Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 19.djvu/77

Fisher . He appears to have laboured chiefly in Kent, in which county Besse (Sufferings, i. 289) says he was 'much abused' in 1658, and in 1659 he was pulled out of a meeting at Westminster by his hair and severely beaten. In May of this year he went to Dunkirk with Edward Burrough [q. v.], when the authorities ordered them to leave the town. They declined, and were then directed to be moderate. After unsuccessfully endeavouring to promulgate their doctrines to the monks and nuns for a few days they returned to England. During the following year Fisher and Stubbs made a journey to Rome, travelling over the Alps on foot, where they 'testified against popish superstition' to several of the cardinals, and distributed copies of quaker literature, nor were they molested or even warned. Wood (Athenæ Oxon. iii. 700) states that when Fisher returned he had a 'very genteel equipage,' which, as his means were known to be very small, caused him to be suspected of being a Jesuit and in receipt of a pension from the pope, and Fisher seems to have undergone some amount of persecution from this cause. Wood also states that this journey took place in 1658, and that it extended to Constantinople, whither Fisher went, hoping to convert the sultan. In 1660 Fisher held a dispute with Thomas Danson at Sandwich, in which he defended the doctrines of the Friends (see Rusticus ad Academicos), and later in this year he was imprisoned in Newgate. The rest of his life was chiefly spent in or near London, where he was a successful preacher. In 1661 he was imprisoned and treated with much severity in the Gatehouse at Westminster. In 1662 he was arrested and sent to the Bridewell for being present at an illegal meeting. He was again sent to Newgate for refusing to take the oaths, and was detained for upwards of a year, during which time he occupied himself in writing 'The Bishop busied beside the Business.' During part of this imprisonment he was confined with other prisoners in a room so small that they were unable to lie down at the same time. Shortly after his discharge he was again arrested at Charlwood, Surrey, and committed to the White Lion Prison, Southwark, where he was confined for about two years. During the great plague he was temporarily released, and retired to the house of Ann Travers, a quakeress at Dalston, near London, where he died of the plague on 31 Aug. 1665. His place of burial is uncertain. Fisher's works show him to have been a man of considerable erudition and some literary skill, but they are disfigured by violence and coarseness. They were, however, quaker text-books for more than a century. He was skilful in argument, had no little logical acumen, and great controversial powers. Sewel asserts that he was 'dextrous and well skilled in the ancient poets and Hebrew,' His private life appears to have been above reproach, and the 'testimonies' of the Friends unite in giving him a high personal character. William Penn, who was intimately acquainted with him, praises his sweetness and evenness of temper, his self-denial and humility, and Besse declares that he excelled in 'natural parts and acquired abilities,' and that he 'incessantly laboured by word and writing.' His more important works are: 1. 'Baby-Baptism meer Babism, or an Answer to Nobody in Five Words, to Everybody who finds himself concerned in it. (1) Anti-Diabolism, or a True Account of a Dispute at Ashford proved a True Counterfeit; (2) Anti-Babism, or the Babish Disputings of the Priests for Baby-Baptism Disproved; (3) Anti-Rantism, or Christ'ndome Unchrist'nd; (4) Anti-Ranterism, or Christ'ndome New Christ'nd; (5) Anti-Sacerdotism the deep dotage of the D.D. Divines Discovered, or the Antichristian C.C. Clergy cleared to be that themselves which they have ever charged Christ's Clergy to be,' &c., 1653. 2. 'Christianismus Redivivus, Christ'ndom both unchrist'ned and new-christ'ned,' &c., 1655. 3. 'The Scorned Quaker's True and Honest Account, both why and what he should have spoken (as to the sum and substance thereof) by commission from God, but that he had not permission from Men,' &c., 1656. 4. 'The Burden of the Word of the Lord, as it was declared in part, and as it lay upon me from the Lord on the 19th day of the 4th mo. 1656, to declare it more fully,' &c., 1656. 5. 'Rusticus ad Academicos in Exercitationibus Expostulatoriis, Apologeticis Quatuor. The Rusticks Alarm to the Rabbies, or the Country correcting the University and Clergy,' &c., 1660. 6. ' An Additional Appendix to the book entitled "Rusticus ad Academicos,"' 1660. 7. 'Lux Christi emergens, oriens, effulgens, ac seipsam expandens per universum,' &c., 1660. 8. 'One Antidote more against that provoking Sin of Swearing,' &C., 1661. 9. 'Ἀπόκρυπτα ἀποκάλυπτα, Velata Quædam Revelata,' &c., 1661. 10. 'Ἐπίσκοπος ἀπόσκοπος; the Bishop Busied beside the Businesse,' &c., 1662. The foregoing works with many less important were reprinted in 1679 under the title of 'The Testimony of Truth Exalted,' &c., folio.
 * [Wood's Athenæ Oxon. iii. 700; Fasti, i. 430, ed. 1813; Croese's General Hist. of the Quakers, p. 63, ed. 1696; Sewel's Hist. of the Quakers, vols. i. ii. and iii. 1833; Gough's Hist. of the Quakers, i. 253; Besse's Sufferings, i. 289, 366;