It is said by these that the Quakers are very wary with respect to their disorderly members, for that when any of them behave ill, they are expelled the society in order to rescue it from the disgrace of a bad character.

Thus if a Quaker woman were discovered to be a prostitute, or a Quaker man to be taken up for a criminal offence, no disgrace could attach to this society as it would to others; for if, in the course of a week, after a discovery had been made of their several offences, any person were to state that two Quaker members had become infamous, it would be retorted upon him, that they were not members of the society.
It will be proper to observe upon the subject of this error, that it is not so probable that the Quakers would disown these, after the discovery of their infamy, to get rid of any stain upon the character of the society, as it is that these persons, long before the facts could be known, had been both admonished and disowned.

For there is great truth in the old maxim "Nemo fecit repente 'turpissimus;" or "no man was ever all at once a rogue." So in the case of these persons, as of all others, they must have been vicious by degrees: they must have shewn symptoms of some deviations from rectitude, before the measure of their iniquity could have been completed.

But by the constitution of Quakerism, as will appear soon, no person of the society can be found erring even for the first time, without being liable to be privately admonished.

These admonitions may be repeated for weeks, or for months, or even for years, before the subjects of them are pronounced so incorrigible as to be disowned.