The journal of George Fox, vol. 2 of 2: Being an historical account of his life, travels, sufferings, and Christian experiences.

About this book

The work is a two‑volume historical journal that records the life, travels, sufferings and Christian experiences of George Fox, the founder of the Religious Society of Friends. The opening pages present the book as a “rich mine” of spiritual insight, contrasting it with the “spun‑out” literature of the day, and then detail the scholarly apparatus of the 1901 eighth (bi‑centenary) edition: a map of the places Fox mentions, enlarged indexes, and careful collation with the original first edition. The contents list shows the journal’s scope, ranging from Fox’s imprisonments and legal battles in England to his voyages to Ireland, the Caribbean and North America, his meetings with indigenous peoples, and his correspondence with judges, monarchs and fellow Quakers. The text therefore promises a chronologically ordered, documentary account of Fox’s public ministry and private trials.

The voice is that of a 17th‑century Quaker leader, marked by plain yet fervent prose, frequent direct appeals to authority, and a theological focus on inner light and conscience. The style mixes narrative travelogue with legal petitions, letters and occasional prophetic visions, all framed by the period’s religious polemics. Readers interested in early modern religious history, the development of dissenting movements, or the trans‑Atlantic networks of the 1600s will find the journal rewarding. It also appeals to those who enjoy primary sources that illuminate the lived experience of persecution, missionary work and the formation of early Quaker institutions.

Opening lines

“His life well repays study. It is a rich mine, and every page of it seems to be solid gold. Books now-a-days are spun out, and you get little after reading much; but The Journal of George Fox contains ingots of gold—things to be thought on and that will have to be thought on month by month before you get at the bottom of them.”—CHARLES HADDON SPURGEON. …

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