Dressing with sufficient simplicity ourselves, we see no good reason for adopting the dress of the society.  It would be as foolish in us to change the colour and fashion of our clothing, as it would be criminal in the Quakers, with their notions, to come to the use of that which belongs to us.  Endeavouring also to be chaste in our conversation, we cannot adopt their language.  It would be as inconsistent in us to speak after the manner of the Quakers, as it would be inconsistent in them to leave their own language for ours.  But we wish we had been born Quakers.  And, if we had been born Quakers, we would never have deserted the society.”

Perhaps they to whom I shall confine my remarks in this chapter, are not aware, that such sentiments as these are floating in the minds of many.  They are not aware, that it is considered as one of the strongest things for those who have been born in the society, and been accustomed to its particularities, to leave it.  And least of all are they aware of the worthless motives, which the world attributes to them for an intended separation from it.

There is, indeed, something seemingly irreconcileable in the thought of such a dereliction or change.  To leave the society of a moral people, can it be a matter of any credit?  To diminish the number of those who protest against war, and who have none of the guilt upon their heads of the sanguinary progress of human destruction which is going on in the world, is it desirable, or rather, ought it not to be a matter of regret?  And to leave it at a time, when its difficulties are over, is it a proof of a wise and a prudent choice?  If persons had ever had it in contemplation to leave the society in its most difficult and trying times, or in the days of its persecution, when only for the adoption of innocent singularities its members were insulted, and beaten, and bruised, and put in danger of their lives, it had been no matter of surprise:  but to leave it, when all prejudices against them are gradually decreasing, when they are rising in respectability in the eyes of the government under which they live, and when, by the weight of their own usefulness and character, they are growing in the esteem of the world, is surely a matter of wonder, and for which it is difficult to account.

This brings me to the point in question, or to the examination of those arguments, which may at times have come into the heads of those who have had thoughts of ceasing to be members of this society.

In endeavouring to discover these, we can only suppose them to be actuated by one motive, for no other will be reasonable, namely, that they shall derive advantages from the change.  Now all advantages are resolvable into two kinds, into such as are religious, and into such as are temporal.  The first question then is, what advantages do they gain in the former case, or do they actually come into the possession of a better religion?