An Exploration of Seventeenth-Century Quaker Printed Title

Paratext refers to all material contained in a printed or manuscript work, including prefaces, marginalia and metadata regarding the publication but excluding the main body of the text. My analysis considers both linguistic phenomena and the visual evidence of each work in the sample. The qualitative study compares the Quaker approach to title page design and language with contemporary printed works by non-Quaker writers in order to test whether it can be said that there is a prototypically Quaker title page. The results show a preference for an ideological framework but a reluctance by Quaker writers to commodify their output. Early Quaker publications demonstrate, in my opinion, a distinctiveness in their approach to creating and producing paratext for pamphlets, tracts and books.


Introduction
This paper is a pragma-linguistic analysis of elements of the title pages found in a sample of seventeenth-century Quaker pamphlets and books and is primarily addressed to those interested in aspects of Quaker studies rather than specialist linguists engaged in the study of paratext.1 Paratext refers to all material contained in a printed or manuscript work, including prefaces, marginalia and metadata regarding the publication.The present-day equivalent of these front pages would be the title page plus publisher's blurb.This is, to my knowledge, the first study to investigate title pages of early printed publications by Quakers.
Much previous scholarship has been devoted to the content of the main body of Quaker publications but the paratext (title pages, prefaces 'to the reader', errata and other metatext) has so far been neglected.My study explores the various framing strategies used in the texts and how these authors and printers presented and commodified their products compared to their non-Quaker religious and secular counterparts.To what extent did persuasive marketing strategies promote these publications?Can we infer there was a prototypically Quaker title page?A visual and linguistic analysis of similarities and differences in a small collection of publications could tell us if there is such a thing as a prototypical Quaker title page.
The enquiry is based on a set of 24 pamphlets or books held in the Library of the Society of Friends, London, all published between 1658 and 1687, the majority before 1670.The early years of the Quaker movement, from 1648 to the 1660s, were the most prolific and uncontrolled, matching the turbulent historical times in which they were published.Some publications were written to attract non-Quakers, others for their perceived importance to a Quaker readership, or as engagement in public doctrinal disputing.The process for the collection was to extract from a previously compiled corpus of seventeenth-century Quaker texts all the items that contained a title page.2Out of a total of 200, I was left with 24.The larger corpus does not comprise all the published material Quakers produced, but we are left with a sufficient subset to use as a starting point for the present study.
The paper is structured in this way: some background information for the Quaker dataset is followed by a brief survey of paratextual theoretical concepts.The remainder of the study investigates the linguistic framing observed of various communication strategies, biblical referencing and speech acts.A separate section analyses the visual layout and typography of the title pages in the sample, and then these elements are compared with a small collection of paratextual non-Quaker religious or secular texts.My concluding remarks revisit the questions posed at the start of the study.

Early Quaker Publications
Seventeenth-century Quaker publications have attracted many studies, in part because so much printed material was preserved during the period of the so-called 'pamphlet wars' in that century.Friends used this new approach as a distinct campaigning tool to 'subject the World with a barrage of Quaker tracts and papers Roads Seventeenth-Century Quaker Printed Title Pages as Paratext which publicised the campaign' (Peters 2005: 42).O'Malley (1982) quotes from the Second Day Morning Meeting minutes (1672) to describe the effective system Quakers developed after 1672 for the financing of books and tracts.
The major sources of finance for Quaker publications were the General Collections for the Service of Truth ….Printing was regarded as being in the Service of Truth.In 1672 money was needed 'for friends supply, that are called into the service of the Lord beyond seas and for bookes that are disposed of and given away for the publick service of truth to the Chiefe Rulers &others'.Another major source of money, at least until the 1680s, was the money paid by Quarterly Meetings to printers for books approved by the Second Day Meeting.(O'Malley 1982: 79) Hagglund ( 2013) makes clear that Quaker pamphlets and books were largely controlled and distributed across the nation and beyond rather than marketed to the wider reading public.Friends with responsibility for this circulation were more concerned with the potential for 'wrong' material to reach the public than in widening readership through sales.Can the concept of 'commodification' even be applied to Quaker publishing?The fact that many publications had a built-in willing readership will be revisited later in this paper.

