Baptism in some form or other, and also in the celebration of the Lord's
Supper. But the Quakers, as will be shown in this volume, consider these
ordinances in a spiritual light, admitting no ceremonials in so pure a
system as that of the Christian religion.

But these differences, which may thus soon or late take their rise upon
these or other subjects, where the parties set a value on their
respective religious opinions, cannot fail of being augmented by new
circumstances in time. The parties in question have children. The
education of these is now a subject of the most important concern. New
disputes are engendered on this head, both adhering to their respective
tenets as the best to be embraced by their rising offspring. Unable at
length to agree on this point, a sort of compromise takes place. The
boys are denied, while the girls are permitted, baptism. The boys,
again, are brought up to meeting, and the girls to church, or they go
to church and meeting alternately. In the latter case, none of the
children can have any fixed principles. Nor will they be much better off
in the former. There will be frequently an opposition of each other's
religious opinions, and a constant hesitation and doubt about the
consistency of these. There are many points, which the mothers will
teach the daughters as right, or essential, but which the fathers will
teach the sons as erroneous or unimportant. Thus disputes will be
conveyed to the children. In their progress through life other
circumstances may arise, which may give birth to feelings of an
unpleasant nature. The daughters will be probably instructed in the
accomplishments of the world. They will be also introduced to the
card-room, and to assemblies, and to the theatre, in their turn. The
boys will be admitted to neither. The latter will of course feel their
pleasures abridged, and consider their case as hard, and their father as
morose and cruel. Little jealousies may arise upon this difference of