A Letter from Batista Angeloni - 4
It is the same thing amongst men; a Quaker with his singularity of dress, self-sufficient business, laconic style, and air of riches, the last of which he never fails to insinuate to all his customers, catches the eye of tradesmen in the country; the apparent probity and power of selling cheap because wealthy, create him business; men in the country are desirous of talking with such a man, and thus deal with him from that singularity in him, and that whimsical disposition in themselves.
The Quakers are extremely punctual and honest in trifles, conscious that men wear out their characters before they make their fortune, who proceed otherwise in trades where riches are gotten by degrees.
But, in matters of consequence, the right of the thing is not the question; the power of obtaining it by artifice is the only object to be considered; and, if a fortune can be made at once, there is little hesitation about the manner how.
Is it not a little surprising, that even a set of men of such principles as the Quakers profess, could be suffered to take root in any nation? notwithstanding they have covered all the political maxims which they adopt, by the veil of religion. In the last rebellion which happened in England, they openly avowed that their principles would not allow them to oppose it. This was nothing to be remarked in a Quaker, and drew no sarcasm on the sect: yet a man of the established church would have been stigmatized for a Jacobite, that had declared any thing like this.
