their fathers," such memorials cannot be so useful to them.

The Quakers, however, have no objection, if a man has conducted himself
particularly well in life, that a true statement should be made
concerning him, provided such a statement would operate as a lesson of
morality to others; but they think that the tomb-stone is not the best
medium of conveying it. They are persuaded that very little moral
advantage is derived to the cursory readers of epitaphs, or that they
can trace their improvement in morals to this source. Sensible, however,
that the memorials of good men may be made serviceable to the rising
generation, ("and there are no ideas, says Addison, which strike more
forcibly on our imaginations, than those which are raised from
reflections upon the exits of great and excellent men,") they are
willing to receive accounts of the lives, deaths, and remarkable dying
sayings, of those ministers in their own society, who have been eminent
for their labours. These are drawn up by individuals, and presented to
the monthly meetings, to which the deceased belonged. But here they must
undergo an examination before they are passed. The truth of the
statement, and the utility of the record, must appear. It then falls to
the quarterly meetings to examine them again, and these may alter, or
pass, or reject them, as it may appear to be most proper. If these
should pass them, they are forwarded to the yearly meeting. Many of
them, after this, are printed; and, finding their way into the bookcases
of the Quakers, they become collected essays of morality, and operate as
incitements to piety to the rising youth. Thus the memorials of men are
made useful by the Quakers in an unobjectionable manner; for the
falsehood and flattery of epitaphs are thus avoided; none but good men
having been selected, whose virtues, if they are recorded, can be
perpetuated with truth.