however, no historical connection between George Fox and these predecessors. His views were entirely his own. The history of the Roman Catholic Church furnishes a parallel in the quietism of Miguel de Molinos (1627-1698), who taught that Christian perfection consists in the sweet repose of all the mental faculties in God, and in indifference to all the actions of the body. He was condemned as a heretic by Pope Innocent XI. (1687), and shut up for life in a monastic prison.
Quakerism is a system of mystic spiritualism. It is the only organized sect of mystics in England and America. The strong practical common-sense of the English race is constitutionally averse to mystic tendencies. Quakerism is an extreme reaction against ecclesiasticism, sacerdotalism, and sacramentalism. It demonstrates the paramount importance of the spirit in opposition to the worship of the letter; the superiority and independence of the inward and invisible in opposition to the overestimate of the external and visible; and the power of silence against the excess of speech.
Christianity undoubtedly is spirit and life, and may exist under different forms, or if necessary without form, like the spirit in the disembodied state. But the normal condition is a sound spirit in a sound body, and while God is independent of his own ordinances, we are bound to them. The Quakers make the exception the rule, but by the law of reaction formalism takes revenge. Their antiformalism becomes itself a stereotyped form, and their peculiar hats and coats are as distinctive as the clerical surplice and gown. When they leave their Society they usually join the Episcopal Church, the most formal among the Protestant denominations.