contained in the paco ore; and for every mark of pure silver gained, destroyed one, and frequently two, marks of quicksilver. Indeed all the operations at the mines of Potosi, the stamping, sifting, washing, quickening and roasting the ore are conducted in so slovenly, wasteful, and unscientific a manner, that to compare the excellent method of amalgamation invented by baron Born, and practised in Europe, with the barbarous process used by these Indians and Spaniards, would be an insult to the understanding of my readers.

The tools of the Indian miner are very badly contrived, and unwieldy. The hammer, which is a square piece of lead of twenty pounds weight, exhausts his strength; the iron, a foot and a half long, is a great deal too incommodious, and in some narrow places cannot be made use of. The thick tallow candles wound round with wool vitiate the air.

In the royal mint at Potosi, where from five hundred and fifty thousand to six hundred thousand marks of silver, and about two thousand marks of gold, are annually coined, affairs were not better conducted. Every hundred weight of refined copper used for alloy in the gold and silver coin cost the king 351 through the gross ignorance of the overseers of the work, who spent a whole month in roasting and calcining it, and frequently rendered it quite unfit for the purpose.'

Rich gold ore abounds in the mountains of La Paz, and in the whole ridge as far as Sicasica, where the Indians collect this precious metal by washing :-but here, too, from the ignorance of the inhabitants, much treasure lies wholly neglected.

Cusco is described in a few desultory lines; and of Guancavelica, though mentioned more than once, we have no account. Its celebrated quicksilver mine, owing to mismanagement, has become less productive than formerly, and is worked on terms. disadvantageous to the government.-A few pages are devoted to Lima, but they convey no intelligence that is new to the curious reader.

Some useful information may be collected from the Appendix, which the Translator has avowedly compiled from Ulloa, Skinner's Present State of Peru, Alcedo's Dictionario geographico, &c. and which he asserts, with singular modesty, 'contains the fullest and the most correct account of Spanish America which exists in any European language.' This fullest account is comprized within 150 duodecimo pages! As a plain and convenient abstract from larger works, it is intitled to commendation.

ART. VIII. A Portraiture of Quakerism, taken from a View of the Moral Education, Discipline, Peculiar Customs, religious Princi ples, political and civil ŒEconomy, and Character of the society of Friends. By homas Clarkson, M. A. Author of several Essays on the Subject of the Slave Trade. 2d Edition. Svo. 3. Vols, 11, 78. Boards. Longman and Co.

THOUGH the current statement be admitted, that the

number of Quakers in this country is considerably diminished, circumstances have occurred to give brilliancy to the rays of their declining sun. Among these, we may reckon the encomiums here bestowed on them by a respectable clergyman of the Established Church; who, in consequence of his intercourse with them on the subject of the abolition of the slave-trade, was so much struck with their manners and general character as to feel it a duty to them and to the world to draw their picture at full length, This undertaking has been so gratifying to the Society of Friends, that the whole of a large impression has been purchased merely by the members of this community, and the public have been obliged to wait the appearance of a second edition. From the large sale also which, as we understand, Mr. Clarkson's Portraiture has obtained independently of its circulation among the Quakers themselves, an inference may be drawn that is equally favourable to the author, and to the people whom he describes. It would hence appear that, though the different classes of the community are too much enslaved by the customs and manners of the age, to be able to adopt the simplicity and rigid morality of the Quakers, they are sufficiently sensible of the charms of virtue to admire the character which this singular fraternity exhibits, When we compare them with society at large, they appear, to use the words of Mr. Walpole, (Lord Orford,) "like a temple in a palace which remains unpolluted, while all around is tyranny, corruption, and folly." Not only in their principles but in their whole economy, their non-conformity to the world is evinced; and it is so strongly marked, that a considerable degree of calmness and fortitude is requisite to enable them to stem the torrent of vulgar sentiment and of fashion. A modern Quaker, who strictly adheres to the rules of his sect, differs nearly as much from the general mass of professing Christians, as a true believer of the primitive church from the surrounding mass of Pagan idolators.

*The Monthly Review has for nearly threescore years been friendly to the Friends: but when will they thus testify their acceptance of its good offices?

As eminent virtue must ever be scarce, so institutions which aim at singular purity will be patronized only by few; and if, whenever they are fairly noticed, men cannot withhold their praise, they will excuse themselves from assuming a yoke which, to the votaries of worldly pride and vanity, must be intolerable, We, who endeavour to form a judgment unembarrassed by public opinion, and had rather be associated with the philosophic few than with the giddy and boisterous multitude, have never disesteemed the Quakers because they are unpopular, but have always been ready to weigh their merit as a body in the balance of the sanctuary. We need not, therefore, add that it is with no little satisfaction that we take up these volumes, in which a clergyman has attempted, with success, to write their moral history.

