From time to time He has been pleased to afford us farther light,
and our principles have been improving, and our errors diminishing.
Now we are not sure that we are arrived at the end of this progression,
and at the perfection of spiritual or theological knowledge;
and we fear that, if we should once print our confession of faith,
we should feel ourselves as if bound and confin'd by it, and perhaps
be unwilling to receive farther improvement, and our successors still
more so, as conceiving what we their elders and founders had done, to be
something sacred, never to be departed from."
This modesty in a sect is perhaps a singular instance in the history
of mankind, every other sect supposing itself in possession
of all truth, and that those who differ are so far in the wrong;
like a man traveling in foggy weather, those at some distance
before him on the road he sees wrapped up in the fog, as well as
those behind him, and also the people in the fields on each side,
but near him all appears clear, tho' in truth he is as much
in the fog as any of them. To avoid this kind of embarrassment,
the Quakers have of late years been gradually declining the public
service in the Assembly and in the magistracy, choosing rather
to quit their power than their principle.
In order of time, I should have mentioned before, that having, in 1742,
invented an open stove for the better warming of rooms, and at the same
time saving fuel, as the fresh air admitted was warmed in entering,
I made a present of the model to Mr.
Pages:
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169