kind of character Christianity, where it is rightly received, will produce; They are living proofs, that it can produce sobriety, inoffensiveness, simplicity, charity, peace, and the domestic and other virtues.  Now though every private Christian can shew in himself an example of these effects, yet the Quakers shew it, not by producing solitary instances, but as a body; the temper of the great mass of their members being apparently cast in the same mould, and their character, as a society, being acknowledged to be that of a moral people.

And here I cannot but stop for a moment to pay a just tribute to the Quaker system, as one of the best modes of the Christian Religion; for whether the doctrines which belong to it, or whether the discipline which it promotes, or whether both of them conjointly, produce the effects which have been just related, certain it is, that they are produced.[44] But that system of religion is surely the most excellent, which produces, first, the greatest, and, secondly, the most universal effect upon those who profess it.  For what is the use of any particular creed, or where is the advantage of any one creed above another, if it cannot give the great characteristic marks of a Christian, a subjugated mind and a moral character?  What signifies the creed of any particular description of Christian professors, if it has no influence on the heart, or if we see professors among these giving way to their passions, or affording an inconsistent example to the world.

[Footnote 44:  Many of the Quakers in America, influenced by custom, Adopted the practice of holding slaves.  But on a due recurrence to their principles they gave freedom to these unconditionally, thus doing another public good in the world, and giving another example of the power of religion on the mind.]

The Quakers have given, again, in the reforms, which, in the first volume, I described them to have introduced into legislation, a beautiful and practical lesson of jurisprudence to the governors of all nations.  They have shewn the inefficacy of capital punishments; that the best object in the punishment of offenders is their reformation; that this accords best with the genius and spirit of the Christian Religion; and that while such a system, when followed, restores the abandoned to usefulness in society, it diminishes the number of crimes.[45]

[Footnote 45:  See Vol.  I, Sect. 4, p. 198.]

They have shewn again, by their own example, that it is not so difficult for men to live peaceably together, as has been usually believed; and they have exhibited the means by which they have effected this desirable end in life.  And as they have proved, that this is practicable in private, so they have proved, as has appeared in this volume, that it is practicable in public life, or, which is the same thing, they have shewn, that in the intercourse which exists between nations, there is no necessity for wars.

They have shewn and established again by the two latter instances, both of which relate to government, a proposition which seems scarcely to be believed, if we judge by the practice of statesmen, but the truth of which ought for ever to be insisted upon, that the policy of the Gospel is superior to the policy of the world.