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November 6, 1852.] THE LEADER. 1063
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'¦NIK PROFANITY OF PRESENT " SABBATH OBS...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Joijicopman Lkaiiuk Against America. " ....
si on , if not of armed resistance , to the great Republic . We are confident that an appeal to the spirit of justice in the American people , especially if it " were made in a tone , not of humility , but of fairness , sincerity , and outspeaking candour , would meet with the reception that it deserves ; but by the petty course of repelling American vessels , even under the American flag and officered by the federal commission , precludes the Government of Spain from making that appeal which the American people could receive . That
the American Government has been remarkable in its forbearance , has indeed almost exhausted the patience of its own people in resisting the temptation to take advantage of Spanish insults , we know . It has , as long as possible , kept the negociations with Spain and her colony on a strictly diplomatic footing , according to the rules of international law . It is Spain , with her local G overnment , who is removing the controversy from that amicable and peaceable field to an issue of force ; and it is not the Government of
Washington that can be blamed for the consequences . The result , indeed , can be foreseen by any statistical writer who is able to compare , even in the most cursory manner , the resources of the two conflicting States ; and it is Spain , we repeat , who has chosen the issue for herself . But the reason which makes us so well pleased to see the able writer in the leading journal confronting the facts is , that we are most anxious for our own Government , and still more for our
own public , to understand the nature of the contest , and of the forces and interests engaged in it . There has been some talk of dragging England into the dispute . She could scarcely enter it at all , to remain passive and neutral : she must either keep firmly out of it , or must be content to share the disasters which Spain is drawing upon herself , or must take some other course , dictated with a view to her own interest , to the inevitable career of the great Republic , and to the ultimate destinies of mankind , which England and America , divided , may influence so mournfully—united , so blessedly .
And it is against America that Prance is said to be leaguing Europe ! The project is natural for any adventurer speculating in the patronage of the despotic powers ; and if England were one on i ]> o niclo aPoo- IuA (/ uluUO OilX CUliUiIIUO , t \ l lOTCe Illl g ^ lj . * be formed which could for some years oppress the European peoples , and harass the American Republic . But where would the victory remain in the end P America is too strong in her territory , her youth , her ambitions , and her vigour , to rest content with defeat . She will continue to grow , and to fight , until she
conquer . And where would English interests be in the mean time P Waging a war of extermination on the ocean against her great naval rival , they would be terribly damaged , year by year , and possibly at last exterminated . England sacriiieed for the benefit pf an ephemeral Napoleon and his despot patrons ! Wo do not know whether this rumoured project be seriously in deliberation , or really advancing ; but the English public ought to know what its Government intends , or rather , ought to know that England will have nothing to do with any such suicidal infamies .
November 6, 1852.] The Leader. 1063
November 6 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER . 1063
'¦Nik Profanity Of Present " Sabbath Obs...
'¦ NIK PROFANITY OF PRESENT " SABBATH OBSERVANCES . " ¦ At h period when the use and genuineness of | ho Christianity professed by tho Church of Eng' "i ( l is beginning to bo questioned , boldly , hut not irreverently , by large numbers of thinking j n (! " , in more quartern than one , it is certainly I' ^ 'iirnbent on the Ministers of that church to viii-( | a ( c thtMr principles , and tho application of ¦ hone principles to tho necessities 01 tho world
'" omul them , on every possible occasion , and in "' o clearest possible form . Tho Venerable Aroh"facon Jlalo , and eighty of the . London clergy , '' PfX'iir to be of thin opinion . So they meet X ? rl ' r at ; Sion-collego , ( on Thursday , October " I ' ' ) to let us Hoo how implicitly we , who are 10 ''"' -y , can trust in them as fair and competent . ' , ( ' P < 'tcrH of the teaching and example ' of the ° "nder of Christianity—by protesting agaiiiHt J ' opening of the Crystal Palace at Sydenhum , '" hiirulny afternoon , to tho vast mass of tho Population of London who can only vinil it on ' "'" L < l ; iy J loll 11 > H ° ' ^" J " * ' < 1 ° » ° * ' require to be . ( - M ' ' » af ; our opinion is on this hint , cruellest , " ° 8 t hoiihoIobb development of the " Sabbath
Observance" fanaticism . We have already argued and re-argued the question now before us ; we have found that our convictions are partaken hy fair-minded men of all classes and all creeds , good churchmen included ; and we had hoped that this miserable agitation against a Sunday walk through a beautiful building filled with beautiful objects , had been set at rest—smothered in its own pulpit cushions—for ever . The meeting at Sion-college shows the enemy to be once more in the field . We have no resource , therefore , but to come out , and do battle again in the cause of Christianity and common sense .
