Customs, Manners, Fashions, Conversation, Conduct. They contain, of course, recommendations, and suggest prohibitions to the Society, as rules of guidance: and as they came from spiritually-minded men, on solemn occasions, they are supposed to have had a spiritual origin. Hence, Quaker-parents manage their youth according to these recommendations and prohibitions; and hence, this Book of Extracts (for so it is usually called), from which I have obtained a considerable portion of my knowledge on this subject, forms the basis of the moral education of the Society. Of the contents of this book, I shall notice, while I am treating upon this subject, not those rules which are of a recommendatory, but those which are of a prohibitory nature. Education is regulated either by recommendations, or by prohibitions, or by both conjoined. The former relate to things where there is a wish that youth should conform to them, but where a small deviation from them would not be considered as an act of delinquency publicly reprehensible. The latter, to things where any compliance with them becomes a posi tive tive offence. The Quakers, in consequence of the vast power, which they have over their members by means of their discipline, lay a great stress upon the latter. They consider their próhibitions, when duly watched and enfórecd, as so many barriers against vice, or preservatives of virtue. Hence, they are grand component parts in their moral education; and hence I shall chiefly consider them in the chapters which are now to follow upon this subject. OF THE QUAKERS. CHAPTER I.. Moral education of the Quakers-Amusements necessary for youth-Quakers distinguish between the useful and the hurtful-the latter specified, and forbidden. WHEN the blooming spring sheds abroad its benign influence, man feels it equally The blood with the rest of created nature, circulates more freely, and a new current of life seems to be diffused, in his veins, The aged man is enlivened, and the sick man feels himself refreshed. Good spirits and cheerful countenances succeed. But as the year changes in its seasons, and rolls round to its end, the tide seems to slacken, and the current of feeling to return to its former level. But |