Conversion To God
Great turmoil.
Dorothy writes of a period of personal turmoil during her early years.11
Because she saw plainly that swearing and drunkenness, whoredom, idle jesting, vain sports and theatrics, were not important, she was largely preserved from temptation.
She would often tell herself that when the opportunity was right and when she had found and could choose a better religion than that practiced in the name of the established church, she would remain undenominationalized.
She lived some years in what she called a “miserable state,” being continually afraid of life, and more particularly of the prospect of dying.
In that century the ordeal of childbirth was one very real danger to the life of the mother.
It is quite possible that her own widowed mother had been present to help her with the birthing process, previous to 1656, but in that year she passed away.12
Without a strong faith focused through sound doctrine it was indeed difficult for her to withstand “the many great trials” and to carry the crosses that the Lord
(as she supposed) continued to afflict her with and repeatedly impose upon her.
She attempted to find solace in the fashions and riches of the world, but soon began to weary in them, and to enter a period of depression.
She continued to fear death, her conscience telling her that she had not acted responsibly,
and she felt that something was missing in her life — that there was no one in a position to give her counsel.
At this point she heard about a people that were willing to lay down their lives for one another and that were of one heart and mind.
She confirmed this story when she gave ear to their preachers.
They spoke of experiences she herself had wrestled with.
They spoke of a personal transformation the beginnings of which fit her circumstance precisely.
She saw all the deeds of her past life pass before her eyes in a new light.
She came to know God ineffably — in such a manner as she could not express.13
The great debate.
The next few years brought with them great growth for Dorothy as she experienced some of the conflicts and persecution directed towards the Quakers.
The County of Kent became a hotbed of disputes between ministers of the different churches.
Dorothy’s disdain for certain of the customary behavior of worldly society became an example for pious emulation or a topic of gross pettiness.
On the 12th to 14th of April 1659, a debate was held in Sandwich, Kent, between the Rev. Thomas Danson and three Quakers:
Samuel Fisher, George Whitehead, and Richard Hubberthorne.
Mr. Hubberthorne published an account of the affair.
Then in July Rev. Danson published his view of the affair in a work he entitled, “The Quaker’s Folly.”14
One such “folly” was the behavior of Dorothy, when he attempted to greet her with a kiss, as was then the commonly accepted practice.
She refused to oblige, whereupon he first got her to admit that scripture being the word of God may justify our actions.
He then cited Romans 16 and Corinthians that enjoin Christians to greet one another with a holy kiss.
Rev. Danson then retells a story of Dorothy’s reaction when her brother-in-law, possibly William Fisher,15
offered to greet her in this way at her home on April 12, 1659.
She took two or three steps back saying, “I have renounced the Devil and the flesh long since.
Prithee forebear that custom of the world.”
In December 1659 Dorothy wrote, and in January 1660 published, her own little book containing eleven “Epistles” or revelations of the Spirit directed to various of her antagonists.16
In Epistle six she attacked Rev. Danson for his pettiness and total disrespect for her actions.
She disparaged this man, who had been schooled at Oxford, but who did not learn real manners.
She betrayed a certain amount of pride when she alluded to her own birth and parentage, well supposing that the Reverend was envious of her for it.
She then defends the character of Samuel Fisher, whom he had disparaged.
Samuel was a well educated minister, recently converted to Quakerism from the Baptist faith.
He was soon to go on a mission through Europe to Rome.17
In the meantime Mr. Whitehead published his own reply to Rev. Danson, and Rev. Danson published a vindication in return.
Samuel Fisher would not be left out and in 1660 published a very large volume whose title in Latin translates to: “Simple Farmers Against a Scholar,”
which included a defense of Dorothy with no small degree of rhetorical verbiage.18
