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George Fox
George Fox (1624 - 1691). English Dissenter, founder of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire. Apprenticed as a shoemaker, he left home at 19, seeking spiritual truth amid Puritan and Anglican tensions. In 1647, after visions and direct experiences of God, he began preaching an “inner light” accessible to all, rejecting clergy and formal worship. By 1652, he gathered followers in northern England, forming the Quakers, known for pacifism and simplicity. Fox traveled across England, Ireland, the Netherlands, and America, enduring eight imprisonments for his beliefs, including at Lancaster Castle. He wrote Journal (1694) and numerous letters, shaping Quaker theology with calls for equality and justice. Married to Margaret Fell in 1669, a key Quaker leader, they had no children, but she had eight from her prior marriage. His 1660 Declaration rejected violence, influencing conscientious objection. Fox’s emphasis on personal revelation transformed Protestantism, and his writings remain central to Quaker thought.
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George Fox preaches about following the example of Christ as innocent lambs, enduring persecution and suffering with patience and love, ultimately obtaining the crown of eternal life. He encourages believers to let patience have its perfect work, to not strive but to bear all things with love, and to remain faithful in the face of trials, trusting in the victory that comes from God. Fox emphasizes the importance of enduring joyfully, leaving judgment to God, and staying rooted in the seed that will overcome all evil.
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Epistle 346
My dear friends,—To whom is my love, and to the rest of Friends that aways. And my desire is, that you may all suffer as lambs of Christ; ‘for when he was reviled, he reviled not again; and he gave his back and cheek to the strikers and smiters, and his hair to be plucked off [Isa 50:6] , and was as a ‘lamb led dumb before his shearers, and he opened not his mouth [Isa 53:7];’ though he was the King of kings, and Lord of lords [Rev 19:16]: and so left his followers and believers an example, that they should follow him, like innocent lambs; for the Lamb and the saints have the victory [Rev 17:14/Dan 7:22] over all the tearers, and strikers, and pluckers, and devourers, and persecutors. And so let patience have its perfect work [Jas 1:4] in you and among you, in which you run the race, and do obtain the crown of eternal life [Heb 12:1/1 Cor 9:24f]. And do not strive, but keep down that spirit that would strive, with love, which differeth you from all other sufferers that <144> have not love, which envieth not, neither is provoked, but beareth all things, and endureth all things [1 Cor 13:4f,7], and will wear out all evil doers. And so be faithful, and of the good faith that hath the victory [1 Jn 5:4], and in it suffer joyfully, as the saints did, and leave the gainsayers to the Lord God, who will reward and repay them. And keep in the seed that will out-last all, and bruise the head of the serpent [Gen 3:15]. And so the Lord God preserve you all both in life, word, and conversation to his glory; and that all your words may be gracious. Amen. G. F.
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George Fox (1624 - 1691). English Dissenter, founder of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire. Apprenticed as a shoemaker, he left home at 19, seeking spiritual truth amid Puritan and Anglican tensions. In 1647, after visions and direct experiences of God, he began preaching an “inner light” accessible to all, rejecting clergy and formal worship. By 1652, he gathered followers in northern England, forming the Quakers, known for pacifism and simplicity. Fox traveled across England, Ireland, the Netherlands, and America, enduring eight imprisonments for his beliefs, including at Lancaster Castle. He wrote Journal (1694) and numerous letters, shaping Quaker theology with calls for equality and justice. Married to Margaret Fell in 1669, a key Quaker leader, they had no children, but she had eight from her prior marriage. His 1660 Declaration rejected violence, influencing conscientious objection. Fox’s emphasis on personal revelation transformed Protestantism, and his writings remain central to Quaker thought.