Author’s Note

(Prefixed to the Second Edition, 1842.)

This work appeared originally¹ in the form of Letters to a Member of the Society of Friends. It was suggested by a controversy which was dividing the Quaker Society. Its main object was to inquire whether an acknowledgment of the spiritual principles, which were professed by the Quaker body, involved the rejection of Christian ordinances, or whether one did not necessarily imply the other. This question was almost identical with another. The Quakers had sought to establish a spiritual kingdom in the world. Did not such a Kingdom exist already, and were not these ordinances the expression of it?

Among many minor but serious mistakes in my treatment of this subject, I found that there was one which had tended to make my purpose unintelligible. The early Quakers affirmed, that the Spiritual Kingdom was defined by no national boundaries. But the Quaker Society has, in fact, existed only in England and in America. As I wished to shew the Quaker to whom I wrote that there was a spiritual body in which he himself might find a home, when the Quaker sect no longer afforded him one, I naturally alluded, in every Letter, to the English Church—speaking of her sacraments, ministers, forms of worship, &c. It seemed, therefore, to many, that I was composing an apology for this Church. But if so, how, it was asked, had I fulfilled my promise of shewing the Quakers that there was a Church Universal, such as they had dreamed of?

I found that my book had been much more read by members of my own communion than by Quakers. Some of my friends, therefore, naturally suggested, that in any new edition I should convert it into a Treatise on the Church, leaving out all reference to the sect, for the sake of which it had been written. This advice I could not take. If I have been able to suggest any thought to a Churchman which he will not find far better set before him in a hundred other books, I owe it to the circumstances which induced me to attempt a comparison between our own position and that of those who seem to be at the greatest distance from us. Moreover, it is obvious, from what I have just said, that if I lost sight of the Quakers. I should abandon one means of repairing the error which I have committed. By following out their line of thought, we may have a good hope of learning how men of earnest minds have been brought to feel that they need a Catholic Church, and not merely a National Church.

But though I cannot cease to connect my hints with the principles of the Quakers, I find that I am almost obliged to omit any allusion to the particular controversy which led me to address them. For that controversy appears to be at an end, and the Society is much more likely to perish by a slow decay, than by a sudden convulsion. Owing to this circumstance, and to others of a more private nature, the form of Letters, which I originally adopted, is no longer applicable. I have been induced, therefore, to rewrite and reconstruct my book; and thus I hope to remove, in some degree, the fault of which I have spoken. I have endeavoured also to remove some of the more gross and palpable errors, which I discovered in it myself, or which were pointed out to me by others. Enough, I doubt not, remain; and in the additions which I have made, others may have been introduced. It will never, I hope, be regarded as anything but a collection of Hints, which, if they lead the reader into deeper thought and greater reverence, may soon be the means of making him far wiser than his instructor.

The following Dialogue will explain how the subject of the whole book is connected with the history of the Quaker body. The conversation is, as to its form, an imaginary one; but I have often expressed the same sentiments in intercourse with members of the Society, and the Quaker’s description of the trials, to which a thoughtful man who has found a sectarian position no longer tenable is exposed from within and without, may, I believe, be regarded as an “ower true tale.”²