Page:Elizabeth Fry (Pitman 1884).djvu/31

Rh and helpless, to enter into sorrows and woes, and to understand and sympathise with quiet suffering. But the time was coming for more active outward service, and when the call came Elizabeth Fry was found ready to obey it.

Towards the end of 1809 her father died, after great suffering; summoned by one of her sisters, Elizabeth hurried down to Earlham to catch, if possible, his parting benediction. She succeeded in arriving soon enough to bear her much-loved parent company during his last few hours of life, and to hear him express, again and again, his confidence in the Saviour, who, in death, was all-sufficient for his needs. As he passed away, her faith and confidence could not forbear expression, and, kneeling at the bedside, she gave utterance to words of thanksgiving for the safe and happy ending of a life which had been so dear to her. The truth was, a burden had been weighing her down for some time past, causing her to question herself most seriously as to whether she were willing to obey "the inward voice" which prompted her to serve God in a certain way. This specific way was the way of preaching in Meeting, or "bearing testimony," as she phrased it, "at the prompting of the Holy Spirit." It will be remembered that this is a distinguishing peculiarity of the Society which George Fox founded. Preaching is only permitted upon the spur of the moment, as people of the world would say, but at the prompting of the inward voice, as Quakers deem. Certainly no one ever became a preacher among the Friends "for a piece of bread." If fanatics sometimes "prophesied" out of the fulness of excited brains, or fervid souls, no place-hunter adopted the pulpit as a profession. Only, sometimes, it needs the presence of an