The second charge is, that the discipline is administered partially; or
that more favour is shewn to the rich than to the poor, and that the
latter are sooner disowned than the former for the same faults.
This latter charge has probably arisen from a vulgar notion, that, as
the poor are supported by the society, there is a general wish to get
rid of them.--But this notion is not true. There is more than ordinary
caution in disowning those who are objects of support, add to which,
that, as some of the most orderly members of the body are to be found
among the poor, an expulsion of these, in a hasty manner, would be a
diminution of the quantum of respectability, or of the quantum of moral
character, of the society at large.
In examining this charge, it must certainly be allowed, that though the
principle "of no respect of persons" is no where carried to a greater
length than in the Quaker Society, yet we may reasonably expect to find
a drawback from the full operation of it in a variety of causes. We are
all of us too apt, in the first place, to look up to the rich, but to
look down upon the poor. We are apt to court the good will of the
former, when we seem to care very little even whether we offend the
latter. The rich themselves and the middle classes of men respect the
rich more than the poor; and the poor show more respect to the rich than
to one another.
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