Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 30.djvu/325

 against a number of divinity students. Two short treatises of this period, ‘Quakerism No Popery,’ a reply to John Menzies's ‘Roma Mendax’ (1675) and ‘Quakerism Confirmed’ (1676), were the joint work of Barclay and Keith. At the end of 1676 the latter was again imprisoned, with Barclay and others, in ‘the chapel,’ or lower prison, of Aberdeen.

Keith had married Elizabeth, daughter of William Johnston, M.D., of Aberdeen, by his wife, Barbara Forbes, and on gaining his liberty he went to England with his wife and Robert Barclay to attend the ‘yearly meeting’ in June 1677. Keith was anxious to secure the doctrinal unity of the quaker movement, by means of a joint confession of faith, an idea which evidently did not commend itself to (1624–1691) [q. v.] Barclay and the Keiths joined Fox, Penn, and others in an expedition to Holland, sailing from Harwich on 25 July, and reaching Rotterdam on 28 July. Here they remained to superintend some printing, rejoining Fox for the ‘quarterly meeting’ at Amsterdam on 2 Aug. The establishment of a ‘yearly meeting’ for Germany followed, and on 6 Aug. Keith, Barclay, and Penn set out on a missionary tour, with Benjamin Furly as interpreter. Barclay soon returned to England with Elizabeth Keith. Keith and Penn pushed on to Heidelberg. On their return to Amsterdam they held a discussion with Galenus Abrahams, a Mennonite teacher of Socinian leanings. They embarked for Harwich with Fox on 21 Oct.

It was probably on his way back to Scotland that Keith visited, viscountess Conway [q. v.], at Ragley Hall, Warwickshire. She sent a contribution towards the building of a quaker meeting-house at Aberdeen, and from her physician, Francis Mercurius van Helmont, Keith derived a belief in the pre-existence and transmigration of souls. At an earlier stage in the quaker movement opinions not less erratic might have passed without challenge; but though Keith never obtruded his new position, defending it rather as providing an opportunity for the salvation of those unreached by Christ in a prior term of existence, it was regarded as a heresy.

About 1680 Keith started a boarding-school, first at Edmonton, Middlesex, then at Theobalds, Hertfordshire. For refusing to take the oath he was imprisoned in 1682. The apologist placed his eldest son, Robert Barclay, at his school in 1683. Next year Keith was again imprisoned in Newgate. Some four years later he emigrated to America, settling at Philadelphia in 1689 as schoolmaster.

This migration was the turning-point in Keith's career. Sewel connects his alienation from the quakers with condemnatory expressions, harsher than he could brook, directed by certain individuals against his doctrine of transmigration. But in a publication at Philadelphia in 1689 (‘The Presbyterian … Churches in New England … Brought to the Test,’ &c.) his allusions to a use of the Lord's Supper (in the form of an agape), though not exceeding the liberty allowed in Barclay's ‘Apology’ (prop. xiii. §§ 8, 11), are significant of a tendency of his mind which brought him out of harmony with quaker modes of thought. On other points, denying the sufficiency of the inner light, he inclined to a stronger assertion of historic and dogmatic Christianity than was palatable to some Philadelphia quakers. He made enemies of William Stockdale (d. 1693), a prominent elder from the north of Ireland, and Thomas Lloyd (d. 10 Sept. 1694), the deputy-governor. The deaths of Barclay and Fox, within a few months of each other, left no one (1691) in the quaker community to whom Keith was inclined to submit, and he aspired to a position of leadership. The ‘yearly meeting’ at Philadelphia, in September 1691, upheld Keith against Stockdale, while blaming the angry spirit shown by both. Nevertheless in the ‘monthly meeting’ Thomas Fitzwalter, a quaker minister, arraigned as heresy Keith's denial of the sufficiency of the light within. The peace of the community was seriously endangered; hence Lloyd and the magistrates intervened, with no goodwill to Keith. But it was clear that the majority of ministers and elders was on his side. Accordingly the magistrates gave judgment against Stockdale and Fitzwalter, suspending them from their functions till they had made public amends for their action against Keith. This they ultimately declined to do, but persisted in exercising their ministry, stigmatising their opponents as Keithians. From this point Mr. Joseph Smith, the quaker bibliographer, dates Keith's ‘apostasy.’ Keith, who made no effort to exclude his opponents, confidently expected their return. Fearing the consequences of the rupture, the magistrates convened a special court of twenty-eight ministers and magistrates, including some who, like Lloyd, and Samuel Jenings, the leading spirit against Keith, held both functions. This court at its first sitting, on 20 June 1692, condemned Keith unheard, and interdicted him from preaching. Keith held his ground. Assisted by Thomas Budd he published a ‘Plea of the Innocent’ and other pamphlets, and maintained distinct meetings for worship, his followers denying that they