Some Ranter Leaders and Their Opinions

THE BULLETIN OF Friends Historical Association Vol. 39Autumn Number, 1950No. 2 SOME RANTER LEADERS AND THEffi OPINIONS By Russell G. Schofield* THE RANTERS and the early Quakers had similar theological opinions and sometimes Ranters became Quakers or Quakers Ranters. George Fox met many Ranter groups and individuals.1 He recognized some as former Quakers who had "run out"2 from the truth. He tried to win them back to Quakerism but generally was unsuccessful. Other Quakers, who either had met Ranters or who had heard others say that the Quakers and Ranters were alike, always disavowed any connection with Ranterism. Thomas Story, writing in the year 1725, tells the following experience: One thing previous to this I have omitted, viz: that a little before night, some airy young persons threw in some reflections upon Friends going about naked, as they said, which could not be consisting with God to command. To which I replied, "That about the time that Friends first appeared, there was a sort of people called Ranters, who frequented our meetings, and mixing themselves among them, acted some unaccountable things, which were imputed unto us by such as could not or would not distinguish them from us; for which we were not accountable, they not being of us ... . "3 * Russell G. Schofield, who is Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge Junior College, has made a special study of the Ranters in seventeenth-century England. 1 The Journal of George Fox, ed. Norman Penney (London, 1924) , 27f, 36f, 45, 46f and passim. 2 Ibid., 256, 276, 287, 300. 3 The Friends Library, ed. William Evans and Thomas Evans (Philadelphia, 1841), X, 313f. Cf. VIII, 241f; XI, 148, 328; XIV, 417. 63 64Bulletin of Friends Historical Association It is quite easy to understand how the two groups were confused in the thinking of the authorities and in the minds of their contemporaries, but a closer examination of the Ranter opinions will show the differences. The principal Ranter opinions were written down by only a few leaders. Leaving out of consideration the mad ravings of John Tany, there were only four men whose written opinions have survived to our day. They are Jacob Bauthumley (Bottomley ), Joseph Salmon, Laurence Clarkson (Claxton), and Abiezer Coppe (Cop, Copp). The book which is the source for the ideas of Jacob Bauthumley is The Light and Dark Sides of God.* Bauthumley began with an extreme Pantheism which identified all being with God: ". . . there is nothing hath a Being, but thy Being is in it, and it is thy Being that gives it a Being. . . ."5 God makes himself known to all men although in some he is not so gloriously manifested: ". . . some live in the light side of God, and some in the dark side; But in respect of God, light and darkness are all one to him. . . ."e God is as much in the low and dark appearances as he is in the most glorious; God inhabits eternity and does not dwell in any circumscribed place, therefore he is in low spirits.7 Heaven is not some local place because God is not confined; heaven is within the individual, since God displays himself within the individual and heaven is naught but God at large.8 The scripture speaks of a glorious city with twelve gates and streets paved with gold, when actually it does nothing but point out the condition that God will appear in upon earth. The statement that a New Jerusalem is said to come down out of heaven means that God will make himself known to men 4 Portions of this book are quoted in Robert Barclay, The Inner Life of the Religious Societies of the Commonwealth (London, 1877) and in Theodor Sippell, Werdendes Quakertum (Stuttgart, 1937). Only short titles will be used in this article. 5 J. Bauthumley, The Light and Dark Sides of God (London, 1650) , 3. 6 Ibid., 10. 7 Ibid., 18. 8 Ibid., 14 Some Ranter Leaders and Their Opinions65 through spiritual manifestations so that men will not need the outward or external form, or the teachings of other men; God will teach men directly by his light within.9 Hell, in similar fashion, is within the individual...