Not one of the six maidens ever remembered a home-coming over-clouded
as was Judge Fell's on that thundery afternoon of late July. Sadder,
darker days lay before them in the years to follow, but none more
filled with unacknowledged dread. Was this sad, stern-looking man, who
dismounted wearily from his horse at the high arched gate, really
their indulgent father? He scarcely noticed or spoke to them, as he
tramped heavily towards the house. 'He did not even raise an eye
towards the window where my mother sits, as she hath ever sat, to
welcome him,' young Margrett noticed. The thunder rumbled ominously
overhead. The first big drops fell from the gloomy clouds that had
been gathering for hours; while upstairs, in her panelled chamber, a
big tear splashed on the delicate cambric needlework that lay between
the elder Margaret's fingers, before she laid it aside and descended
the shallow, oaken stairs to greet her husband.
Margaret Fell looked older and sadder than on the afternoon under the
yew-trees, only three weeks before. There was a new shade of care on
her smooth forehead: yet there was a soft radiance about her that was
also new. Even her voice had gentler tones. She looked as if she had
reached a haven, like a stately ship that, after long tossing in the
waves, now feels itself safely anchored and at rest.
Happily she has left an account of the Judge's return in her own
words, words as fresh and vivid as if they had been written but
yesterday, instead of more than two hundred and fifty years ago. We
will take up her narrative at the point in Ulverston church at which
Judge Fell broke away from Mr. Justice Sawrey when he was telling him
the same tale from his point of view, on the glistening sands of the
estuary of the Leven.
'And there was one John Sawrey,' writes Mistress Fell, 'a Justice of
Peace and professor, that bid the church warden take him [George Fox]
away, and he laid hands on him several times, and took them off again,
and let him alone; and then after awhile he gave over and he [G.F.]
came to our house again that night. He spoke in the family amongst the
servants, and they were all generally convinced; as William Caton,
Thomas Salthouse, Mary Askew, Anne Clayton, and several other
servants. And I was struck into such a sadness, I knew not what to do,
my husband being from home. I saw it was the truth, and I could not
deny it; and I did as the Apostle saith, "I received truth in the love
of it;" and it was opened to me so clear, that I had never a tittle in
my heart against it; but I desired the Lord that I might be kept in
it, and then I desired no greater portion.'
'He went on to Dalton, Aldingham, Dendron and Ramside chapels and
steeple-houses, and several places up and down, and the people
followed him mightily; and abundance were convinced and saw that that
which he spoke was the truth, but the priests were in a rage. And
about two weeks after James Nayler and Richard Farnsworth followed him
and enquired him out, till they came to Swarthmoor, and there stayed
awhile with me at our house, and did me much good; for I was under
great heaviness and judgment. But the power of the Lord entered upon
me within about two weeks that he came, and about three weeks end my
husband came home; and many were in a mighty rage, and a deal of the
captains and great ones of the country went to meet my then husband as
he was coming home, and informed him "that a great disaster was
befallen amongst his family, and that they were witches; and that they
had taken us away out of our religion; and that he must either set
them away, or all the country would be undone."'
'So my husband came home, greatly offended; and any may think what a
condition I was like to be in, that either I must displease my husband
or offend God; for he was very much troubled with us all in the house
and family, they had so prepossessed him against us. But James Nayler
and Richard Farnsworth were both then at our house, and I desired them
both to come and speak to him, and so they did very moderately and
wisely; but he was at first displeased with them until they told him
"they came in love and goodwill to his house." And after that he had
heard them speak awhile, he was better satisfied, and they offered as
if they would go away; but I desired them to stay and not go away yet,
for George Fox will come this evening. And I would have had my husband
to have heard them all, and satisfied himself further about them,
because they [_i.e._ the neighbours] had so prepossessed him against
them of such dangerous fearful things in his first coming home. And
then he was pretty moderate and quiet, and his dinner being ready he
went to it, and I went in, and sate me down by him. And whilst I was
sitting, the power of the Lord seized upon me, and he was struck with
amazement, and knew not what to think; but was quiet and still. And
the children were all quiet and still, and grown sober, and could not
play on their musick that they were learning; and all these things
made him quiet and still.'
