Antichrist and oppression, welcomed with thankfulness the veteran of
another warfare; who, in conflict with a principalities and powers, and
spiritual wickedness in high places," had made his name a familiar one in
every English hamlet. "He and Thomas Goodyear," says Fox, "came to me,
and were both convinced, and received the truth." He soon after joined
the Society of Friends. In the spring of the next year he was in his
field following his plough, and meditating, as he was wont, on the great
questions of life and duty, when he seemed to hear a voice bidding him go
out from his kindred and his father's house, with an assurance that the
Lord would be with him, while laboring in his service. Deeply impressed,
he left his employment, and, returning to his house, made immediate
preparations for a journey. But hesitation and doubt followed; he became
sick from anxiety of mind, and his recovery, for a time, was exceedingly
doubtful. On his restoration to bodily health, he obeyed what he
regarded as a clear intimation of duty, and went forth a preacher of the
doctrines he had embraced. The Independent minister of the society to
which be had formerly belonged sent after him the story that he was the
victim of sorcery; that George Fox carried with him a bottle, out of
which he made people drink; and that the draught had the power to change
a Presbyterian or Independent into a Quaker at once; that, in short, the
Arch-Quaker, Fox, was a wizard, and could be seen at the same moment of
time riding on the same black horse, in two places widely separated. He
had scarcely commenced his exhortations, before the mob, excited by such
stories, assailed him. In the early summer of the year we hear of him in
Appleby jail. On his release, he fell in company with George Fox. At
Walney Island, he was furiously assaulted, and beaten with clubs and
stones; the poor priest-led fishermen being fully persuaded that they
were dealing with a wizard. The spirit of the man, under these
circumstances, may be seen in the following extract from a letter to his
friends, dated at "Killet, in Lancashire, the 30th of 8th Month, 1652:"--