Narrative Papers of George Fox (review)

BOOK REVIEWS AND NOTES Edited by Edwin B. Bronner Narrative Papers of George Fox. Edited by Henry J. Cadbury. Richmond, Indiana, Friends United Press 1972. 249 pp. including index. Introduction by the editor. $6.95 list; $4.95 subsidized. From manuscripts mostly found in Friends Library, London, Henry Cadbury has meticulously edited heretofore unpublished or uncollected letters and documents of narrative nature which reinforce or supplement the standard collections and histories of George Fox. In general these source materials corroborate others used in publication, although often enhancing them through variant readings of the same events or interpretations. The reconstructipn of Fox's notes regarding judgments upon persecutors of Quakers and the passages of Friends from place to place are of a more particular nature. These reconstructions constitute a second excursus into a difficult field of scholarship, the first being the highly significant Book of Miracles (1948) by which Cadbury reconstructed from notations, accounts of Fox's ministry of signs and healings. The inclusion of the letters showing the passages, or significant traveling of Friends in the ministry seems to me especially valuable for interpreting the Quaker movement. In some cases the spiritual admonitions had been placed in Fox's Epistles (first published in 1698) without the contextual narratives. Epistolatory admonitions to "inherit Gospel power" are enhanced by relating the exhortations to the "spread of Truth" in Holland, Germany, Barbados, New England and the West Indies, and with reference to the death of one (William Leddra) at Boston. Thus a "passage" letter of Fox in 1661 is shown as the context for material, portions of which were excerpted for Epistle 204. Such fine touches of a master historian make the book an especially valuable reference to the student of Quakerism. We have been in great debt to Henry Cadbury for having researched the calendaring of Georg· Fox's papers and having published a transcript of them in 1939 as the Annual Catalogue of George Fox's Papers. The Book of Miracles built en this work. The Narrative Papers is a good companion piece for die latter. The most extensive narrative in Cadbury's recent book is die 46 page folio manuscript, "How the Lord by his power and spirit did raise up Friends," which Gerald Croese used as one document in his General History of the Quakers (Latin, 1695; English, 1696). Using the rubric "h" from the Catalogue, Henry Cadbury interprets and annotates die source to show major parallels and minor déviances from the Spence MS and odier narrations which documented the Journal. As newly-discovered biblical scrolls have reinforced the basic integrity of the record so these narratives reinforce the Quaker record. Perhaps in the case of Fox as with canonical writers there is revealed an acute sense of the 124 BOOK REVIEWS125 acts of God to which one must be faithful. Although Ellwood's editorial work can be seen more clearly by examining these narrative papers (and some careless omissions rectified) his work is not denigrated by reference to parallel sources. Fox's keen memory and penchant for records-keeping is enhanced. So these collections make interesting reading. Unless we are completely antiquarian, however, the variant readings, as illustrated below, carry the same spiritual wallop and lay the burden of faithfulness upon us equally. While I was speaking, the constables drew towards the door, and the soldiers stood with dieir muskets in the yard. When I had done speaking, I kneeled down, and prayed, desiring the Lord to open the eyes and hearts of all people, high and low, that their minds might be turned to God by his Holy Spirit: that he might be glorified in all and over all. (Ellwood Journal, 1682, p. 555.) And so GF. went on with many other words, and then the Constables drew out towards die door and the soldiers stood with their muskets in die yard and G.F. kneeled down and prayed and desired the Lord to open the eyes and hearts of all people both high and low that their minds might be turned to God by his Holy Spirit that he may be glorified in all and over all. ("h" cited Narrative, p. 56) George Fox CollegeArthur...