gredient of war; but they voted an aid to New England of three
thousand pounds, to be put into the hands of the governor, and
appropriated it for the purchasing of bread, flour, wheat, or other
grain. Some of the council, desirous of giving the House still further
embarrassment, advis'd the governor not to accept provision, as not
being the thing he had demanded; but be reply'd, "I shall take the
money, for I understand very well their meaning; other grain is
gunpowder," which he accordingly bought, and they never objected to
it.[10]

[10] See the votes.--[Marg. note.]

It was in allusion to this fact that, when in our fire company we
feared the success of our proposal in favour of the lottery, and I had
said to my friend Mr. Syng, one of our members, "If we fail, let us
move the purchase of a fire-engine with the money; the Quakers can have
no objection to that; and then, if you nominate me and I you as a
committee for that purpose, we will buy a great gun, which is certainly
a fire-engine." "I see," says he, "you have improv'd by being so long
in the Assembly; your equivocal project would be just a match for their
wheat or other grain."

These embarrassments that the Quakers suffer'd from having establish'd
and published it as one of their principles that no kind of war was
lawful, and which, being once published, they could not afterwards,
however they might change their minds, easily get rid of, reminds me of
what I think a more prudent conduct in another sect among us, that of
the Dunkers. I was acquainted with one of its founders, Michael
Welfare, soon after it appear'd. He complain'd to me that they were
grievously calumniated by the zealots of other persuasions, and charg'd
with abominable principles and practices, to which they were utter
strangers. I told him this had always been the case with new sects,
and that, to put a stop to such abuse, I imagin'd it might be well to
publish the articles of their belief, and the rules of their
discipline. He said that it had been propos'd among them, but not
agreed to, for this reason: "When we were first drawn together as a
society," says he, "it had pleased God to enlighten our minds so far as
to see that some doctrines, which we once esteemed truths, were errors;
and that others, which we had esteemed errors, were real truths. From
time to time He has been pleased to afford us farther light, and our
principles have been improving, and our errors diminish