USA > Pennsylvania > Chronicles of Pennsylvania from the English revolution to the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1688-1748, Vol. I > Part 18
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"reviling words" were not true, and whether the ex- pressions and certain practices of his enemies were not condemnable. The 9th of these questions was based upon the use of force against Babbitt and his men, as mentioned in the last preceding chapter, and inquired whether the twenty-eight condemners of Keith had not better have condemned some of themselves for hiring men to fight, commissioning them, as one preacher had done, and so, by force of arms, recovering a sloop, and taking privateers. There will be little doubt that the hiring of men to fight, and the providing of Indians with powder and lead to fight other Indians, against which practices the 10th question was directed, was incon- sistent with the peace principles of Friends. Question No. 11 was whether it was according to the Gospel that ministers should pass sentence of death on malefac- tors, as some had done, "preaching one day not to take an eye for an eye, another day taking life for life?" In this connection, it may be remarked that the bishops in the English House of Lords do not ad- judge matters of treason or capital crime. This 11th question, which may have been suggested by Opde- graves, a former Mennonite, brought forward the diffi- culty in conscience which had induced Quakers else- where and all Mennonites to keep aloof from admin- istering secular government. Bradford, the printer, having taken side with Keith, printed this Appeal.
Thereupon began proceedings which amounted to religious persecution by indirection, although it took the form of prosecution for slander, and for unlicensed use of the press, and could be justified if the acts of some modern judges of our own day in punishing for contempt of court can be. Those whose conduct had been animadverted upon in this published Appeal, who probably had previously, in another situation, contended for liberty of conscience and of the press, now per- suaded themselves that bitter words against magis-
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trates uttered in religious controversy, and questions whether their executing offices was consistent with their principles, tended to overthrow the government. They proceeded against the printer. A warrant was signed by Samuel Richardson and Robert Ewer, Jus- tices; and the Sheriff and a constable entered Brad- ford's shop, and seized all the copies of the Appeal which could be found, and took Bradford before the Justices. John McComb, who was alleged to have cir- culated two copies, was also arrested. Refusing to give security to answer at the next court, Bradford and McComb were committed to jail by warrant dated Aug. 24, 1692, signed by Justices Cooke, Jennings, and Humphrey Morrey, as well as Robert Ewer. On an- other warrant, Bradford's house was searched, and his type taken away. The day after the commitment of Bradford and McComb, Justices Cooke, Jennings, Richardson, Morrey, Ewer, and Anthony Morris asked the only Justices who were not Quakers, viz: Lasse Cock, a Swede, and John Holmes, a Baptist, to join in taking steps against "the seditious and dangerous," but Cock and Holmes told their five colleagues that the whole matter was a religious difference, and did not relate to the government. Holmes asked them to send for Keith, and offered to join them if it then appeared that Keith struck at the government. This not being done, Cock and Holmes withdrew. The others then issued a proclamation describing Keith as a seditious person and enemy to the King and Queen's government, in that Keith had publicly reviled Thomas Lloyd, the Deputy-Governor, calling him an impudent man, telling him that he was not fit to be Governor, and that his name would stink, and in that Keith had misrepresented the industry, care, readiness, and vigilance of some magistrates and others in the proceedings against some privateers. The point was made in the document that to grant that it was inconsistent for ministers of the
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gospel to act as magistrates, would render the "Pro- prietary incapable of the powers given him by the King's letters patent, and so prostitute the validity of every act of government more especially in the execu- tive part thereof to the courtesie and censure of all factious spirits." After explaining that the procedure against those in the Sheriff's custody, and what was intended against others, respected only the tendency to sedition and disturbance, and did not relate to dif- ference in religion, the proclamation warned against giving countenance to any contemners of authority, and against further publishing of the pamphlet called the Appeal. It is declared in New England's Spirit of Persecution Transmitted to Pennsilvania that Keith never spoke the aforesaid words except in Monthly Meetings and religious controversies, and that Lloyd had several times said that he would take no advantage of what was being said.
