Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/38

Rh The Puritans had simplified the marriage ceremony. The Friends rejected marriage by a priest, and it became a civil rite. If a man and woman declared themselves willing to live together as a married pair, that sufficed to constitute the marriage. The inner voice was enough to sanctify the union and to make it firm; the inner voice alone could point out the way and keep the heart pure.

Thus pure, thus sublime were the principles which guided this little people who went over to the New World to make that “holy experiment,” as William Penn terms it; to found a community, wholly and entirely, based upon that which is most inward and most spiritual in human life.

Thus began the colony which, under the guidance of William Penn, extended itself into the most flourishing condition and received the name of Pennsylvania. Penn desired in it to found a free colony for all mankind.

The fame of that holy experiment resounded afar. The sons of the forest, the chiefs of the Indian tribes, came to meet the Quaker King. Penn met them beneath the open sky, in the depths of the forest, now leafless by the frosts of autumn, and proclaimed to them the same message of the nobility of man, and of the unity and truth of the inner light, which Fox had announced to Cromwell, and Mary Fisher to the Grand Sultan. The Englishmen and the Indians must regard the same moral law, and every quarrel between them be adjusted by a peaceful tribunal composed of an equal number of men of each race.

“We meet,” said Penn, “upon the broad pathway of good faith and good will; no one shall seek to take advantage of the other; but all shall be done with candour and with love.”

“We are all one flesh and blood.”

The Indians were affected by these noble words. “We