Paratext: Some Theoretical Framing Concepts
The concept of paratextuality, in which framing devices present metatext to inform and guide readers, was developed by Genette (1997).He proposes certain functions which are relevant to the present study.These are: the 'interpretive' function, in which the author's intentions, explanations and clarifications may be found; the 'commercial' function comprising recommendations, persuasion and overt marketing; and the 'navigational' function which would be used to set out the organisation of a text as a guide to the reader.
Genette's ground-breaking work in paratextual literary studies has been extended more recently by other scholarship in this field.Birke and Birte (2013) widen their scope to include the mapping of paratextual digital and other media; Ruokkeinen and Lüra (2017) go into visual elements of typography and script choices.Cecconi's chapter (2020) comes closer to the early modern concept of the Quaker genre with a study of seventeenth-century paratextual elements in news and broadside ballads.Suhr's (2012) pragmatic analysis explores marketing considerations regarding illustration and layout.She also focuses on identifying elements that were apparently obligatory and others that might have been optional in the minds of the authors and the publisher-printers, and asks which styles of presentation would have been most likely to generate sales.
The study of seventeenth-century pamphlets has occupied a number of other scholars working in various sub-fields.Verhoest (2019) makes the following generalisation about pamphlets as a print medium, but one which could well apply more generally to several Quaker publication types: Pamphlets in the 17th century were short tracts of religious, political or topical interest, written in the vernacular, generally printed in a quarto format, and sold at a low price in order to reach a wide audience.… Pamphlets constitute an important testimonial of the religious, political and economic changes that characterized this historical epoch, not only through their contents, but also through their function, both as a commodity to be sold for profit and as a means of persuasion and communication.(Verhoest 2019: 48) Verhoest's study is valuable for the detailed background to the processes used by printers, booksellers and authors in terms of production and distribution in the public sphere.He comments unfavourably on the superficial informational content of the material and suggests the aim was rather to 'mobilize public opinion for a cause' (Verhoest 2019: 53), hence the emphasis on the commodity of cheap pamphlets and tracts.Their content was discussed in public spaces, reprinted or handed on.Thus the primary readership, he claims was not the main target for the marketing of such publications (Verhoest 2019).Clearly, the importance of title pages was a major consideration in the production process.Silva's 2014 study of sixteenth-century paratext as an aspect of brand supports this broad argument (Silva 2014: 83).
Cecconi's work on early news texts (2020) also provides a new and important fourth strategy to Genette's functional set, namely the 'ideological' function.She pinpoints this function through the use of words in the title pages such as warning or lamentation, and suggests the purpose is 'intent to change the reader's attitude and beliefs' evidenced by an author's stance regarding their topic (Cecconi 2020: 140).Religious texts such as Quaker ones may usefully include this 'ideological' classification.I draw on this and other theoretical elements as a basis for investigating speech acts and attitudinal language used in the title page texts.

Functional Strategies
The functional strategies explored in this section are based largely on Cecconi's interpretation of classifications formulated by previous scholars (Cecconi 2020: 140).