Bradford and McComb asked for a trial at the ap- proaching term of Court, but the case was continued until December, and McComb's license to keep an inn was revoked. Meanwhile Bradford retired from his employment of printing for Friends. The restraint upon the two was indeed relaxed by the Sheriff : McComb's wife lying ill, he was let off daily, and even at night, to visit her, and afterwards both he and Brad- ford were allowed to go about their business, on giving their word to appear. But they or their advisers saw the dramatic effect of their writing a statement from prison, so, having prepared a statement to the public, they went to the Sheriff's house, which served as jail, and which communicated by a common entry with the house adjoining, and, the Sheriff being out, so that they could get in no further, they signed their names in the entry. With more frankness, to show the unfairness of the claim that the Appeal was subversive of govern- ment, the three judgments complained of by Keith, the
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Answer, and the Appeal were then printed in one pamphlet. The Appeal was set up on posts in Phila- delphia nine days before the time appointed for the Yearly Meeting.
The Yearly Meeting was held that year in Burlington on the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th days of 7th month. It is evident that those who gave the judgment appealed from, were not willing to submit the subject to the general company of Friends attending: Keith, if given the opportunity to make a speech, was to be feared. He and his supporters conferred together in the Court House, and sent to the Meeting a paper asking for an answer to the Appeal, or requesting their adversaries to allow a fair hearing before impartial Friends an hour after the close of the meeting for worship on the second day of meeting. The messenger found the door of the meeting-house crowded, with the object, he sup- posed, of keeping out the Keith party; whereupon the messenger got up into the window, and stood there while he read, probably both letter and Appeal, nor did he desist when Thomas Janney started to pray, which the Keithians believed to be an expedient to stop the reading. It is not necessary here to examine the ques- tion, who had the standing to be considered in adjourn- ing the sittings, or taking the action of Yearly Meetings. Many who claimed impartiality, as not having been concerned actually on either side, met at the time Keith desired for a hearing. Lloyd and his party were then sent for, but refused to come, and those in attendance adjourned until an hour after the public meeting the next day. Then Lloyd and his party again refused to come. Then or on the previous day some ministers came to offer a hearing on the last day of the Meeting, but these were sent away, because Keith would not agree: he knew that the large attendance, on which he depended for victory, would not continue so long. The following, who may have included a number of New
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Jersey ministers, then declared Lloyd and his party in default, and proceeded to hear Keith, and decided in his favor:
Robert Turner
Andrew Smith
Elias Burling
William Hixon
John Reid
John Pancoast
Charles Read
Henry Burcham
Thomas Coborne
Thomas Hearse
Harmon Updengraves
John Jones
Thomas Powell
Joseph Willcox
Nathaniel Fitzrandal
Thomas Godfrey
Joseph Richards
John Budd
Edmund Wells
Roger Parke
Thomas Kimber
Caleb Wheatly
Edward White
Abraham Brown
Thomas Gladwin
John Hampton
Thomas Rutter
Daniel Bacon
Edward Smith
Joseph Adams
Benjamin Morgan
Edward Guy
Joseph Sharp
Bernard Devonish
William Thomas
Samuel Ellis
John Bainbridge
Thomas Cross
John Snowden
James Moore
William Black
Thomas Jenner
William Snowden
John Harper
Nathaniel Walton
Robert Wheeler
Robert Roe
Emanuel Smith
Peter Boss
Peter Daite
Thomas Bowles
Richard Sery
William Budd
George Willcox
James Silver
William Wells
Samuell Taylor
Isaac Jacobs Van Biber
Griffith Jones
Cornelius Scivers
William Righton
William Snead David Sherkis
Thomas Kendall
Samuell Houghton
John Carter
John Neall
Henry Paxon
Anthony Woodward
Thomas Tindal.
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They signed as from the Yearly Meeting, on behalf of themselves and "many more Friends who are one with us herein," a declaration that Keith and his friends were not guilty of the division leading to the setting up of separate meetings, that Lloyd and the rest of the twenty-eight should recall their paper of condemna- tion, and condemn the same in writing, and that the public Friends charged with misdemeanors and ill be- havior should forbear speaking in public meetings until they cleared themselves. The declaration, or de- cision, with the signatures was printed: a reprint of the whole is in Mrs. Thomas Potts James's Memorial of Thomas Potts. We are more familiar with other forms of some of the surnames, such as Fitz Randolph (now Randolph of Phila. and N. J.), Updengraff, van Bebber, &ct. A Confession of Faith, probaly the one prepared by Keith, as before mentioned, was also issued under date of 7mo. 7, 1692. It was subsequently printed by Bradford. It appears that those remaining in attendance at the meeting-house either treated Keith's appeal as not prosecuted before them, or for- mally confirmed the judgment against him, the latter action being mentioned by Gough. A contrite letter dated 11, 31, 1692, from Caleb Wheatly, aforesaid signer in favor of Keith, saying that he had been blinded by fond, foolish affection for Keith, is printed by Gough.
