bility, be useful to these; that it would have a
tendency to enable them, in the perilous situation in which they are
placed, to stand against the corrupt opinions and fashions, and while
they were living in the world, to live out of it, or to deny it.

Peculiarly situated as the Quakers are, they have opportunities, beyond
any other people, of ingrafting knowledge into their system of education
without danger, or, in other words, of giving knowledge to their
children with the purity which Christianity would prescribe. The great
misfortune in the world is, that a learned education is frequently
thought more of than a virtuous one; that youth, while they are
obtaining knowledge, are not properly watched and checked; and that they
are suffered to roam at large in the pursuit of science, and to
cultivate or not, at their own option, the science, if I may so call it,
of religion. Hence it will happen, that, where we see learned men, we
shall not always see these of the most exemplary character. But the
Quakers have long ago adopted a system of prohibitions, as so many
barriers against vice, or preservatives of virtue. Their constitution
forbids all indulgences that appear unfriendly to morals. The Quakers
therefore, while they retain the prohibitions which belong to their
constitution, may give encouragement to knowledge, without a fear that
it will be converted to the purposes of vice.

The Quakers, again, have opportunities or advantages, which others have
not, in another point of view. In the great public seminary at Ackworth,
which belongs to them, and which is principally for those who are of the
poor and middle classes, every thing is under the inspection and
guidance of committees, which can watch and enforce an observance of any
rules that may be prescribed. Why then, if public seminaries were
instituted for the reception of the children of the rich, or if the rich
were to give encouragement to large private seminaries for the same
purposes, should they not be placed under the visiting discipline of the
society? Why should they not be placed under the care of committees
also? Why should not these committees see that the two great objects of
the education proposed were going on at the same time, or that, while
knowledge was obtaining, discipline had not been relaxed. Why should not
such seminaries produce future Penns, and Barclays, and others, who,
while they were men capable of deep literary researches, should be