A PROTESTANTISM IN SOCIAL USAGES NEEDED. 113 



absurd usnges by sensible ones, but the dethronement of 

 that secret, irresponsible power which now imposes our 

 usages, and the assertion of the right of all individuals to 

 choose their own usages. In rules of living, a West-end 

 clique is our Pope ; and we are all papists, with but a mere 

 sprinlding of heretics. On all who decisively rebel, comes 

 down the penalty of excommunication, with its long 

 catalosjue of disasfreeable and, indeed, serious conse- 

 quences. 



The liberty of the subject asserted in our constitution, 

 and ever on the increase, has yet to be wrested from this 

 subtler tyranny. The right of private judgment, which 

 our ancestors wrung from the church, remains to be 

 claimed from this dictator of our habits. Or, as before 

 said, to free us from these idolatries and superstitious con- 

 formities, there has still to come a protestantism in social 

 usages. Parallel, therefore, as is the change to be 

 wrought out, it seems not improbable that it may be 

 wrought out in an analogous way. That influence which 

 solitary dissentients fail to gain, and that perseverance 

 which they lack, may come into existence when they unite. 

 That persecution which the world now visits upon them 

 from mistaking their nonconformity for ignorance or dis- 

 respect, may diminish when it is seen to result from 

 principle. The penalty which exclusion now entails may 

 disappear when they become numerous enough to form 

 visiting circles of their own. And when a successful 

 stand has been made, and the brunt of the opposition 

 has passed, that large amount of secret dislike to our 

 observances which now pervades society, may manifest 

 itself with suflScient power to effect the desired eman- 

 cipation. 



Whether such will be the process, time alone can de- 

 cide. That community of origin, growth, supremacy, and 

 decadence, which we have found among all kinds of gov* 



