The Quakers in English Society, 1650-1725 (review)

86Quaker History well as lewd and drunken behavior both before and after his temporary removal during the civil war and interregnum. The wide range in Gyford's choice of episodes also provides a broad picture of community life: cases illustrating disrespect for church court officials, the alleged oversupply of alehouses in Witham, fear ofvagrants, charges ofwitchcraft, and the case ofamanthrown down some stairs by others and consideredby ajury to have died from a "divine visitation." Quakers receive attention with the visits ofFox, Parnell, and Caton to the county and the establishment of meetings at Witham and elsewhere. Charitable and educational efforts as well as Friends' sufferings and defections are noted. Depiction ofthe Quaker John Freeborne's house is among nearly 40 drawings by Ray Brown that, together with maps and reproductions of primary sources, greatly enhance the book's value and attractiveness. There are also useful attempts at quantification supported by graphs and tables, although sometimes the numbers are so small as to be of questionable significance. Missing fromthe discussion ofdissent, however, are the Muggletonians who were in Braintree in the last half of the 1 7th century. They and the Quakers engaged in one ofthe most bitter pamphlet wars of the century, and they were also the only two radical religious movements arising in mid-century that lasted much beyond that time (see my The Acts ofthe Witnesses, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999). Although intended primarily for local readers, persons with no connections at all to this geographical area will find Public Spirit an interesting work, and those desirous ofwriting their own local histories can learn much from it. T. L. UnderwoodUniversity of Minnesota, Morris The Quakers in English Society, 1650-1 725. By Adrian Davies. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000. xvi + 262 pp. Map, illustrations, appendixes, tables, notes, bibliography, and index. $65. For a book dealing with Quakers, whose commitment to veracity led them to name themselves "Friends ofthe Truth," this book is exasperating. It is a fine work, based on extensive research, and informed by clear questions relating to English social history after the mid-seventeenth century; practically every one ofits short chapters—many run less than ten pages, one shorts out at six—sparkles with conclusive insights that bear remembering and continued reflection. All ofthat is hardly exasperating. What is is that Davies, or more likely his publisher or the editors ofthe Oxford Historical Monographs ofwhich this book is a part, insisted that he give his 1986 Oxford dissertation on Book Reviews87 "Quakers in Essex, 1655-1725" a new title and publish it. Now we have an essentially shortened dissertationthat expands the original researchnot one whit, other than adding a tiny handful ofpost-1986 book and article titles; practically every example Davies adduces relates to Quakers in Essex and relies onresearchhe didadecade and ahalfago inthe EssexRecordOffices. Moreover, much ofhis research ends about 1689, relatively little going up to 1725. In his conclusion, he specifically champions the value of "local" studies rather than looking exclusively at a group's national leaders; such helpful comments clearly undercut the book's promise and makes a reader feel cheated by a work whose title commits to much more. Davies demonstrates that Quakers in the early days were at odds with their larger society and that the authorities and ordinary folk were correct in regarding them as enemies of the standing order. Yet, somewhat surprisingly , in thehamlets ofEssex theywere alsowell integrated into the society, particularly as the years went by, and held positions of trust as they moderated extreme positions. Davies underscores the erratic nature oflaw enforcement, the ties forged by close association ofpeople who lived sideby -side, and the willingness to value public spiritedness in whomever it mightbe found, allpart ofthe complexitythatmarked English society in the period covered. In such fashions, he believes, Essex Quakers contributed to a broader tolerance characterizing the larger social order. As the broader society had its impact on them, so they influenced it. From a religious perspective, all this was unfortunate, for as Davies shows the new respectability won by the Friends not only cost them their earlier explosion in numbers but also much of their religious fervor; they became "urbane" and acceptable. In this...