had, among her cynics, a Diogenes and a Menedemus ;* Bohemia and Germany had their Beghards; France had her Turlepins; Italy her friar Juniper. All these professed an aversion to the shackles of clothing in their holy processions!

The society have lately told the world, that they have searched, and can find no evidence that any of their females were guilty of these disorders.§ This betrays an inexcusable ignorance of the history and of the sentiments of their fathers. Fox, and Penn, and Sewel, do not only admit the facts, but applaud the acts of these immodest lupercalians.

§ 22. DRESS. The society have always shown the greatest anxiety to be plain and simple. In the attainment of this, they changed the ancient names of days and months, as heathenish; though their reforming hands have left words in our language equally heathenish in origin. They changed the familiar mode of speech, which custom, from time immemorial, had sanctioned. They became martyrs and confessors for the honour of the pronouns thee and thou. Yet, alack! how weak are even martyrs! Though they suffered, even to wounds and blood, for thee and thou in the singular; they have for more than a hundred years been committing grammatical murder on the case and person. They have all along been guilty of saying "how does thee do?" They carried their plainness, in a rigid manner, in ancient times, to their houses and furniture. Some of them, when sending their

* Menedemus made his processions in the street as a fury come fresh from Tartarus, to note down the incorrigibly wicked. W. Anderson's Philosophy of Greece, p. 368, &c. folio.

Mosh. vol. iii. cent. 13, p. 2, ch. 2.

See Boileau's Hist. of the Flagellantes, ch. 23.

In their remarks on Mosheim's History, in an appendix to the Ame rican editions of that work, they are careful to say only "their females." But the note seems to convey a denial of these naked processions. Mosh. Eccl. Hist. New York edit. vol. iv. p. 287.

These extravagances should not have been noticed, had they not grown out of their principles, and been advocated by their writers. Sec Fox's Jour. vol. i. pp. 208, 499, 531; ii. p. 65, 79. Sewel, ii. p. 226. See article Signs, in their respective indices. Penn, ii. p. 80, 836, and particularly the eighth chapter of his "Serious Apology." Works, vol. ii. "For his saying that some of our women went naked, 'tis affirmed "with lightness; tho' some few of our Friends went naked for a sign,” &c. Penn then proceeds to a godly comment on the scandalous practice. See also Farnsworth's defence of these luperci, in his "Pure Language of the Spirit," printed A. D. 1656.

effusions from the press, would not permit a proud capital letter to stand in any of their modest pages. And one removed from his fire side the luxury of tongs, and substituted the primitive implement of a cloven stick!* But the pride of plainness distinguishes the society from all other sects, in their dress. They wear the broad brim,t the flowing coat and breeches. The oral law respecting the make of the hat and the coat, has been like the laws of the Medes and Persians; or the laws of China when they received the signature of the red pencil. But, as to the make of the last article, I mean the small clothes, I cannot find that it is a sine qua non-that it should exactly resemble the mode of that on the fine statue of Penn, in the hospital yard of Philadelphia. This has got a convenience, or else a singular decoration in front; the absence of which, in the moderns, records, with melancholy evidence, how much they have degenerated from that great leader of the ton. According to the oral canons, which fix and regulate their costume, the most orthodox colour is drab; sober gray and brown, are tolerated. Black is, for obvious reasons, absolutely heterodox. For red, the use of it is prohibited, and even proscribed by the oral law, in terms approaching the rigour of the law of Menu, who prohibits the Brahmins of India from even trafficking in red garments. The gay Quakers, however, it must be observed, use nearly as much freedom with the oral canons of the society, on this article, as many of the clergy do with the canons of the church, in a better cause. They make them suit their own way of thinking.

It has been justly observed, that there is little profit in disputing about matters of taste. Each nation has its own customs and

* Sewel, vol. i. p. 242.

The broad brim has exercised the wit of poets and actors:

"With broad brims sometimes like umbrellas."-Hudibras.

The profane wit, Nokes, appeared on the stage under a tremendous hat. But this was only as the first fruits to the harvest. Dryden brought one of his personages forward, under a hat made after the dimensions of the hind wheel of a carriage. See Dunscomb's Antiq. of Hereford Edit. of 1804. But the irresistible courage, and imperturbable gravity of the society, in defence of the broad brim, have secured them the peaceable and triumphant possession of it.

