The Leveller Tracts, 1647-1653 (review)

38 BULLETIN OF FRIENDS HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION The final essay is appropriately by Frank Aydelotte, for many years the president of Swarthmore College, under whom William I. Hull served. It is an evaluation of George Fox's character and way of life and vividly paints the career of this man on the canvas of his time. This series of essays gives interesting glimpses of various aspects of Quaker life from the time of Fox down to the present. Some are entertaining , some stimulating and some informative, although one does not feel that all of them hold as much food for thought as they might. On the whole, Pendle Hill and especially Howard Brinton are to be congratulated for the good editorial work and the contribution this series of essays makes to Quaker history. William Penn College.Arthur J. Mekeel The Leveller Tracts, 1647-1653. Edited by William Haller and Godfrey Davies. New York, Columbia University Press, 1944. 481 pp. $6.50. THIS is a notable book and a "must book" for persons who are interested in the birth of democracy and in the preservation of its principles and ideals. It is furthermore a book of peculiar interest for members of the Society of Friends, for John Lilburne became a Quaker, and a remarkable one. The term "Leveller" has usually been misunderstood and thought of as representing an extreme "leftist" movement, and the "Levellers" have not received the attention they deserve at the hands of most historians. Lilburne is barely mentioned in J. R. Green's History of the English People. The word "Leveller," like "Quaker," was a term of reproach, used to blacken and arouse hostility against the democratic tendencies in the Commonwealth Army. It was used originally to designate persons who insisted on "an equality of right to choose and be chosen" in the sphere of political government. The Levellers very soon constituted a weighty party, became a formidable factor, and, under Lilburne's brilliant leadership and pamphleteering , a constant thorn in Cromwell's side. The main writers of the pamphlets were Lilburne, Walwyn and Overton. These tracts powerfully express the voice of the people, their political, economic, religious and social grievances, and a program of reforms, based on history and legal rights. They are pleas for the common rights of Englishmen, especially for the right to be heard. This is a precious collection of documents that have in them the life blood of the democratic way, and they are vital and opportune for these times. Their editors and the Columbia University Press have done us all a memorable service. I shall dwell especially upon the contribution of John Lilburne, a great many of whose tracts on fundamental liberties are here printed, and who was the outstanding leader of this movement for equal rights. Lilburne, Vol. 34, Spring 1945 BOOK REVIEWS39 whom Carlyle describes as "a fuliginous man," has in recent times come to be recognized, though not yet sufficiently, as a person of large significance in the agelong fight for human rights, and one of the brave creators of democracy. He was born in the County of Durham in 1618. He had a distinguished career as a soldier in the first Civil War and became lieutenant-colonel, and in this early period he was a friend and admirer of Cromwell, and, until Lilburne showed his hand, Cromwell was his friend, though he later poured vials of wrath upon his head. Few men have ever had to suffer a more continuous line of persecution than Lilburne. He was whipped, pilloried, fined, and loaded with irons by the Star Chamber in his early manhood, and after his disillusionment over the outcome of the Civil War, and his powerful demand for "equal justice, impartially distributed to all men," and the break with Cromwell, he endured a series of imprisonments, in Newgate, in the Tower of London, and in a variety of prisons. He was banished for a time from England. But no method was found to stop his pen from producing his fiery and extremely popular tracts on justice and liberty for all men. He was a foe to tithes and to parliamentary control of religion. He advocated the abolition of imprisonment...