if the Shakers refuse to allow themselves to devote their time to study, the effect of wealth will probably be to introduce excess in the pleasures of the table. Luxury and laziness are generally concomitant, and when once yielded to, produce other evils. If the principles of Shakerism be able to preserve all its professors from contagion, under circumstances like these, a novelty will be exhibited in the moral history of man.

Archbishop Leighton expressed his regret that at the period of the Reformation all monastic establishments were destroyed; and a writer in a late number of the Quarterly Review advocated the propriety of establishing a Protestant nunnery. In the example of the Shakers we have a specimen of the kind. But notwithstanding the comparative mildness of the regulations, and the strictness of morality which I believe to prevail amongst them, I do not think they exhibit such a view of human happiness as to render it desirable to have their example followed. Even if learning were introduced and encouraged, the most formidable objection would remain; namely, that the monastic life is contradictory to the dictates of nature. Christianity doubtless requires, that nature shall be brought under regulations productive of individual and

general good; but it does not require that nature shall be so thwarted as to deprive us of enjoyments compatible with our duties to God and the harmony of creation. The married state, when entered upon with prudence and affection, is found to improve the disposition and enlarge the heart. It adds more than any thing else to the sum of human happiness. The formation of a state of society where it is prohibited, is as unnatural as a government, where there is no will but the will of a despot.

The mention of government reminds me that that of the Shakers is professedly a theocracy. Whatever alteration is proposed, either in the laws or the executive officers, is discussed by the body at large. But no division on a question ever takes place, it being their opinion that the spirit of judgment is given to some, and must be yielded to by the rest. I suppose that the aged and a few leading characters decide the part to be taken on all momentous occasions. Unanimity is probably secured by the fear that refractoriness may be followed by expulsion. If any breach of harmony occurs, the knowledge of it is confined to the members, all their proceedings except worship, being confined exclusively to themselves. Their general prosperity and good

order are indicative of a government competent to its purpose; yet Shakerism as a system, appears like some complex piece of mechanism, beautiful and regular, but liable to be put out of order if any of the concealed springs lose their elasticity.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE INDIANS.

He

HAVING mentioned the state of religion in general, and of that of several independent societies, I am led by a natural chain to take some notice of the Indians, whose religion seems to demand more notice that it has hitherto obtained. When Penn first landed in Pennsylvania, he was so struck with their Jewish countenances, and with the similarity of some of their customs to those of that people, that he conjectured they might be the descendants of the lost ten tribes. supposed, what has since been proved true, that Asia and North America were so nearly contiguous, that they might have migrated from one continent to the other. Whether the Indians Penn saw, were of different aspect to the other tribes cannot now be known, but none of the present race, so far as my observation goes, and judgment may be formed from portraits, are like the Jews. I certainly saw a youth among the Seneca Indians, whom if I had met in Houndsditch, or in any other street in London where they haunt, I should have taken for one of them;

but this was a solitary instance. The customs alluded to by Penn are in degree correspondent to some of the Jewish, but not more so than some prevalent amongst the Negroes in one district in Africa, nor than others amongst the Asiatics. There is however one remarkable particular in which they agree with the Jews, and which deserves the more notice from its being one that no other barbarous people share with them. Their religion is pure theism undefiled by idolatry or symbolical representations of the Deity. But if they were the descendants of the Jews, is it probable that their worship would be without ceremonies? Doctrines may be forgotten or changed, but ceremonies are generally continued, even after their origin is forgotten, and when they are totally useless. Now the Indians have so few ceremonies that it strongly militates against Penn's idea. But how aston

ishing is it, that they alone of all savage nations should believe in the unity of God, and worship him without the aid of visible objects! With the exception of a tribe or two in Virginia now extinct, who had framed an image to which they paid their adorations, there is not I believe an instance to the contrary on record within the territory of the United States. One of the early colonists in New Jersey, who has left some ac