[Footnote 128: 1 Cor. 2. 4.]
From hence it appears to be the opinion of the Quakers, that the whole
worship of God, whether it consist of prayer or of preaching, must be
spiritual. Jesus Christ has also, they say, left this declaration upon
record,[129]that "God is a spirit, and that they that worship him, must
worship him in spirit and in truth." By worshipping him in truth, they
mean, that men are to worship him only when they feel a right
disposition to do it, and in such a manner as they judge, from their own
internal feelings, to be the manner which the spirit of God then
signifies.
[Footnote 129: John 4.24.]
For these reasons, when the Quakers enter into their meetings, they use
no liturgy or form of prayer. Such a form would be made up of the words
of man's wisdom. Neither do they deliver any sermons that have been
previously conceived or written down. Neither do they begin their
service immediately after they are seated. But when they sit down, they
wait in silence,[130] as the Apostles were commanded to do. They
endeavour to be calm and composed. They take no thought as to what they
shall say. They avoid, on the other hand, all activity of the
imagination, and every thing that arises from the will of man. The
creature is thus brought to be passive, and the spiritual faculty to be
disencumbered, so that it can receive and attend to the spiritual
language of the Creator.
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