Interpretive
The purpose of this function is to give extra clarifying information or an indication of the writer's stance.Three texts draw on this strategy.Extracts 1-3 exemplify stretches of language which may be classified as interpretive.
1) Written for the use of such that denyeth not themselves the use of Reason and Sense, and that are not wedded to their own Perswasion (West, 1668) Roads Seventeenth-Century Quaker Printed Title Pages as Paratext 2) Twenty Cases of Conscience … the which also may serve as a Glass to shew the ignorant the Spots and Deformities in the Way of their Worship (Crook, 1667) 3) A faithful Warning Which may serve as a Caution to all others in authority within the Nation.(Mason, 1660) Navigational Some authors and printers set out some text-organising information as a guide to the potential reader, see examples 4) and 5).Hickock's layout sets out clear sections to be found in the main body: 4) An Answer to the great Dragons Message, Put forth in five Positions.(Hickock, 1660) Norton explains there will be three distinct parts to his text: 5) Errors answered; a reproofe to the Offenders, some Queries to all people.(Norton, 1659) The title page of the tract The Spirit of the Martyrs by Hookes ('living testimonies of the true Church, seed of God, and faithful martyrs in all ages') provides a navigational aid in the form of a numbered list of eight ways in which spiritual objectors in past ages came up against the authorities of the day.One of the objections on the list is 'saying that the gift of God could not be bought nor sold for money'.Each objection in the list is linked in the body of the text to similar Quaker grievances in their present day.
Commercial -only one text, example 6), contains any language that could be construed as using promotional language: 6) Answers to the many Objections that are frequently produced by their Opposers, which may be profitable for all to read.(Caton, 1659) None of the items in the sample contain paratext that promotes, recommends or praises.This is contrary to findings from previous studies looking at non-Quaker material, see for example Cecconi 2020: 140;Ruokkeinen 2021: 18-19).

Ideological
This function may be illustrated by any of the Quaker persuasive texts.Many of the writers use exhortatory language in order to 'change the reader's attitudes and beliefs', to reiterate Cecconi's definition, although expository passages may well be woven into the content of the title pages too.I return to this aspect below when discussing speech acts in the paratexts.Example 7) typifies this function: To conclude this part of the study, my analysis indicates the ideological function to be the predominant framing strategy of much Quaker published material at this time.

Other Framing Strategies
Textual Labels These are included in some of the texts as a guide to the type of discourse comprising the content in the main body.Specifically Quaker-focused labels are 'Testimony-ies' and 'Epistles'.'Warning' as a label is also typical of the apocalyptic discourse of many mid-century Quaker publications.Others are more conventional for early modern pamphlets and books in the field of theology including 'Account', 'Answer', 'Counsel', 'Narrative' and 'Reflection'.These labels accurately correspond to the ensuing text types so that potential purchasers would understand broadly what they were buying, although some labels do have rather nebulous meanings.Not all the texts in the sample carry a label however.

Printers and Dates
Some but by no means all of the texts carry the printer's name, place of publication and date.Many Quaker pamphlets were published contrary to the censor's regulations and printers ran the risk of contravening those.Quakers used printers known to sympathise with them or those who were themselves Quakers (Mortimer 1948;Peters 2005).Printers named in this sample are Giles Calvert, Thomas Simmons and Robert Wilson.Twelve texts are published with no reference to the printer, and one merely states 'printed for the author'.This element might not seem relevant as a communicative strategy from a Quaker perspective, but the marketplace for much published material at the time was competitive.Knowing where and from whom to purchase items was an important piece of information for many potential readers beyond the Quaker community.

Addressees
A tally of the variety of intended addressees as evidenced by the title pages shows that 'all readers' is the most common intended readership, although George Whitehead singles out 'people that care about their souls' (1660) and Robert West claims his work was 'written for the use of such that denyeth not themselves the use of Reason and Sense, and that are not wedded to their own Perswasion' (1668).Three are intended as public replies to individual, named priests; four are open letters to Parliament or 'other Rulers'.Two texts speak to professors of religion (that is, readers who identify as adherents of specific denominations) and one -not at first glance making use of a good marketing ploy -hopes to catch the eye of the 'ignorant blind'.Two texts are destined for an internal audience of Quakers and their Meetings.

Biblical References
Ratia (2013) surmises in her introductory section that it was a common convention for authors to include either full text extracts or references, and this seemed to be the case whether the discourse was theologically based or not.Two Quaker writers take this element of the title page very seriously: Turner (1658) lists six references and Parnell (1655) lists ten.There seem to be no obviously favourite quotations, and both Old and New Testament books feature widely.
Early Quakers cared deeply that their distinctive version of Christianity should demonstrate firm biblical underpinning in their writings.Several of the title pages devote a sizeable percentage of the available space to a display of full extracts.On the other hand, nine out of the 24 provide no biblical references at all, indicating that this paratextual element was not always a given.

