Another serious charge may be advanced against music, as it is practised at the present day.  Great proficiency, without which music now ceases to be delightful, cannot, as I have just observed, be made without great application, or the application of some years.  Now all this long application is of a sedentary nature.  But all occupations of a sedentary nature are injurious to the human constitution, and weaken and disorder it in time.  But in proportion as the body is thus weakened by the sedentary nature of the employment, it is weakened again by the enervating powers of the art.  Thus the nervous system is acted upon by two enemies at once, and in the course of the long education necessary for this science, the different disorders of hysteria are produced.  Hence the females of the present age, amongst whom this art has been cultivated to excess, are generally found to have a weak and languid constitution, and to be disqualified, more than others, from becoming healthy wives, or healthy mothers, or the parents of a healthy progeny.

SECT.  II.

Instrumental forbidden—­Quakers cannot learn it on the motives of the world—­it is not conducive to the improvement of the moral character—­affords no solid ground of comfort—­nor of true elevation of mind—­a sensual gratification—­remarks of Cowper—­and, if encouraged, would interfere with the duty recommended by the Quakers, of frequent religious retirement.

The reader must always bear it in his mind, if the Quakers should differ from him on any particular subject, that they set themselves apart as a christian community, aiming at christian perfection:  that it is their wish to educate their children, not as moralists or as philosophers, but as christians; and that therefore, in determining the propriety of a practice, they will frequently judge of it by an estimate, very different from that of the world.

The Quakers do not deny that instrumental music is capable of exciting delight.  They are not insensible either of its power or of its charms.  They throw no imputation on its innocence, when viewed abstractly by itself; but they do not see anything in it sufficiently useful, to make it an object of education, or so useful, as to counterbalance other considerations, which make for its disuse.

The Quakers would think it wrong to indulge in their families the usual motives for the acquisition of this science.  Self-gratification, which is one of them, and reputation in the world, which is the other, are not allowable in the Christian system.  Add to which that where there is a desire for such reputation, an emulative disposition is generally cherished, and envy and vain glory are often excited in the pursuit.