Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: FRIENDS IN COUNCIL. Friends: SAMUEL BONUS and JEREMIAH AUSTEN. JEREMIAH. Oh ! this is mournful. Samuel, does thee know, That, from our fathers' land beyond the sea, — The land of Fox, of Barclay, and of Penn, — Tidings have come of breaches wide and deep In the defences which so long have kept Our Zion safe and separate from the world ? Samuel. A rumor reached me, that our Friends proposed, In things of discipline, some little change. JEREMIAH. Some little change ? Dost say, some little change ? A little change ! The pillars twain, so long The chief support of all our sect holds dear, Are tottering to their fall. Samuel. My recent letters hardly give support To such an apprehension. 'Twas supposed, (Thus ran the tidings as they come to me,) That by the favor of our weightiest Friends, Who late in London held convening sage, Some modes less rigid in our marriage rules Might at the Annual Gathering be approved. 'Twas further rumored, that the same high source Some trifling relaxation might ordain In those requirings which restrain, so close, Friends in the matters of attire and speech. JEREMIAH. Such is indeed the fact; and, knowing this, Can thee the purposed consummation view Without the deepest sadness and alarm ? To me it heralds overthrow and ruin. The flood-gates open wide; the worldly waves Rush unobstructed and relentless in, And sweep before them every thing that gives, To those who hold in purity our faith, A place apart, distinctive and secure. Samuel. And can it be that our peculiar speech, And vestments hued and fashioned by a rule Made of an accident, with no support But weak tradition, are the pillars strong, Which give us all our beauty and our strength ? Are we by these distinctive and ...