Proyectos del grupo de trabajo Unicornios

Contrasting responses to the pursuit of science illustrates the second key characteristic of this material - the diverse and divergent individual views it contains. There were tensions over the relationship between spirit and matter, on which positions ranged from the dualism of Barclay, in which the physical world was effectively shorn of much of its meaningfulness, to the vitalism of the Helmontians. Whilst Fox and Barclay’s opposition to van Helmont’s metaphysical speculations is the most obvious example of disagreement, there were other more significant ways in which views diverged or emphases differed. Despite the trend towards intellectualisation, Friends

340 Ibid.

were not agreed about the value of human reason, or of empiricism as a way of understanding the world around them, as contrasting responses to the Royal Society illustrate. Views on the epistemological status of the natural world varied widely: to Barclay, physical objects were merely external stimuli to divinely-planted ideas; to Lawson and Penn, the physical world was the ‘book of creation’, a storehouse of divinely-inspired wisdom; to followers of the kabbala, it was the ‘gateway’ to God.

Nevertheless, heterodox ideas were taking root amongst influential Quakers.

Helmontian metaphysics resonated neither with ‘enlightenment’ ideas about nature, nor with the Quakers’ regard for truth revealed through personal experience.

However, a combination of enlightenment philosophy and the Quakers’ regard for the supremacy of truth and for human welfare ensured that foundations for empirical approaches to the creation were established amongst Quakers. Whilst Fox was emphatic about the need to distinguish between the Creator and his creation and the supremacy of the former, they were ‘Friends of Truth’, and truth, as Penn and Lawson argued, could be found in the created world as well as through inward revelation.

Being created by God, the physical world contained truths that were seen as

independent of human beings and human reason, including grand theories, religious, philosophical or scientific. Moreover, those truths could be revealed by diligent, honest observation of the created world, rather than by speculation or religious experience. One of the key consequences of the tendency to separate the particular from the universal was the relaxation and movement in the original

‘creation-dialectic’ established by the first Quakers. Although God continued to be the ultimate source of truth, the created world – as the work of God - was also accepted as a source of truth provided that certain conditions were met. Quaker support for natural

theology depends on how that term is understood, but there is evidence here of

significant sympathy with its aims, despite the potential for tension with fundamental Quaker beliefs about revelation.

However, Quakers generally continued to believe that the true understanding of the created world and its relationship to humanity was crucially dependent on the guidance of the divine inward light. Although Penn’s position on this point is unclear (3.4.2), witnesses as diverse as Barclay, Penington, Lawson, van Helmont, and

Thomas Story (chapter 4), made a clear distinction between the natural powers of human observation and reason and the workings of the divine spirit. All agreed that divine guidance was necessary for the true understanding of the physical world.

Much the same was probably true of natural theology. Whilst Barclay admitted that the created world did provide evidence to human reason of the existence of God, any real understanding of divine truths came only through the guiding influence of the inward light of God, the same God that had created the outward world. In spite of a relaxation in the exclusivity of the authority of immediate revelation to embrace some degree of empirical experience, and a new emphasis on the epistemological value of the created world, Quaker orthodoxy severely restricted the scope and status of the latter as an independent source of truth. Moreover, little or no evidence has come to light to suggest that contemporary Quakers perceived any epistemological connection between their belief in the inward light or the personal experience of spiritual

transformation, and early support amongst Quakers for empiricism.

3.6.3 Living in the ‘Meantime’: Management of the Creation

Quakers seem to have been reluctant to fully articulate the doctrine of the stewardship of creation as set out by Matthew Hale (3.3.1). Although Penn and Fox saw in nature models for human behaviour (3.3.1), Quakers might be expected to have been uneasy

about the arguments used by natural theologians like Hale, as they served to diminish the role of direct revelation. Friends’ insistence on frugality and simplicity was concerned primarily with right relations with God rather than with the physical creation. Indeed, Fox’s emphasis on spirituality and piety is not intrinsically

incompatible with Brooks-Saxl’s conception of humankind as ‘guests’ on earth whose focus is on spiritual, not material, realities. Penn’s view of the provisional nature of the present created world also seems to fit with this conception, and might be seen as raising doubts about the radical importance of humans as stewards of creation.