As hinted in the Justices' proclamation, Keith could be caught under Chapter XXVIII of the Great Law of 1682, that any person convicted of speaking, writing, or any act tending to sedition or disturbance of the peace should be fined not less than 20s., or else under Chapter XXIX, that any person convicted of speaking slightingly or carrying himself abusively against any magistrate or person in office should suffer acording to the quality of the magistrate and nature of the offence, but not less than a fine of 20s. or ten days imprison-
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ment at hard labor. Both of these statutes allowed much latitude to the judges imposing sentence, although Chapter XXVIII did not admit of imprisonment, ex- cept as resulting from non-payment of a heavy fine, whereas Chapter XXIX contemplated a severe pun- ishment when the magistrate in question was the high- est officer in the Province, as was Thomas Lloyd. It seems straining the meaning to say that putting to death was authorized. Overt acts of sedition, rioting, &ct. seem to have been so punishable, by the laws of England in this regard not having been superseded. As to one who had done more than print or circulate a pamphlet, or write a scurrilous letter, it was to be expected, from the tone of the proclamation, that in some process or proceeding emanating from them or other members of their party invested with the author- ity, there would be the formal charge of sedition. We can not suppose that there was any likelihood of Keith suffering death, but the possibility of it was not only set forth by him, some years later, apparently as a claim to hearing and consideration, but, indeed, was mentioned by his old antagonist, Rev. Cotton Mather, before Keith's statement, at least the one known to the present writer, appeared. Mather said in his Decen- nium Luctuosum, printed in Boston in 1699 (reprinted in Narratives of Indian Wars 1675-1699) : " 'tis verily thought that poor George would have been made a sacrifice to Squire Samuel Jennings and the rest of the Pennsylvania dragons [is there an allusion to St. George and the dragon?]; and that since a crime which their laws had made capital was mentioned in the mittimus whereby Keith was committed, they would have hang'd him, if a revolution upon their government had not set him at liberty." Keith's statement was "I was presented by a grand jury at Philadelphia, and the presentment would have been prosecuted if the government had not been changed, and I had been ac-
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cused for endeavoring to alter the government, which is capital by their law, and they would have found me guilty of death, had they not been turned out of the government, tho' I was innocent, and when I objected against the jury, they would not suffer one of the jury to be cast." Perhaps he meant the Grand Jury.
The actual proceedings in the County Court, as far as ascertained, were as follows. Boss, Budd, Keith, Bradford, and McComb, having been indicted by the grand jury of Philadelphia County, were arraigned for trial in December, 1692. The Justices sitting through the proceedings were Jennings, Cooke, Rich- ardson, Ewer, Henry Waddy, and Griffith Owen, Quakers, and Holmes, the Baptist, but Turner, a Keithian, attended on the 10 and 12th of the month, and Cock, the Swede, and Anthony Morris attended on the 12th. When Bradford and McComb, apparently the first ones to be tried, appeared, a Justice upraided them for "standing so before the Court." McComb said "You can order our hats taken off." Probably the Quaker Justices did not proceed to such incon- sistency. About thirty years after this, when, as Chancellor of the Court of Equity, Sir William Keith -no near relative of George-ordered John Kinsey's hat to be taken off, strong exception was taken to such interference with Quaker custom, and, on the next day, the Chancellor made an order that thenceforth, in the Courts of the Province, every man should remain covered or uncovered according to his persuasion. We may here recall the story which Miss Strickland, in her Queens of England, tells of King James II, when, for the first time after his accession, receiving William Penn. Penn came with his hat on, whereupon the King took off his own, and, on Penn being surprised, naïvely remarked that it was the custom in that place for "only one man to wear a hat."
