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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
« ducatfc > m ?/ This seems to be a very pretty observation ; a fine fraternal sentiment . Has it produced good effects ? AH the world may answer , ti Yea . We
cannot distinguish your poor from those who suppoit them . " Is not this lovely ? It is . Moreover , as the Friends are excused from filling various offices , in the regulations of society at large , which
their principle unfits them for , there seems , in the providing for their own poor , a kind of quid pro quo rendered to the community at large . But the unworldly Friends , Without -two coats , retiring , in
tbrnv greatest need , to share in the parochial provision , which , in the years of tlreir active life , they have , perhaps , largely contributed to , might , instead of being nursed in obscurity , have been as lights
hi the world * They might have been the means of spreadingabroad the testimonies of truth , among their fellow . men , and even thus have helped to extend and keep up the most excellent system the
world ever saw—a system which lamentably languishes in these countries , in others has become extinct ^* -I mean the purely religious , part of the system of the people called Quaker ? . The
indecent phraseology " of the rich / ' " of the poor / ' so flippantly used by these modern Nazarenes , might never have found a place in their ecclesiastical proceedings . They might never have had to form under the head of
Removals , Settlements , &c . a system of poor laws , perhaps as com * plex as , and more grotesque than , ell the poor laws of the realm . A poor man on applying to become a member of their society , might not have received the rebuke I
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have heard of , from the Quaker ; by inheritance possessing more " in basket and store , " than all the twelve apostles ever had unit- * edly , '' John ! thou wishest to , be received in order to obtain a settlement . " If such a questioU could then have had place in the
society , as their query— " Are the necessities of the poor among you properly inspected and relieved ? &c . the answer might not have been , as I have heard it , from a district where the needy are numerous , u We have no poor . " There might not have been that
trimming' among their members to < L keep cast ; '' that observa * tion of the established etiquette , I will call it , as deserving no bet * ter name , for the retention of fellowship . There might never have thus been held out the
temptation to go up to their as * sembliesfrom unworthy motivesthose assemblies which but foe the hierarchial stains wherewith they are disfigured , would be the most comely in their appearance of all the gatherings together th $£ take place among the sons anci daughters " of men .
Of all these hard . sayings I am willing , if necessary , to go into a detailed explanation . But the day seems to be gone by when ( 1697 ) Friends were desired to be diligent in spreading Frienck * books , which are answers to
adversaries , and to get them exposed to sale where the adversaries ' books are sold ; and this to be done in time , and not delayed till the service is partly over . Friends , am I your enemy because I have told you the truth ? Verily , my mind has sometimes been affected
with a goodly jealousy , in thinking of tbee , O Israel of ' later-time *?
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Dr . Walker on the Quaker Poor Laws * 3 $
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1814, page 35, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2436/page/35/
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