the society. In fact, the bond of unity that had constituted them one society, had been broken, and a forbearing condescension and united action was not to be expected from distinct bodies, acting under repelling influences, but only that each division should look to its own conservation. The charges of unsoundness in faith by one portion against the other, were again generally denied, and a conformity with the doctrines of the founders of the society averred, and that whatever charges of unsoundness were applicable now, were only such as were made against and applicable to ancient Friends by those from whom they had been gathered to unite as a society.

Each division appealed to the writings of ancient Friends, to prove the correctness of its opinions, by the publication of numerous extracts from their writings. These were convincing to the members of each that they were standing on the true foundation, but did not reconcile those in the opposing ranks. Whatever may have been the diversity of individual opinions among primitive Friends, the cementing power that united them was now lost; and many leaders among modern Friends had not only inclined to opposing extremes of opinion left in the writings of their ancestors, but under the prevailing excitement and distrust, were mutually suspected and charged by opponents as having gone beyond the range of opinions formerly entertained. They might both, as they did, profess to believe in the doctrine of the inward

light, and to support all of the invaluable testimonies of the society; but the bond of religious fellowship had been severed, their love had been replaced by distrust and repulsion of feeling, and they were no longer united by common sufferings inflicted by an intolerent and persecuting world.

Generally the minorities in the respective meetings retired from the majority, and each portion formed or kept its connexion with the yearly and subordinate meetings of discipline which it elected to join or continued to adhere to. The right of property became the subject of litigation in several of the States; but it was apparent, that even before temporal tribunals, each litigant party was quite as anxious to establish its claim to be the true Society of Friends, as to gain the property in contest. To the credit of both, however, it can be truly said that they soon wearied of litigation; the controversy was found uncongenial and distasteful, and both yielded supposed rights of great value rather than continue a strife wasteful of their spiritual well-being and Christian profession.

The difficulty with those who adhered to the Yearly Meeting of 4th month, 1827, that continued its sittings upon regular adjournments at the same place, and over to the next year, was, that apprehending those in its connexions to be the only true society, it would be an abandonment of obligatory trusts to come into any arrange

ment for the voluntary division of the property; while their opponents as sincerely claimed to be a portion of the Society of Friends, and to be equally within the purpose of the trusts. It was not to be expected of human nature that where so much feeling existed, such an arrangement could be consummated. The writer has no

right to judge those so much better and purer than himself, yet he could not but cherish the thought that if Friends could have come to an amicable and equitable division of property, they would have set an example to the world of more value than the property to be thereby sacrificed, fitting to be recorded with the history of their leading and glorious triumphs of principle, when they treated with and paid the Indians for lands that by chartered right was already the Proprietary's; when as pioneers they secured religious toleration; and when, obedient to the calls of humanity, they enfranchised their slaves, and zealously co-operated for the abolition of the slave trade. In scriptural authority, they had before them the beautiful and persuasive example of Abraham and Lot-each willing to yield to the other the right to take to the right hand or to the left, for the enjoyment of what a bountiful Providence had amply supplied for their flocks and herds, and their households and people.

In respect to the legal right so to have adjusted the rights of property, when it is considered that it is a cherished principle of our jurisprudence to favour amica

ble settlements, and that family compacts made for the determination of controversy, are upheld as of sacred obligation, because they avert litigation and preserve peace, it could hardly be doubted that the tribunals of justice would meet in the same spirit and most willingly affirm the amicable treaties of divided religious associations. Can this be questioned when the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania has reiterated the recommendation that the litigant members of a divided religious society should "part in peace, having settled their claims to the property on the basis of mutual and liberal concession," and expressed the confident trust that, even in the contingency of revolution, "to the justice and forbearance of the majority of the association, whose very object is to deal justly, love mercy, and walk humbly, the minority cannot appeal in vain ?" 1 W. & S. 40. But no word of censure of Friends is intended to be here implied: it is only the indulgence of the thought, perhaps an enthusiastic one, that those who have been always so self-sacrificingly just, and so prominent in the cause of humanity, might, even in this respect, have gone counter to all known practice, and transcended the example of the world.

From an early period of life Philip Price had been a member of all those select bodies of Friends of infre

quent change of members. He participated in the opinion, and entertained a solemn conviction, that unsound doctrines had been preached and were making progress in

the society. The Yearly Meeting to which he belonged did not provide by an amendment of the discipline to meet the extraordinary emergency, that a separation from its subordinate meetings should be accepted as a resignation, or make such act itself a cause of disownment, without the visitation and effort at reclamation which the discipline required in its usual course of administration. The task of disowning equal and often greater numbers, was left as an imperative but very onerous duty on the members, in stations requiring them to carry out the requisitions of the discipline. These visitations were regarded by the parties visited and disowned, and who recognised their own body as the true society, as useless aggravations of the existing differences and feelings; and it was not to be expected that such visits would generally be received with complacency or meekness. This unwelcome duty Philip Price performed among friends and neighbours; and also as one of a committee to visit the Southern Quarter, where but few remained in the same connexion to perform the duty. The respect and veneration felt for the man, caused him to be received with kindness, but the ordeal was the severest his kind nature had ever been subjected to, and sorrow and tears were often his portion. Yet he did his duty according to what he believed required of him, to the acquittal of his own conscience, and of his obligation to his religious society and his Creator.