“The whole matter of the Universe and all the parts thereof,” says Henry More, “are ever upon motion, and in such a dance as whose traces backwards and forwards take a vast compass; and what seems to have made the longest stand, must again move, according to the modulations and accents of that Music, that is indeed out of the hearing of the acutest ears, but yet perceptible by the purest minds, and the sharpest wits. The truth whereof none would dare to oppose, if the breath of the gainsayer could but tell its own story, and declare through how many Stars and Vortices it has been strained, before the particles thereof met, to be abused to the framing of so rash a contradiction.” CHAPTER CXC. DANCING PROSCRIBED BY THE METHODISTS. ADAM CLARKE. BURCHELL'S REMARKS ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF THIS PRACTICE. HOW IT IS REGARDED IN THE COLUMBIAN PHILOSOPHY. _Non vi par adunque che habbiamo ragionato a bastanza di questo? A bastanza parmi, rispose il Signor Gasparo; pur desidero io d'intendere qualche particolarità anchor._ IL CORTEGIANO. The Methodist Preachers in the first Conference (that is Convocation or Yearly Meeting) after Mr. Wesley's death, past a law for the public over which their authority extends, or in their own language made a rule, that “schoolmasters and schoolmistresses who received dancing-masters into their schools, and parents also who employed dancing-masters for their children, should be no longer members of the Methodist Society.” Many arguments were urged against this rule, and therefore it was defended in the Magazine which is the authorized organ of the Conference, by the most learned and the most judicious of their members, Adam Clarke. There was however a sad want of judgement in some of the arguments which he employed. He quoted the injunction of St. Paul, “whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him,” and he applied the text thus. Can any person, can any Christian _dance_ in the name of the Lord Jesus? Or, through him, give thanks to God the Father for such an employment?