he strain of a division of the meeting. It was
harder to believe that the Spirit of God was in all men, when half the
community was set off as "unorthodox." It had suffered the strain of
seeing the wide social difference caused by money. Yet it bravely played
the game. Children are not more adapt at "making believe" than were
these old Friends. They deceived even themselves; and their "pretending"
assimilated into the communal life every newcomer. For it created
underneath all differences a sense of oneness; it kept alive, in all
divisions, many of the operations of unity. It compelled strangers and
doctrinal enemies to "make believe" to be friends.

I find it difficult to describe this elusive force of the communal
spirit in the place, just as the communal character of the place is
itself evanescent, while always powerful. I know clearly only this, that
it proceeded, and still on Quaker Hill proceeds from the old religious
inheritance, and from the present religious character of the place; that
it tends directly to the creation of the community of all men, of all
different groups, and that it is ready at hand at all time, to be
called to the assistance of anyone who knows how to appeal to that
communal unity; and that it is a power of idealization, meaning by that
"a power of making believe." In this power, I recognize this community
as being more expert and better versed than any I have ever known.

The dramatic expression of an ideal has had great social power. Upon the
casual observer or visitor it has wrought with the effect of a charm to
impress upon them in a subtle way the ideal of Quakerism. Expressed in
words, it would have no interest: acted out so quaintly, it awakens
admiration, interest, and imitation, not of the forms, but always in
some degree of the substance of the Quaker ideal.

Thus the Quaker ideal has given authority to the Friends, especially to
the older and more conservative of them; has furnished a subtle
machinery for assimilating new members into the community and thus has
been an organizing power.

[10] "Richard Osborn--a Reminiscence," by Margaret B. Monahan;
Quaker Hill Series, 1903.

CHAPTER VII.

MORALS OF THE QUAKER COMMUNITY.

From the first the members found themselves subjected to a clear, simple
standard of morals. Its dominion was unbroken for one hundred years, and
came to an end with the Division of the Meeting; though that event was a
result as much as a cause