erved,
if you feel such a disposition as this wish indicates, do you not become
Quakers?" "Because, it has been replied, we are too old to be singular.
Dressing with sufficient simplicity ourselves, we see no good reason for
adopting the dress of the society. It would be as foolish in us to
change the colour and fashion of our clothing, as it would be criminal
in the Quakers, with their notions, to come to the use of that which
belongs to us. Endeavouring also to be chaste in our conversation, we
cannot adopt their language. It would be as inconsistent in us to speak
after the manner of the Quakers, as it would be inconsistent in them to
leave their own language for ours. But we wish we had been born Quakers.
And, if we had been born Quakers, we would never have deserted the
society."

Perhaps they to whom I shall confine my remarks in this chapter, are not
aware, that such sentiments as these are floating in the minds of many.
They are not aware, that it is considered as one of the strongest things
for those who have been born in the society, and been accustomed to its
particularities, to leave it. And least of all are they aware of the
worthless motives, which the world attributes to them for an intended
separation from it.

There is, indeed, something seemingly irreconcileable in the thought of
such a dereliction or change. To leave the society of a moral people,
can it be a matter of any credit? To diminish the number of those who
protest against war, and who have none of the guilt upon their heads of
the sanguinary progress of human destruction which is going on in the
world, is it desirable, or rather, ought it not to be a matter of
regret? And to leave it at a time, when its difficulties are over, is it
a proof of a wise and a prudent choice? If persons had ever had it in
contemplation to leave the society in its most difficult and trying
times, or in the days of its persecution, when only for the adoption of
innocent singularities its members were insulted, and beaten, and
bruised, and put in danger of their lives, it had been no matter of
surprise: but to leave it, when all prejudices against them are
gradually decreasing, when they are rising in respectability in the eyes
of the government under which they live, and when, by the weight of
their own usefulness and character, they are growing in the esteem of
the world, is surely a matter of wonder, and for which it is difficult
to account.

This brings me t