The danger for any spirit-inspired religion is individualism carried to excess. In the seventeenth century, this was seen amongst those called Ranters. Friends, too, ran this risk. What preserved them was the discovery of 'gospel-order', the setting up of meetings for church affairs where individual insight was tested against the insight of the gathered group. A series of meetings for church affairs, some local, some regional or national, had developed from 1654 onwards, though it was during the years 1667-1669 that George Fox journeyed throughout the country, creating from a series of ad-hoc meetings a regular structure of monthly and quarterly meetings as part of a yearly meeting for the whole nation.
In 1659 the Box Meeting of women Friends was set up in London. George Fox wrote:
And when I came to Gerard Roberts' house about 8 in the morning there came in Sarah Blackbury to complain to me of the poor and how many poor Friends was in want. And the Lord had showed me what I should do in his eternal power and wisdom. So I spoke to her to bid about 60 women to meet me about the 1st hour in the afternoon at the sign of the Helmet at a Friend's house, and they did so accordingly: such as were sensible women of the Lord's truth and fearing God. And what the Lord had opened unto me I declared unto them concerning their having a meeting once a week every second-day, that they might see and inquire into the necessity of all Friends who was sick and weak and who was in wants, or widows and fatherless in the city and suburbs.
Next: 19.53
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