of Novels ;-take the word in its English sense, and understand it as extending to four volumes of one continued tale of love. These are manufactured chiefly for women and soldier-officers. To the latter they ean do no harm; to the former a great deal. The histories of chivalry were useful, because they carried the imagination into a world of different manners; and many a man imbibed from them Don Quixote's high-mindedness and emulation, without catching his insanity. But these books represent ordinary and contemporary manners, and make love the main business of life, which both sexes at a certain age are sufficiently disposed to believe it. They are doubtless the cause of many rash engagements and unhappy marriages. Nor is this the only way in which they are mischievous: as dram-drinkers have no taste for wine, so. they who are accustomed to these stimulating stories, yawn over a book of real value. And there is as much

ing them. I have heard a party of ladies discuss the conduct of the characters in a new novel, just as if they were real personages of their acquaintance.

The circulating libraries consume these publications. In truth, the main demand for contemporary literarure comes from these libraries, or from private societies instituted to supply their place, books being now so inordinately expensive that they are chiefly purchased as furniture by the rich. It is not a mere antithesis to say that they who buy books do not read them, and that they who read them do not buy them. I have heard of one gentleman who gave a bookseller the dimensions of his shelves, to fit up his library; and of another, who, giving orders for the same kind of furniture, just mentioned that he must have Pope, and Shakespere and Milton. "And hark'ye," he added, "if either of those fellows should publish any thing new, be sure to let me have it, for I choose to have all their works.”

Account of the Quakers.

THE most remarkable sect in this land of sectaries is unquestionably that of the Quakers. They wear a peculiar dress, which is in fashion such as grave people wore in the time of their founder, and always of some sober colour. They never uncover their heads in salutation, nor in their houses of worship; they have no form of worship, no order of priests, and they reject all the Sacraments. In their meeting-houses they assemble and sit in silence, unless any one should be disposed to speak, in which case they suppose him to be immediately moved by the Spirit; and any person is permitted to speak,

are only a few of their peculiarities. They call the days of the week and the months according to their numerical order, saying that their common names are relics of idolatry. The English, instead of addressing each other in the third person singular, use the second plural. This idiom the Quakers reject as the language of flattery and falsehood, and adhere to the strict grammatical form.. They will not take an oath; and such is the opinion of their moral character, that their affirmation is admitted in courts of justice to have the same force. They will not pay tithes ;. the priest therefore is obliged to seize their goods for his due. They will not bear arms, neither will they be concerned in any branch of trade or manufactory which is connected with war, nor in any which is so dependant upon accident as to partake of the nature of gaming. They prohibit cards and other games, music, dancing, and the theatre. A drunken Quaker is never seen, nor a criminal one ever brought

to the bar. Their habits of patient and unhazarding industry ensure success ; and accordingly they are, in proportion to their numbers, wealthier than any other set of people. They support their own poor, and take the lead in every public charity. What is truly extraordinary is, that though they seem to have advanced to the utmost limits of enthusiasm as well as of heresy, so far from being enthusiastic, they are proverbially deliberate and prudent: so far from being sullen and gloomy, as their prohibitions might induce you to suppose, they are remarkably cheerful: they are universally admitted to be the most respectable sect in England; and though they have a church without a priesthood, and a government without a head, they are perhaps the best organized and most unanimous society that ever existed.

Were it not for their outrageous and insufferably heretical opinions, it might