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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 urges believers to avoid the distractions and temptations of worldly desires and cares, emphasizing the importance of remaining steadfast in faith and not succumbing to the pressures of society. He encourages the faithful to dwell under God's protection and to be free from the entanglements of material wealth, advocating for a deep commitment to the Lord. Fox highlights the historical suffering of the righteous who resisted joining in with the corrupt practices of the world, instead choosing to remain devoted to God and His truth, which brings peace and righteousness.
Epistle 161
O friends! do not die from the good through the wantonness of fleshly lusts [2 Pet 2:18], neither be choked with the cares of this life [Mat 13:22], nor fear the shearers [Isa 53:7], neither let the heat scorch your green blade [Mat 13:6]; but dwell under the shadow of the Almighty [Psa 91:1], who will shade you from the heat and cold. Neither be cumbered nor surfeited with the riches of this world [Rom 11:12], nor bound, nor straitened with them, nor married to them; but be free and loose from them, and be married to the Lord [Rom 7:4]. The sufferings in all ages, of the righteous and just, were, because they could not join to the nations' vain worships [Mat 15:9], evil customs, rudiments, traditions [Col 2:8], and carnal inventions, but joined to the Lord [Jer 50:5, 1 Cor 6:17, etc], and not to them; and therefore they suffered, and kept single to the Lord God [Mat 6:22,24] in following him and his truth, and living in it, the amen, [Rev 3:14] the crown, life, virtue, and righteousness [Rev 2:10/2 Tim 4:8], that floweth over all [Amos 5:24], in which the righteous have peace. 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.