Speech Acts
The communicative message in texts can be analysed by applying aspects of speech act theory.Assertive, directive and expressive speech act verbs in the Quaker title pages carry the underlying illocutionary force of infor m ing, pe rsua di ng, a dv isi ng and e x horti ng.We look first at assertives.Assertive speech acts are declaratives which confidently and directly state something to be true.For instance, John Field's assertions consist of refuting slanders by an opponent.He terms them on his front page: 'Thomas Crisp's Rapsody of Lies, Slanders and Defamations'.Luke Howard has the same intention with regard to 'Thomas Danson's lies', and Zachary is bent on castigating and reproving those readers who have received the Quaker message but for some reason have not left off indulging in the ways of the world.Hickock's title page announces a report in narrative form of the denunciations of a priest at Bastchurch, Shropshire.Hickock thinks it wrong that a priest should tell all his parishioners they are living in sin.There is sermonising by Will Caton in the form of 'a guide to the blind', that is, those readers who have not yet understood the Quaker position regarding the hostile attitudes taken by some 'professors of religion'.This is familiar ground for the campaigning approach found in many Quaker publications.
The second approach of the Quaker discursive tactic is to employ directive speech act verbs, of which many examples occur in the sample.The point of directives is to convince one or more people to change their behaviour in some way, or to require someone to act in a specific way.The communicative force is implied in those title pages that contain such pragmatic discourse.Three types occur in this directives group: r equ esti ng, counselli ng and pe rsua di ng, and in each group a range from mild to strong is implied.Allowances should be made by present-day readers for possible different implications of these, as seventeenth-century speakers may have had a different interpretation from present-day ones.In the 'request' category writers are r equ esti ng/ask i ng/ de m a nding/plea ding.For example, both Forster and Hickock want certain priests to provide answers to queries they have set out.In the 'pleading' category both Watkins (M.W.) and Crook plead with their readers.Watkins describes the sufferings of many Friends and pleads for relief, while Crook addresses both houses of Parliament and all readers in his petition for liberty of conscience against outward force being used in matters of faith and religion.In the 'counselling' category writers are e ncou r agi ng/a dv isi ng.For example, Forster's title page uses the actual words counsel and encourage.A number of writers expand their long titles by encouraging changes in behaviour; for example, Wilkinson frames his text through advice to rulers not to 'neglect the people'.The 'persuading' group of writers are using their paratexts for pe rsua di ng/u rgi ng.Many clothe their apocalyptic warnings with language designed to get readers to act while there is still time.For example, Mason addresses the king and all those in authority, urging them to 'to improve this little inch of time that they have' in the face of 'approaching misery'.
Only two examples of expressive speech act language occur in the sample; this is the category in which writers convey their emotions and feelings.Many of the main bodies of the sample texts include this approach at length but we are only concerned here with evidence from the title pages.The two texts in this category concern Quakers addressing Quaker groups: Dewsbury in a neutrally worded epistle title, and Whitehead (1665) in his epistle to the 'Remnant of Friends' with the heartfelt running title 'a testimony of love to Friends suffering in London'.

Evaluative Language
The attitudinal and evaluative discourse mostly express disagreement or polemic.Negative or disputative attitudes to perceived or actual opponents are expressed by adjectives such as 'sinful', 'illegal', 'dangerous' and 'infectious', and there are denigrating phrases such as 'the dragon's message' (Hickock), or 'outward bread which the Baptists have idolized' (Fuce).On the other hand some authors reach out to those with 'tender hearts' or who are 'wise in heart'.They offer a 'friendly call' and style themselves 'a true friend'.These dynamic attitudes carrying a positive or negative thrust have been attested in a larger corpus of Quaker writings (Roads 2015: 109-13).This linguistic element contributes to the 'ideological' communicative strategy common to Quaker paratext.
So in summarising this section we can say that the miniature examples of the paratext pages belong to some extent within the framing function of 'interpretive' (that is to say, clarifying or stance-indicating a headline title).But this overlaps and is dominated by the 'ideological' classification, which I argue fits the latter function more closely since it takes stance marking into the realm of persuasion and the attempt to change religious beliefs and attitudes.It is debatable to what extent the polemic language Quaker writers adopted may have contributed to the persuasive marketing of their publications.Other functions are much less apparent.In other strategic devices, the main approach that carries communicative weight appears to be the linguistic evidence of the speech act analysis.