Quaker concern for the care of the creation was born of spiritual

enlightenment through direct revelation rather than contractual obligation that the term ‘steward’ implies.³⁴¹ Fox’s earliest expressions of concern in this context were God-centred in that he saw people’s treatment of domestic animals as an indicator of the state of their relationship to God, and Penn seems to have applied this to the creation as a whole. Anne Adams argues that early Quakers believed that human beings were more than ‘simply stewards’; humans were ‘part of creation under God’

and ‘everything we use of creation must be to his glory’.³⁴² Those who followed the inward light of Christ were obedient to God’s will for the creation as a whole, treating it with the same wisdom in which it was created by God. Schurman also refers to ‘the whole community of creation’ of which humankind, nature and the earth are each a part. Thus, when ‘we remain guided by Christ, the Word of Wisdom, the creation will be restored to its original goodness and harmony’.³⁴³ Dean Freiday wrote of Fox’s belief in creation as a continuing process on the part of God.³⁴⁴ Mel Keiser sees the contemporary Quaker view of this process as potentially participatory: humanity’s

341 Keiser, Inward Light, 13.

342 Adams, ‘Early Friends and Creation’, 150.

343 Schurman, ‘Quaker Theology of Stewardship’, 39.

344 Freiday, Response, 44.

destiny was a spiritual one, but one in which people could share God’s creative activity.³⁴⁵

Attitudes towards the care of creation, and the important place of knowledge about the physical world in the emerging Quaker educational curriculum (3.4.3), confirm the positive attitude of Restoration Quakers towards the created world. By the late 1660s, Fox was explicitly concerned with posterity on earth – the meantime – a future in which people would be anticipated to continue to require and enjoy the fruits of God’s providence in terms of the physical products of creation. Friends’

perception of the creation in terms of particular species or resources, as well as their practical interest in trees, are both indicative of a fresh engagement with the ongoing task of caring for the creation for the benefit of future generations of humankind. For Quakers, this meant enlightened dominion over creation: the care of particular

elements of the creation focused on ‘creatures’ with which contemporary humankind was seen to have some kind of direct relationship in terms of fulfilling basic human needs. Indeed, the practice and progress of agriculture epitomised the enlightened approach to the care of creation.

Factors, both within and outside the Quaker movement, may have driven or constrained this transition. The first Quakers’ belief that Christ’s Second Coming – and the ‘new creation’ of heaven and earth - was imminent, or else actually being realised, had made exploration of the present outward creation unimportant or irrelevant. Intellectual interest in the created world appears to grow after the waning of millennial expectations. Whilst the present created order might be seen as

‘groaning under the burden’ of human disobedience, it was still essentially the work of the Creator, and was probably going to survive for the foreseeable future.

345 Keiser, Inward Light, 13.

Moreover, change for the better in the short-term might have to rely more on human agency than had been envisaged. The development of a concept of stewardship by Fox and Penn can be seen as indicative of the changes taking place not only in Friends’ views of creation, but also in their wider view of themselves and their place in the world. Fox’s later statements and those of Penn focussed on the care of the creation represent a specific example of adaptation away from waning expectations of the Second Coming towards acceptance of a continuation of historic time, the

‘meantime’. The recognition of rights and responsibilities by human beings in relation to the rest of creation is also consonant with the concept of a covenantal relationship with God giving way to a contractual relationship with his creation (2.5.2).

3.7 SUMMARY

This chapter has presented evidence of a range of new, often highly individualistic, Quaker responses to the created world, based much more on reasoned argument (and speculation) from well-educated Quakers than was the case in chapter 2. It was illustrated how the creation played an important part in the educational ideas of leading Friends. The first clear evidence of support for natural theology and natural science in its modern sense among Friends appeared in this period, but powerful contemporary opposition was also expressed to the study of the physical world divorced from true spiritual understanding. Belief in divine power to direct and intervene in the operation of creation existed alongside a new perception of the physical world as a resource for humanity, and a growing awareness of the practical issues and opportunities that presented.

The chapter concluded by characterising the period in three ways. Firstly, Quaker discourse on the creation became more intellectual; more influenced by outside thinking, and less by spiritual transformation. Secondly, it saw a significant increase accorded by some Friends to the epistemological value of the created world, although this remained largely contingent on the operation of the divine inward light.

Thirdly, the evidence reflects a wider change in contemporary perceptions away from millennial expectations, towards life in the ‘meantime’ in which the utilisation of the creation at home and abroad became a matter of more practical as well as spiritual concern.

The next chapter explores how these changes, and the contrasting legacies of the period in relation to the authority of empiricism and the place of nature in the spiritual life, developed into a more settled pattern of responses to the natural world, as well as the tensions that ensued, amongst 18^th century Quakers.

QUIETISM AND RATIONALISM: 18^TH CENTURY QUAKERS