Disembarking at Boston in 1656, Mary Fisher, "a religious maiden," and her companion Ann Austin, Quakers, were welcomed by hangman, by gaoler. The hangman made a public bonfire of all books found in their possession. The gaoler, after examining them for evidence of witchcraft, clapped them into jail, where they lay five weeks. Then the religious maidens were shipped back -to England.
So upset were the people of Massachusetts that they made a law. The next Quaker to land would get one ear lopped off. If he came back, off with the other ear! If yet again he returned, his tongue was to be pierced by a red-hot iron. These provisions failing, however, to deter the Quakers, presently the gibbet was invoked and four Quakers were hanged, one of them a woman.
But the Quakers still kept coming. Last week, energized by the election of a member of their organization, Religious Society of Friends, as President of the U.S.,* they were beginning what is probably the most vigorous effort in more than a century for converts.
A circular vigorously urging the doctrine of the Quakers was distributed in the mails, signed by Jesse H. Holmes, professor of philosophy, Swarthmore College; Roscoe Pound, dean of the Harvard Law School; J. Russell Smith, professor of Economic geography, Columbia University; Thomas A. Jenkins, professor of the history of the French language, University of Chicago; Albert T. Mills, professor of history and political science, James Millikin University.
Warmakers Welcome. Although in course of years the Quaker has come to represent t'ie very personification of the pacifist spirit, the circular explains that militarists are not excluded from membership in the society.†
This point and others made in the circular were explained by the fact that the Quakers have never formulated any fixed creed. They have no body authorized "to dictate to the members as to doctrine or conduct."
Addressed to "the scientifically minded," the circular declared that it did not seek the attention of those satisfied with "the Apostles or the Nicene Creed, the inerrancy of the Bible, the virgin birth of Jesus, and the verity of the miracle stories of the old and new Testament." God goes by many another name among Quakers: "the Seed, the Inner Light, the In-speaking Voice, the Christ within, the Word . . . The Hidden Dynamo, The Super-self, The World-father." And "religion as we understand it has nothing to fear from science."
I Street N. W. A mild little colonial structure of red brick, with a peaceable white door and portico, stands on I Street northwest, in Washington. It is the Meeting House of the Society of Friends in the capital, and there Mr. & Mrs. Hoover attend service. Its capacity is about 200 people, and the Friends were wondering how best to stretch the walls. With or without circulars to the scientifically minded, they foresaw that crowds would throng to their door each "First Day" of the next four years, when President & First Lady attend.