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William Penn (1644 – 1718) has been known as one of many first true champions of American liberty. A Quaker minister, preacher, and missionary, he was born on October 14 in London throughout occasions when Protestants battled with Catholics and each teams additionally persecuted Jews and free-spirited women and men. On this illiberal age, Penn modeled radical respect for all peoples.
Penn made essentially the most of his well-to-do upbringing by attending Oxford College and learning at a prestigious French Protestant College. Again in England in 1664, he went to regulation college in London.
Imprisoned in 1668 for distributing Quaker pamphlets that have been thought of heretical, he had loads of time for silence and meditation. He wrote: “I thank God for my alternatives for solitude, and kiss the mild hand that led me into it. Although solitude might sound barren to the world, it could actually by no means be so to me.” In jail he additionally wrote pamphlets about freedom of conscience which have been distributed by the Quaker underground.
In 1681, the King of England gave him a constitution enabling him to ascertain an American colony. It grew to become Pennsylvania, which many noticed as America’s first nice melting pot. Philadelphia, the “Metropolis of Brotherly Love” grew to become a sacred web site for liberty. It was there that Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and delegates drafted the Structure.
To Identify This Day . . .
Religious Apply
Some Fruits of Solitude: Sensible Sayings on the Conduct of Human Life by William Penn has been edited by Eric Okay. Taylor. He sums up this extraordinary lawyer and sage’s life and work with the next phrases:
“[William Penn] had the integrity and braveness to observe his conscience, even at nice private value. He suffered with out changing into bitter. He held nice energy with out being corrupted by it. He was an incredible thinker, however he had the humility and the knowledge to hunt and worth the enter of others. In an illiberal age, he granted toleration to others whereas staying true to what he believed. In an age the place Native Individuals have been typically cheated, Penn handled them with dignity, honesty, and equality; he stands just about alone in having saved and upheld the treaties he made with them. Penn confirmed by his life {that a} man of peace may stay properly in a violent world.”
Take a while as we speak to learn this transient overview of Penn’s life and work, to hunt out different works of his within the library, or to flick through “William Penn writings” on-line. Ponder the religious undertow in his work as he explores important dimensions of democracy, similar to freedom, equality, hospitality, justice, and reverence.
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