After having, in the introduction, explained his motives for undertaking this work, adverted to the origin of the term Quakers t, and given a short sketch of the life of George Fox, the founder of this society, Mr. Clarkson presents us with a definition of Quakerism:

Quakerism, (he says,) may be defined to be an attempt, under the divine influence, at practical Christianity, as far as it can be carried. They who profess it, consider themselves bound to regulate their opinions, words, actions, and even outward demeanour, by Christianity, and by Christianity alone. They consider themselves bound to give up such of the customs or fashions of men, however general or generally approved, as militate, in any manner, against the letter or the spirit of the Gospel. Hence, they mix but little with the world, that they may be less liable to imbibe its spirit. Hence, George Fox made a distinction between the members of his own society and others, by the different appellations of Friends, and People of the world. They consider themselves also under an obligation to follow virtue, not ordinarily, but even unto death. For they profess never to make a sacrifice of conscience; and therefore, if any ordinances of man are enjoined them, which they think to be contrary to the divine will, they believe it right not to submit to them, but rather, after the example of the Apostles and primitive Christians, to suffer any loss, penalty, or inconvenience, which may result to them for so doing.'

Charmed as this writer evidently is with Quakerism as a system, which, if closely followed, leads towards purity and perfection, he does not mean to offer an unqualified encomium on the members of this sect; for he adds

* " Plus apud nos vera ratio valebit, quam vulgi opinio." CICERO. tJustice Bennet, of Derby, gave the Society the name of Quakers in the year 1650, because the founder of it admonished him, and those present with him, to tremble at the word of the Lord.'

! I know

I know well that all who profess it, are not Quakers. The de viation, therefore, of their practice from their profession, and their frailties and imperfections, I shall uniformly lay open to them whereever I believe them to exist. And this I shall do, not because I wish to avoid the charge of partiality, but from a belief that it is my duty to do it.'

We must therefore consider this portraiture as drawn under the strong impression of duty, and executed with a studious care neither to misrepresent the Friends nor to mislead the world. Let us see in what way Mr. C. has discharged his office, and what use he has made of his intercourse with this

sect.

The first part of the work is occupied with an account of the Moral Education of the Quakers; in which their principles and practice respecting recreations and amusements are fully detailed and largely discussed. It is observed that

They allow their children most of the sports or exercises of the body, and most of the amusements or exercises of the mind, which other children of the island enjoy: but as children are to become men, and men are to become moral characters, they believe that bounds should be drawn, or that an unlimited permission to follow every recreation would be hurtful.

The Quakers, therefore, have thought it proper to interfere on this subject, and to draw the line between those amusements which they consider to be salutary, and those which they consider to be hurtful."

In the latter class they reckon all Games of chance, Music, the Theatre, Dancing, Novels, and the Diversions of the field. Cards and other instruments of gaming are prohibited on account of their tendency to agitate and enflame the passions; for

One of the first points in the education of this Society is, to attend to the subjugation of the will; to take care that every perverse passion be checked; and that the creature be rendered calm and passive. Hence, the children belonging to it are rebuked for all ex. pressions of anger, as tending to raise those feelings which ought to be suppressed. A raising even of their voice beyond due bounds is discouraged, as leading to the disturbance of their minds. They are taught to rise in the morning in quietness, to go about their ordinary occupations with quietness, and to retire in quietness to their beds.'

While the present rage for Music and Singing prevails, and such enormous sums are given to the first performers in this line, the sentiments of the Quakers on this subject will scarcely be tolerated; and we perhaps shall be told that we are "fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils," if we attempt the mildest vindication of them: yet, at all hazards, we shall venture to hint that some of the objections of the Quakers to the

study

study of music are well founded; and that it is worthy of the serious consideration of parents, whether the prominent feature which it is allowed to assume in the general system of fashionable education can be rationally vindicated. Is the following statement correct, or is it not?

Great proficiency, without which music now ceases to be delightful, cannot, as I have just observed, be made without great application, or the application of some years. Now all this long application is of a sedentary nature. But all occupations of a sedentary nature are injurious to the human constitution, and weaken and disorder it in time. But in proportion as the body is thus weakened by the sedentary nature of the employment, it is weakened again by the enervating powers of the art. Thus the nervous system is acted upon by two enemies at once; and in the course of the long educa tion, necessary for this science, the different disorders of hysteria are produced. Hence the females of the present age, amongst whom this art has been cultivated to excess, are generally found to have a weak and languid constitution, and to be disqualified more than others from becoming healthy wives, or healthy mothers, or the parents of a healthy progeny."

The total prohibition of music may be as absurd as the total prohibition of wine: but an excessive passion for it, especially when it pervades the middle classes of society, is fraught with more serious consequences than may be commonly imagined.

That so strict a sect as the Quakers should condemn the theatre, and the ball-room, and the sports of the field, is no matter of wonder; and they certainly manifest their good sense in proscribing novel reading as productive of a romantic spirit and a sickly sensibility, alike injurious to mind and body. I have been told by a physician of the first eminence, (says Mr. C.) that music and novels have done more to produce the sickly countenances and nervous habits of our highly-educated females, than any other causes that can be assigned. The excess of stimulus on the mind, from the interesting and melting tales that are peculiar to novels, affects the organs of the body, and relaxes the tone of the nerves, in the same manner as the melting tones of music have been described to act upon the constitution, after the sedentary employment, necessary for skill in that science, has injured it.'

A strong objection to novel-reading is that it indisposes those who indulge in it for all other kinds of reading.

Hunting, hawking, and shooting, are condemned by Quakers; and so is Fishing, no doubt, from the cruelty which attaches to it, though the quietude of this amusement is singu. Jarly adapted to their habits. "Jam undique silvæ et solitudo, ipsumque illud silentium, quod venationi (aut piscationi) datur, magna

cogitationis