WILLIAM AM) MABY.

139

One of the precious truths which were divinely revealed to thisnew apostle was, that^it was falsehood and adulation to use the -second person plural instead of the second person singular.Another was, that to talk of the month of March was to worshipthe bloodthirsty god Mars, and that to talk of Monday was topay idolatrous homage to the moon. To say Good morningor Good evening was highly reprehensible, for those phrasesevidently imported that God had made bad days and badnights.* A Christian was bound to face death itself ratherthan touch his hat to the greatest of mankind. When Fox waschallenged to produce any Scriptural authority for this dogma,he cited the passage in which it is written that Shadrach,Meshech and Abednego were thrown into the fiery furnace withtheir hats on; and, if his own narrative may be trusted, theChief Justice of England was altogether unable to answer thisargument except by crying out, “Take him aivay, gaoler.”**Fox insisted much on the not less weighty argument that theTurks never show their bare heads to their superiors; and heasked, with great animation, ivhcther those who bore thenoble name of Christians ought not to surpass Turks in virtue.***Bowing he strictly prohibited, and, indeed, seemed to considerit as the effect of Sataujcal influence; for, as he observed, thewoman in the Gospel, while she had a spirit of infirmity, was

living God, doth let them see and know the chaff from the wheat, and dothsee that which must be shaken with that which cannot be shaken normoved, what gives to see that which is shaken and moved, such as live inthe notions, opinions, conceivings, and thoughts and fancies, these be allshaken and comes to be on heaps, which they who witness those thingsbefore mentioned shaken and removed walks in peace not seen and dis-cerned by them who walks in those things unremoved and not shaken. 11 —A Warning to the World that are Groping in tho Dark, by G. Fox, 1(555.

* See the piece entitled, Concerning Good morrow and Good even, theWorld’s Customs, but by the Light which into the World is come by itmade manifest to all who be in the Darkness, by G. Fox, 1657.

** Journal, page 166.

*** Epistle from Harlingen, 11th of 6th month, 1677.

CHAP.

XVII.

16'Jl.