The Role of Paratextual Typography
We next turn to the visual evidence.The topic of paratextual visual highlighting in early printed material is explained by Ruokkeinen and Lüra (2017).
Visual highlighting acts in a navigational function, guiding the reader's attention by separating the paratextual matter visually from the text.Highlighting seems to indicate the paratextuality of other elements, rather than carry a paratextual significance of its own.(Ruokkeinen and Lüra 2017: 118) Both McConchie (2013) and Ratia ( 2013) have concluded from their studies of title pages that graphical choices made by the printer largely take precedence over linguistic choices.Where there is a conflict between layout and language, the layout and visual appearance seems to take precedence.In other words, graphical design (in the modern sense) is what publishers then (and now) believe is what sells their products.Let us see what transpires from the detailed linguistic description of one eight-page Quaker pamphlet published in 1659 by Bryan Wilkinson.Fig. 1 shows the title page.
The typography and positioning of this title page demonstrates a variety of different elements.The headline title To the Present Authority of Parliament now sitting has three variants of typeface.Small all-capitals are used for the least prominent words: to the; of; now sitting.The two words present authority are set with initial capitals but a large lower-case typeface style, and possibly a different font.These two words appear to be slightly less foregrounded however than the most prominent word which is parliament.This uses a large all-capitals style.The whole title is centred, taking up the top third of the page.
There is a clear visual separation between the main title and the running title, which comprises three separated paragraphs.Each little paragraph is centred, set in lower case and with white space between each segment.The whole is arranged in what is sometimes called a half-diamond indentation (Smith 2000: 60) but McConchie prefer the description 'double-tapered indentation' (McConchie 2013: section 4.1) in the shape of an inverted isosceles triangle.Even in this section there is variation in that a slightly larger lower-case typeface is used for the first line of paragraphs two and three.This takes us to the lower third of the page where, separated by a line across the page there are two quotations from the Bible.These are set in a smaller, italic style.Author and printer details appear below, all centred.The author's name is separated above and below from neighbouring text.For the author's name the printer has used the larger lower-case style as was seen in the running title text.Finally, at the foot of the page we have the word 'London' in italicised all-capitals.The printer, Thomas Simmons gives his name and workplace address and the publication year (1659) at the very foot of the page, all in italics.
The image demonstrates the usual lengthy running title that many Quaker writers were fond of.This has an 'interpretive' function and as we have seen, the layout serves to highlight the scope of the main text of the pamphlet that follows the initial paratext page.This open letter (which may never have been read by the stated addressees) announces a political and religious stance, and exemplifies the ideological function of paratext.These paragraphs may stand too as a gentle marketing hook to persuade potential readers to look inside.There is no navigational element.This close inspection of one title page can serve as a comparator for the remainder of the Quaker samples, beginning with the typography and layout.The use of italic script for place names ('England', 'London' in the Wilkinson page) are found in all the other texts.Biblical quotations are also typically presented in italics, see Fig. 2

