This is a portion of the good which the Quakers have done since their appearance as a society in the world.  What other good they have done it is not necessary to specify.  And as to what they would do, if they were permitted to become universal legislators, it may be a pleasing subject for contemplation, but it does not fall within the limits of the present chapter.

CHAP.  III.

General opinion, that the Quakers are on the decline as a society—­Observations upon this subject—­Opinion believed, upon the whole, to be true—­Causes of this supposed declension—­Mixed marriages—­Tithes—­Pursuit of trade, as connected with the peculiar habits of the society, and a residence in the towns—­Education.

I have often heard it suggested as matter for conversation, whether the Quakers were increasing or decreasing in their number, and the result has always been an opinion, that they were a declining body.

When we consider the simplicity and even philosophy of the Quaker religion, the preservation it affords against the follies and difficulties of life, and the happiness to which it ultimately leads, we shall wonder that the progress of the society, in point of number, has not been greater than we find it.  And when we consider, on the other hand, how difficult it is to be a Quaker, how much it is against the temper and disposition of man to be singular, or to resist the tide of custom and fashion, and to undergo an ordeal of suffering on these accounts, we shall wonder that it has not been long ago extinct.

That many are disowned by the society, in consequence of which its numbers are diminished, is true.  That others come into it from other quarters, by which an increase is given to it, independently of its own natural population, is true also.  But whether the new members exceed the disowned, or the disowned the new, is the question to be resolved.  Now no people have had better opportunities of ascertaining this point, than the Quakers themselves.  By means of their monthly meetings they might with ease have instituted a census on a given day.  They might have renewed such a census.  They might have compared the returns in every case.  But as no such census has ever been made, the Quakers themselves, though they have their ideas, cannot speak with particular accuracy, on this subject.

The general opinion, however, is, and the Quakers, I apprehend, will not deny but lament it, that those who go out of the society are upon the whole more numerous than those who come into it by convincement, and therefore that there is, upon the whole, a decrease among them.