| Citation |
NYP-N.783.004
17 Nov 1783:44 (333)
Just come to hand, and to be sold at S. Loudon's, No. 5,
Water-Street, between the Coffee-House and Old Slip,
Brief Hints of a Religious Scheme . . . [4 lines] by
Valentine Rathbun, minister of the gospel.
The following extract will in part show the wild and
extravagent enthusiasm and phrensy of this sect, more
commonly known by the appellation of The Shaking Quakers.
'When they meet together for their worship, they fall a
groaning and trembling . . . [5 lines] some will be singing,
each one to his own tune; some without words in an Indian
tone; some sing jig tunes; some tunes of their own making in
an unknown mutter, which they call new tongues; some will be
dancing and others stand laughing heartily and loudly;
others will be drumming on the floor with their feet, as
though a pair of drum-sticks were beating a ruff on a drum-
head; others will be agonizing as though they were in great
pain; others jumping up and down; others fluttering over
somebody and talking to them; others will be shooing and
hissing evil spirits out of the house; till the different
tunes, groaning, jumping, dancing, drumming, laughing,
talking and fluttering, shooing and hissing, make a perfect
bedlam: this they call the worship of God.'
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