below.
The Wilkinson example in Fig. 1 makes no use of any decorative elements or elaborate initial letters.Very few of the other texts do.Where they are apparent is in prefatory material which makes use of the first page of the pamphlet below the title page.The preface to the Wilkinson pamphlet does have a 'swash' initial letter but that is found on page two.The decreasing half-diamond shape for the running text occurs in several pamphlets, see Fig. 3.As the printer Simmons also avoids this format for some authors we may assume it is the choice of the writer (and whichever individual or Meeting is paying) whether the half-diamond shape is to be used or not.An element of typography that is absent in the Wilkinson example is the use of widely spaced all-capitals.This is a device used in a number of the texts as an additional way of highlighting prominent words or phrases, see Fig. 4 (which also illustrates the 'navigational' function with its use of a numbered list mentioned above).Within the plain taste apparently favoured by Quaker writers and their Meetings there is clearly a wide variety of typography and layout.
Using this highly detailed analysis as a benchmark we can look more generally at the other Quaker examples, being aware that a twenty-first century reader will certainly have different expectations of a visually engaging layout and typography from a seventeenth-century one.Text set in very large all-capitals seizes the attention, more so if the letters are widely spaced and surrounded by generous white space.Fig. 5 gives an approximate representation of the largest and the second largest words in each of the texts in the sample.The size variation presumably indicated the relative importance of these key words to seventeenthcentury eyes.Modern eyes might be surprised at some of the choices of these 'key words' but too many centuries have passed for us to question the originators.Small paragraphs, whether shaped or not, seem effective.One or two examples that cram in as much text as possible seem to be trying too hard and the message is lost, and the same can be said where there is a large amount of variation of typeface, style and layout.

Comparisons with Non-Quaker Title Pages
The key framing function of interest for paratextual comparison appears to be how Quaker writers promoted their work (if they did).How much evidence is there for the 'commodification' aspect in the Quaker set compared to the more commercial and/or religious publications produced by the non-Quaker world?Although a full comparison is beyond the scope of this initial enquiry, to investigate the small Quaker set with no regard at all for what lay beyond the Quaker community would lack a sense of breadth.The present study merely points the way to a fuller, more comprehensive study in the future.
To make the comparison I collected several non-Quaker religious and non-Quaker secular publications.These are 18 publications of which six have religious themes.I separated the religious-based texts from the broad overview, as the rhetorical purpose of these writers could be argued to be closer to the Quaker purpose than the secular ones.This is not the place to sub-divide further into denominational differences.More of the items are book-length than in the Quaker set; the date range is between 1656 and 1695.A systematic comparison of such different yet outwardly similar publications is not possible without a larger dataset.Nevertheless, some initial similarities and differences can be detected.
An inspection of the non-Quaker group shows that much of the assertive speech act language is similar to the Quaker group: r e porti ng, com pla in ing, justif y ing, expla in ing.or example in the non-Quaker factual genre, Robert May's text The Accomplisht Cook (1685) describes and explains the ideal preparation of flesh, fowl and fish along with appropriate sauces; John Tutchin (1690) narrates a famous sea battle.For publications with a directive framing there is William Cole's physico-medical Essay Concerning the Late Frequency of Apoplexies which sets out to convince doctors of ways to prevent and treat strokes.
The religious texts are commonly in the form of sermonic exhortations, for example in the keeping of the commandments.Two are more persuasive in tone, somewhat in the Quaker style: John Hart (1682) addresses the 'worldly rich' reminding them of their charitable duties to resist 'unmerciful men' -a doctrinal dispute we need not trouble ourselves with here.The anonymous author of Truth and Duty (1689) sets out his argument in the form of a 'modest' expository essay but in reality the title page focuses on controversial aspects of 'baptism and the Sabbath day'-maybe an answer to a challenge from the Quakers?The directive speech acts of pe rsua di ng and a dv isi ng with a view to convincing are surely part and parcel of creating a paid-for text for wide distribution to likely readers.Roads Seventeenth-Century Quaker Printed Title Pages as Paratext A brief snapshot of evaluative language in the small collection of non-Quaker text retrieves lexis such as noble, true and impartial, modest, remarkable, vindication.One can see how easily this language lends itself to the present-day label of marketing (for instance easie and perfect, easie access, authoritative).Copies need to be sold and printers need to be paid.
With regard to visual elements, inevitably there are seventeenth-century similarities between the non-Quaker and the Quaker styles of printing (and printers' preferences).Each printer or publisher will have their individual tastes.In general Quaker texts use less or no decorative features on the title page.The non-Quaker texts are too varied to extend to a reliable generalisation.
An analysis of title pages of seventeenth-century treatises on the plague by Ratia ( 2013) serves as a useful extra non-Quaker comparator.Her analysis of the front page typography reveals a difference between her specific genre-based text type and the multipurpose Quaker publications in my sample.She agrees that what we might think of as 'key words' are not necessarily highlighted in the large types and scripts of the visual evidence.
An interesting difference between Ratia's texts and the Quaker set is the range of textual labels assigned by Quaker authors or printers in the long titles.She defines these labels as a kind of 'umbrella term referring to various types of discourse'.Her dataset includes 'Dialogue', 'Treatise', 'Observations', 'Meditations'.The Quaker labels, however, indicate the very different nature of much of Friends' published output, as was noted earlier.Several of the Quaker texts in the sample contain no such descriptors however, and readers were presumably expected to work out the nature of the publication for themselves.