The vindication of the dignity of Lloyd and the
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Quaker ministers in the judiciary was not left in the hands of impartial men, and, in the proceedings in Court, there was a neglect of the proprieties which only the scarcity of lawyers, judges, and jurors dis- connected with the controversy can, as to some points, excuse. The public prosecutor, or Attorney-General, John Moore, being an adherent of the Church of Eng- land, David Lloyd was appointed to conduct the prose- cution. Jennings sat on the bench with the other Judges, even in the trial of Boss, although refraining from joining in the judgment, or the fixing of the fines. Keith made a speech, but declined to plead in form, and was marked "Nihil dicit;" the others, particularly Boss, putting themselves on trial, excepted to the Quakers on the jury as prejudiced, some especially so, against Keith and all who favored him, but the major- ity of the Judges would not allow the exceptions, although the Baptist Judge wished to; and one of the twenty-eight who signed the paper of condemnation against Keith, and against whom Boss's letter was written, actually sat on this jury. However, to the credit of Quakers be it spoken, the jurors, or at least enough to control the verdict, were rather scrupulous, and gave a verdict satisfactory to the prosecution only in the case of Boss, whom they found guilty of trans- gressing the XXIXth Chapter of the Law. He was accordingly fined 6l., in default of paying which he remained a prisoner until after the change of govern- ment. In Budd's case, the jury, after sitting all night, found him simply guilty of saying that Jennings be- haved himself too high and imperiously in worldly courts. It was claimed that this was no conviction on the indictment. However, Budd was fined 5l. Brad- ford, denying that the Appeal was seditious, asserted the advanced principle that the jury must find both that it was seditious, and that he had printed it. This protection to liberty was not allowed: a majority of
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the Judges declared that whether it was seditious was a question for the Judges, and that all the jury had to do was to say whether he had printed it. To prove that fact, his printing frame was sent to the jury after he had retired, without it being exhibited in open court. The jurors in this case remained out forty-eight hours, and then came in to ask a question, and were sent back, according to the barbarous method of forcing a decision,-it was Winter,-without meat, drink, fire, or tobacco. In the afternoon, they returned and said that they could not agree, and were discharged. McComb appears to have been acquitted or discharged; for Gough says that he afterwards was so just as to give a true state of the case. Budd and Keith asked for an appeal to the Provincial Court, but this was denied. They then asked for an appeal to the King and Queen under the Vth article of the Charter to Penn. This, too, was denied, Justice Robert Turner dissenting, as he had done on several points. However guilty the various accused had been of discrediting the civil gov- ernment, and even if the circumstances had not miti- gated their offence, there is no wonder that, reading the report of these trials in New England's Spirit of Persecution transmitted to Pennsilvania, and even be- fore hearing of any danger to the life of Keith, people outside of the Province felt, that, if such were Quaker methods, no man could trust his liberty or property to a trial by Quakers. Whether the law had been stretched too far or not, the fact remained that both liberty and property had been taken away judicially by the oppos- ing party in a religious dispute. Should a case arise where the legal penalty clearly involved loss of life, would not the Quakers vindicate their authority in the same way as the Congregationalists of New England? This suspicion had nothing to do with the assumption, described in the next chapter, of the government by the Crown. That change had already been ordered. What
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was the occasion of the letter of Lloyd and others to Keith shortly after the Court adjourned, is not known.
The indictment or a fresh one was pending against Keith when the new Governor assumed authority. Keith, in his aforesaid statement about being accused of a capital offence, goes on to say that this representa- tive of the Crown "ordered them to let fall the indict- ment, and I was cleared by a public writ signed by the Deputy Governor Col. Markham and the Council." The only record found bearing on this is the minute of Fletcher's Council for June 20, 1693, Markham pre- siding, that George Keith (printed "Seith" in Colo- nial Records, Vol. I.) exhibited a letter to Keith dated 10th month 26, 1692, from Thomas Lloyd, Samll. Jen- nings, Arthur Cooke, and Jno. Delaval, charging him with being crazy, turbulent, a decrier of magistracy, and a notorious evil instrument in Church and State; whereupon Fletcher's Council issued a certificate of Keith's good behavior. The fines against Keith and Budd, which the Quaker government had not attempted to collect, were remitted, as well as Boss's, by Fletcher, who released Boss from prison, and caused Bradford's tools and type to be returned to him.
