Changing Their Path: Quaker Adaptation to the Challenge of Restoration, 1660-1680

This chapter focuses on how epistles sent to Ireland guided Quaker communities. In the years before the restoration of Charles II, Quaker missionaries in Ireland used apocalyptic language to transmit their prophecy that the kingdom of God would reign on Earth soon, all of which served to emphasise the Quaker rejection of the world. The political and ecclesiastical restoration in 1660 suggested that the glorious outcome of Christ's kingdom on earth would be delayed. In Ireland the legacy of religious heterodoxy provided challenges for the government and the established church at the time of the restoration. The Quaker community in Ireland after the restoration had two main challenges. The first challenge came with the failure of the Quaker negotiations with the rump Parliament in 1659. The second challenge was for the Quakers to renegotiate the political landscape in Ireland to ensure that their believers thrived and to guide the second generation into adulthood as faithful members of the community.