'At night George Fox came: and after supper my husband was sitting in
the parlour, and I asked him, "if George Fox might come in?" And he
said, "Yes." So George came in without any compliment, and walked into
the room, and began to speak presently; and the family, and James
Nayler, and Richard Farnsworth came all in; and he spoke very
excellently as ever I heard him, and opened Christ's and the apostles'
practices, which they were in, in their day. And he opened the night
of apostacy since the apostles' days, and laid open the priests and
their practices in the apostacy that if all England had been there, I
thought they could not have denied the truth of these things. And so
my husband came to see clearly the truth of what he spoke, and was
very quiet that night, said no more and went to bed. The next morning
came Lampitt, priest of Ulverston, and got my husband in the garden,
and spoke much to him there, but my husband had seen so much the night
before, that the priest got little entrance upon him.... After awhile
the priest went away; this was on the sixth day of the week, about the
fifth month (July) 1652. And at our house divers Friends were speaking
to one another, how there were several convinced hereaways and we
could not tell where to get a meeting: my husband being also present,
he overheard and said of his own accord, "You may meet here, if you
will:" and that was the first meeting that we had that he offered of
his own accord. And then notice was given that day and the next to
Friends, and there was a good large meeting the first day, which was
the first meeting that was at Swarthmoor, and so continued there a
meeting from 1652 till 1690 [when the present Meeting-house, given by
George Fox, was built]. And my husband went that day to the
steeple-house, and none with him but his clerk and his groom that rid
with him; and the priest and the people were all fearfully troubled;
but praised be the Lord, they never got their wills upon us to this
day.'
George Fox in his Journal also records his first eventful interview
with Judge Fell as follows:
'I found that the priests and professors and Justice Sawrey had
much incensed Judge Fell against the truth with their lies; but
when I came to speak with him I answered all his objections, and
so thoroughly satisfied him by the scriptures that he was
convinced in his judgment. He asked me "if I was that George Fox
whom Justice Robinson spoke so much in commendation of among
many of the parliament men?" I told him I had been with Justice
Robinson and Justice Hotham, in Yorkshire, who were very civil
and loving to me. After we had discoursed a pretty while
together, Judge Fell himself was satisfied also, and came to
see, by the openings of the spirit of God in his heart, over all
the priests and teachers of the world, and did not go to hear
them for some years before he died. He sometimes wished I was
awhile with Judge Bradshaw to discourse with him.'
This was Judge Bradshaw the regicide, and, coming as it did from such
a friend of Cromwell's as Judge Fell, the remark was probably a high
compliment.
The following year, 1653, George Fox came again to Swarthmoor, where
he says he had 'great openings from the Lord, not only of divine and
spiritual matters, but also of outward things relating to the civil
government. Being one day in Swarthmoor Hall when Judge Fell and
Justice Benson were talking of the news in the newsbook, and of the
Parliament then sitting, (called the long Parliament) I was moved to
tell them, "before that day two weeks the Parliament should be broken
up, and the speaker plucked out of his chair"; and that day two weeks
Justice Benson told Judge Fell that now he saw that George was a true
prophet, for Oliver had broken up the parliament.' Although Judge Fell
never actually joined Friends he was their constant protector and
helper, and, in the words of Fox, 'A wall to the believers.' If he did
not himself attend the meetings in the great Hall at Swarthmoor, he
was wont to leave the door open as he sat in his Justice's chair in
his little oak-panelled study close at hand, and thus hear all that
was said, himself unseen. How entirely his wife had regained his
confidence, and how entirely Lampitt and Sawrey had failed to poison
his mind against her or her new teacher, is shown by the following
letter written about this time, when the Judge was away on one of his
frequent absences. It is the only letter to Judge Fell from his wife
that has been preserved, but it is ample assurance that no shadow had
dimmed the unclouded love of this devoted husband and wife.
'Dear Husband,' Margaret writes, 'My dear love and tender
desires to the Lord run forth for thee. I have received a letter
this day from you, and am very glad that the Lord carried you on
your journey so prosperously.... Dear Heart, mind the Lord
above all, with whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning,
and who will overturn all powers that stand before Him.... We
sent to my dear brother James Nayler and he is kept very close
and cannot be suffered to have any fire. He is not free to eat
of the jailor's meat, so they eat very little but bread and
water. He writ to us that they are plotting again to get more
false witnesses to swear against him things that he never spoke.
I sent him 2 lb., but he took but 5 [shillings?]. They are
mighty violent in Westmorland and all parts everywhere towards
us. They bid 5 lb. to any man that will take George anywhere
that they can find him within Westmorland.... The children are
all in health, praised be the Lord. George is not with us now,
but he remembered his dear love to thee....
'Thy dutiful wife till death,
MARGARET FELL.'
'Swarthmoor, Feb. 18, 1653.'
But whether Margaret Fell ever entirely forgave Justice Sawrey for the
part he had played in trying to alienate her husband from her, is, to
say the least, doubtful. Anyhow, later on she wrote of him as 'a
catterpillar which shall be swept out of the way.' And 'swept out of
the way' he eventually was, some years later, when it is recorded that
'he was drowned in a puddle upon the road coming from York.' But he
was to have time and opportunity to do much harm to Friends, and
especially to George Fox, before that happened, as the next two
stories will show.