It was the Keithian Monthly Meeting which, at Phila- delphia, on 8mo. 13, 1693, gave forth "an exhortation and caution to Friends concerning buying or keeping of negroes." This, except what was expressed at a gathering in Germantown in 1688, was the first anti- slavery declaration of the Quakers.
Keith and Budd went to England about the end of 1693. Jennings and Thomas Duckett went about the same time, to circumvent them. Keith and Budd at- tended the next Yearly Meeting in London, where Jennings and Thomas Duckett appeared against them from America, and were supported by the visiting Friends, Thomas Wilson and James Dickenson. The Meeting declared that Keith had done ill in printing
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and publishing the differences, and asked him to call in his books, or publish something to clear the body of Quakers. Thomas Ellwood submitted on the 2nd day an epistle warning against him, and obtained leave to print it. Keith being no more inclined to submission than most reformers, the next Yearly Meeting, on May 25, 1695, after hearing him through, disowned him, ex- plaining that this was not for doctrine, but for his unbearable temper and carriage and refusal to with- draw his charges against the Philadelphia Quakers.
Keith then hired the Turners' Hall, Philpot Lane, London, and there, in Quaker garb, he preached and administered baptism and communion. Köster the Pietist (see chapter on the Germans), or more likely his biographer Rathlef, misunderstanding him, strangely accounts for the Keithians of Pennsylvania delaying to practise these ordinances from Keith's Anglican mis- givings about a layman doing so, misgivings which Köster as a Lutheran did not have. The Keithians of Pennsylvania, we are told, being twitted with not practising what they showed their belief in, several of them who had not been baptized in infancy induced Köster to immerse them in the Delaware River. It was a few years after this, and when various Pennsylvania Keithians had gone different ways, that Keith entered the ministry of the Established Church. He gave his reasons for so doing in a farewell sermon at the Hall on May 5, 1700, and was made deacon by the Bishop of London seven days later. Keith's further career will be mentioned in connection with the Church of England.
Although it has been stated that some of the Keitli- ians reunited with the regular organization of the Society of Friends, no instance has been found of any prominent one doing so. Robert Turner and others of those who were inhabitants of the City are recorded in the list kept by William Hudson of persons deceased
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"not Friends." Nor did a movement back to the So- ciety break up the Keithian meetings at Southampton, Lower Dublin, or Providence. Equally untrue is the idea that Christ Church, Philadelphia, the Mother of the Episcopal Churches of the City and the Province, was started by or absorbed most of the Keithians. The greatest trend was towards the Baptists, but a number, after being immersed, were keepers of Saturday as the day of rest and worship, and joined the Seventh Day Baptists.
According to Rev. Morgan Edwards's Materials towards a History of the Baptists in Pennsylvania, William Davis and Thomas Rutter in 1697 were im- mersed by Rev. Thomas Killingworth, a First Day, or regular, Baptist minister from Norfolk, England, who had a small congregation at Cohansey, New Jersey. Davis joined the Pennypack Baptist Church, but was expelled on Feb. 17, 1698, for heresy as to the Divine and human natures in Christ. John Hart seems to have led the non-seceding members of his First Day Meeting to the house of John Swift in Southampton Township, where they joined other Keithians. To these Hart preached. He was immersed by Rutter in 1697. For a while at least, Hart and his followers were among those convinced of the obligation to keep Saturday as the Sabbath, but he, in 1702, and most of the other Keithians of Southampton sooner or later joined Pennypack Baptist Church. Evan Morgan was also immersed by Rutter in or about 1697, and became a minister in 1706.
. Perhaps it should be here noted that the Pennypack Church bid fair to become flourishing, a not inconsider- able number of Baptists from Pembrokeshire and Car- marthanshire, who had organized in 1701 at Milford, came over that year to Philadelphia with their minister, Rev. Thomas Griffiths, and went to the Pennypack. However, they insisted upon the ceremony of laying on
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of hands, and so could not be in fellowship with the others, and, in 1703, bought 30,000 acres, since known as the Welsh Tract, in New Castle Co., and removed thither. From the Welsh Tract Church, missions and perhaps emigrants founded several congregations, among them that of the Great Valley (in Tredyffrin Township, Chester Co.), instituted in 1711 with Rev. Hugh Davis, an ordained minister from Wales. The Pennypack Church died out, and the views and prac- tices of the Welsh Tract people spread through the Baptist denomination of Penn's colony.
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