Note 55 — Chapter IX

A schism, of which Story and Wilkinson were at the head, is frequently referred to in the writings of some of the early Friends. It commenced and spread mostly in the north. There were, however, those in London, Bristol, and some southern counties, who, through ease and unwatchfulness, having lost their first love and the discerning spirit, were deceived by a specious bait, and became the cause of much exercise and trouble to their brethren.

The ground of difference was alleged by them to be, their objection to those meetings for regulating the affairs of the church, exercising a salutary discipline over its members; and more especially against the establishment of women’s meetings, which G. Fox and other Friends “were moved to set up.” They stated, with a show of plausibility which gained some, chiefly the looser sort, to their ranks, “That such meetings were needless, some years having been passed in peace and unity without them; and that every individual ought to be guided by the Spirit, and left free to act; that meetings for discipline were a form, and the exercise of that discipline an infringement upon individual liberty.” Great endeavours were made for their enlightenment and restoration. In 2nd Month, 1676, a meeting was held at Drawell, which lasted four days, in which “many Friends laboured much for their preservation, but they were too far gone in a separate spirit to be reclaimed.” They, therefore, became out of unity with the body who, “walking by the same rule, minded the same thing.” They fell to jangling, and, after a while, the best among them came to see how they had been deceived; and the rest, after having had separate meetings, are said to have “vanished as snow in the fields.”—See Sewell’s History, folio edition, pp. 583, 584.