Concluding Remarks
Can we now identify a prototype model of a Quaker title page?On the basis of this small sample I suggest that the model will probably have a plain-looking layout, albeit with a wide variety of typographical switches of style and size.Typically there will be little or no decorative element; that could be a principled Quaker approach or it could simply be a money-saving reason, or both.The framing function, with or without a textual label, will be mostly ideological, guiding the reader to distinct interpretation of the contents through a mix of assertive and directive speech acts.The navigational function will mostly likely be absent.There is likely to be a strong communicative illocutionary force, more underlying than overt marketing from a linguistic perspective.It is not clear how much the writers paid attention specifically to 'manipulating' a reader's attention, or whether the printers did this on behalf of the writers anyway, possibly without consulting them.Many of the Quaker publications in the seventeenth century were purposed as either campaigning tools or for internal consumption by members of the developing Quaker movement.
There is a closer comparison with the rhetoric of non-Quaker religious texts although the latter publications in the sample are more evidently mainstream Christian sermonising than the radical exhortatory style of the Quakers.The very word sermon in the non-Quaker set occurs in the sample as a common textual label.There is a greater distinction between Quaker and non-Quaker secular texts, as might be expected.Again, the latter contain more overtly commercial rhetoric with the obvious aim to sell multiple copies.These may have been more expensive to purchase, especially the book-length ones, so more would be at stake in the production.Some Quaker title pages do use persuasive approaches designed to attract the reader's attention, sometimes in a rather less professional style.This is more the case for texts in the first decade or so of the Quaker movement, I suggest.
This study has focused on a sample of title pages of Quaker texts.A browse through Quaker material on the Early English Books Online (EEBO) site indicates that only relatively few items have a minimal or non-existent title page.These tend to be broadside sheets, or epistles destined solely for internal Quaker readership.Where there is simply a title plus running text laid out on the top half of an initial page, the visual style described above (with the usual wide variety of typefaces) still holds good.
My analytical study of paratextual title pages brings out aspects of the campaigning messaging that Quaker authors wished to communicate as paramount.There are notable differences in the framing strategies between the Quaker set and the non-Quaker secular sample, both visually and linguistically.Having said that, there are indeed some similarities of production and framing between the Quaker set and the non-Quaker religious sample.Nevertheless, I suggest a clear Quaker approach is discernible compared to the contemporary material with which the Quaker writers (and their printers) were in public competition.This model encapsulates a determination to exhort, persuade and otherwise influence their intended readership through the title pages of their output.Further research is indicated to look at other aspects of Quaker paratext such as lengthy passages 'to the reader', handwritten notes by subsequent readers and other material extraneous to the main body of the texts.
7) A Friendly call to all Notionists and high Professors of Religion … to come speedily down from their Pinacle, lest they fall into Temptation.(Forster 1676) Mason, example (8), urges spiritual changes in English governance: 8) A faithful Warning with good Advice … to Englands King and his Council.(Mason 1660)

Fig. 1 .
Fig. 1.Title page of Wilkinson's pamphlet To the Present Authority of Parliament now Sitting (1659).

Fig. 2 .
Fig. 2. Title page from A Shield of the Truth, Parnell 1655, showing biblical quotations and references in italic script.

Fig. 3 .
Fig. 3. Showing the 'half-diamond' shape on the title page of The Saints Justified, Hickock, 1660.

Fig. 5 .
Fig. 5. Highlighted items in the title page shown by largest and second largest difference in type size and script.