possibility of repairing his loss. In short, there is no end of hope
upon these occasions. It is always hovering about during the contest.
Cards, therefore, and amusements of the same nature, by holding up
prospects of pecuniary acquisitions on the one hand, and of repairing
losses, that may arise on any occasion, on the other, have a direct
tendency to produce habits of gaming.

Now the Quakers consider these habits as, of all others, the most
pernicious; for they usually change the disposition of a man, and ruin
his moral character.

From generous-hearted they make him avaricious. The covetousness too,
which they introduce as it were into his nature, is of a kind, that is
more than ordinarily injurious. It brings disease upon the body, as it
brings corruption upon the mind. Habitual gamesters regard neither their
own health, nor their own personal convenience, but will sit up night
after night, though under bodily indisposition, at play, if they can
only grasp the object of their pursuit.

From a just and equitable they often render him a dishonest person.
Professed gamesters, it is well known, lie in wait for the young, the
ignorant, and the unwary: and they do not hesitate to adopt fraudulent
practices to secure them as their prey. In toxication has been also
frequently resorted to for the same purpose.

From humane and merciful they change him into hard hearted and
barbarous. Habitual gamesters have compassion foe neither men nor
brutes. The former they can ruin and leave destitute, without the
sympathy of a tear. The latter they can oppress to death, calculating
the various powers of their declining strength, and their capability of