Sir William Jones's Disc. on the Relation of the Chinese to the Hindus; and Life, p. 393.

standard of propriety. Which of us would pretend to refute the arguments of a Turk in defence of his beard or his turban? So tenacious is the Chinese of his customs, that solemn embassies have been refused an audience, because the haughty European would not prostrate himself, or beat his forehead, a given number of times on the floor, before the presence! We cannot refute feelings or taste. Were it not even folly to persuade the society, that the broad brin: should give way to the narrow brim? They could tell you, that the Chinese wear brims even broader than theirs. That blue or black is a finer colour than drab? They could quote against us the custom of the Asiatic nations, where light colours prevail. That they should banish the flowing skirts? The flowing robes of the east, where they derived their opinions, are clearly in their favour. That modern manners make it a mark of respect to uncover the head in the presence of a superior? They could tell you, that the orientals do not uncover their heads: "that the Jews at Rome, and the west, do not stir their bonnets "in their synagogues to any man, but remain still covered."* And if this were too modern to render it venerable authority, they could call in, to their aid, the ancient Romans, who certainly remained covered in their temples, when they drew near the shrine of their idols. And what is more, they have the authority of Tacitus and of Plutarch, to prove that it was an especial privilege of the priesthood among the heathens, in their public intercourse, and in their solemn services, while others were uncovered, never to lay aside their hats.†

It is very certain, therefore, that many customs prevail among us, for which we cannot produce such ancient and classic authority. However, there is, unhappily for them, one circumstance which operates rather against their system. The common feelings and sense of the west are clearly against them. Their attempts to bring in upon us the customs of the east, and its fashions in dress, are about as anomalous and extraordinary, as would be the zeal of a Turk, to induce the citizens of Constantinople to ex

* Sir E. Sandy's View of Religion in the west. Anno. 1613 p. 242. "Nunquam pileum deponebant." Baronius de Donat. Constant. and Valer. Max. i. 1 and 4.

change their pantaloons for the Quaker breeches, and yield up the red turban to the broad brim of black beaver!

The charge of affectation, in ushering in singular customs and forms of dress under covert of religion, has not been the severest trial to which the faith of the Friends was subjected in older times. No small portion of their bodily sufferings was originated by their zealous adherence to an item of their religious ceremonies connected with their dress. It was a part of their ancient religious ceremonies, not to uncover the head to a mortal man. Hence their conscientious and most scrupulous refusal to uncover their heads before magistrates and courts of justice. They resisted the order from the bench to uncover, as an insult to their religious creed; as a wound inflicted on a tender part of their conscience. Hence they would not be driven from their faith and practice in this particular, by bonds and imprisonments. They would sooner have consented to lose their heads than to uncover them !*

But the society has derived benefits from the peculiarity of their dress, sufficient to out balance the pains of martyrdom for it. The circumstance, trivial as it may appear to the most of christians, who devote their time rather to the cultivation of mind, than to the arrangements of distinctive dress, has been one strongly operating cause of fixing the public character of this

sect.

By the colour and shape of their vestments, they proclaim their religion more loudly than by the trumpet of the Pharisee. They exhibit their confession of faith, in their front and in their rear. In the cut and colour of the coat, they carry their religious dogmata into the street, and into the counting house. They hold them up to every eye, and tell them in every ear. They invite, they challenge a rigid scrutiny; and the world does fix a keen and scrutinizing eye on them. It searches out, with an

See an account of the tragic farce of Penn and Mead, respecting the duties of the hat, before a very tyrannical court. Penn's works, vol. i. ad nitium and Sewel, vol. ii. p. 244. The late king, George III. when he gave audience to the Friends, took care to save their honour, and spare his own feelings, by stationing an extra groom of the chamber at the door of the levee, whose duty it was to take off each of their beavers as they approached the presence.-Clarkson.

eagle-eye, the spots on their consecrated garments. This produces a deep and permanent effect on their members. It operates on a well known principle of human nature. The deportment of the student arranged in his well known garb and badge, and of the soldier when bearing the uniform and arms of his country, when among strangers, is rigid and virtuous; while the eye of the public is intensely fixed on them. And it gradually relaxes, as the public notice withdraws its virtuous stimulant. And it frequently becomes dissipated as they merge in the crowd of common dress, and ordinary men. Every member, conscious that he has made his challenge on the public attention, and conscious that he is, according to the tenor of this challenge, constantly watched, is on his guard. He is always in an attitude of defence. Hence a strict eye on each other's deportment, as well as their own, that the common enemy may not find where with to reproach the faith. Hence their coldness and distrust, and distance, and jealousy in the presence of strangers. Hence the indirect and ambiguous style in conversation. Hence the sly and cautious manner, bordering on cunning, which have marked their public character in all countries; especially, where their numbers are small. And hence, as the result, under all the feelings of the pride of party, ingeniously created and kept alive by the shibboleth of speech and fraternal livery, they keep themselves fairly separated from the whole world; and strongly, of course, devoted to their own sect.

The singularity of their dress operates another way. The Friends have been long known by the appellation of good moralists. Nay, if the good Clarkson be correct, they monopolize all morality. Their dress and manners bring them forth from the retired walk, in which other christians are seen to pursue the journey of life. Hence, they are presented before the public eye in contrast, not with the religious world, who, by their

*The character of the German and Scottish Quaker, is very different from the Philadelphian Quaker. The latter feeling his power, and trusting to the number of his a xiliaries, lets down much of the stern manners of olden times. The former, especially the Scotch Quaker, who stands almost single handed, in a country where metaphysics drive fanatacism over its southern border, has retained the ancient public character most strongly marked.