The best known of the reverend speakers at the Archdeacon ' s meeting , and their chief , judging by the length and elaborateness of his oration , was Dr . Croly . We shall certainly do our opponents no injustice if we proceed to estimate the truth that is in them , and in their convictions , by the arguments and opinions of the author of " Salathiel . " The Doctor began with " Paradise , " " the Wilderness , " "the Ten Commandments , " " the local la * v of Moses , " and " the seventy years captivity . " As all this concerns the Jews , and as we happen to be a Christian people , we beg to be excused from saying a word to Doctor Croly in his character of an Israelitish
archaeologist . We will also give him the full oratorical benefit of a certain proclamation of James I ., to whieh lie next alluded—being of opinion that people who live in the nineteenth century , and in the reign of Queen Victoria , have got rather beyond the reach of precedents drawn from the period of James I . Having pretty well disburthened himself of his historical responsibilities as a speaker , by beginning with the garden of Eden , and ending with Charles I . and " Laud's Popish tendencies , " Doctor Croly was at length at liberty to occupy himself with present affairs , and to tell us why he and his brethren objected to the opening of the New Crystal Palace on Sunday afternoon .
He dissented altogether from the notion that the working-classes required amusement on Sunday to refresh them Their proper refreshment was rest , " a " quiet walk , the domestic meal , and the domestic evening . " If Doctor Croly and his friends had been legislating about Sabbath observn . o - £ -.- - ' -- *— ' -f - ' % r 7 rjuu 8 animals , their definition ot proper Sunday refreshment would be perfect . A " quiet walk "
( in the fields ) for poor Dobbin , a " domestic meal" ( of grass ) for Dobbin and his quadruped friends , and a " domestic evening" for the miserable , exhausted brutes ( say rolling comfortably on their backa and shaking themselves in company ) to crown all . Very good and very humane for over-worked horses on Sunday , —but for over-worked men / men who have souls ; men who have minds to be cultivated , and hearts to
bereiined ; men whose higher God-given faculties collapse under the leaden pressure of labour all the week , —is it unchristian , is it any infringement of any word spoken by Christ , to make the " quiet walk" of these men a walk that shall tend towards informing their minds and ennobling their hearts , that shall do something more for them than merely stretching their muscles and purifying their lungs P Is such a purpose as this a purpose for clergymen ( or any men ) to protest againstP And is not this really and truly the only object wo want to achieve ( and shall achieve ) by opening the Sydenhnm Palace on Sunday afternoon P
As for the " domestic meal" and the " domestic evening , " those who know more about the ordinary food and ordinary home of the London artisan , than the eighty London clergymen at Sion College would appear to have known , can judge for themselves how far these ingredients in the working-man ' s Sunday-life , are likely to refresh him sufficiently , in any sense of the word , physical or otherwise . We leave our readers to settle this question for themselves , merely observing that our poor brothers and sisters would
be perhaps better occupied over their " tea , " better amused through the rest of their evening , by talking of pictures , statues , beautiful trcctJ and flowers , wonderful inventions of science , and other subjects of this sort , which the realization of the good and great project that we are now advocating would give them to talk of , than in occupying themselves with the small gossip of the neighbourhood or tho work-shop , which is all that " Hahbath observances" have left to them at present , us subjects of conversation through the Sunday evening and over tho Sunday meal .
But "Religion ! "but " Church-goingP "—When the vast mass of people of whom we have been writing , and to whom we want to open the Crystal Palace on Sunday , are taught so much of their religion by the clergy as may dispose them to go to Church , we shall be happy to show how church-going and innocent sight-seeing may be perfectly and religiously harmonized together . At the present time , a walk through any poor neighbourhood in London , during the hours of " Divine-service , " is quite enough to show anybody , even a member of Sion College , that the working-classes do not go to Church . They are either basking in the sun , or quarrelling at
home , or waiting against the gin-shop walls for the opening of the gin-shop doors . We only want to offer them something better to do than this ,- we are willing , out of respect to church-goers , to put off pulling these " humble classes" out of their Sunday morning mire , till the Sunday morning service is over ; and one of the results of our attempting to achieve this very fair purpose in this very considerate way is , that Archdeacon Hale and eighty of the London clergy call a meeting with the express object of protesting , on religious grounds , against us and our design .
Doctor Croly dissented also from the notion that " the show" ( as he called it ) would thin , the customers at gin palaces ; and though he was impartially read y to admit that there might possibly be occasional instances of drunkenness on Sunday evening in the streets (!) he really could not remember the time when he himself had seen one of those instances ! There is a description in one of Coleridge ' s poems , of a certain owl who , after first shutting both his eyes , vaingloriously flew about , hooting " at the sun in heaven , " and crying out , " Where is it ?" " That owl may not have been a doctor ; but nothing will ever persuade us that his name was not Croly .
Returning for one moment to the assertion , that " the show" would tend to empty the ginpalacos ( to state that they are filled on every Sunday , in every quarter of London , is equivalent , if people choose to open their eyes , to stating that two and two make four ) , wo may observe that this assertion simply assumes the e > - ~— . - ¦ ¦¦• ¦ . i-: ~ -u T v —„ x . ,-i : „< . aphorism , and to which tne experience oi tne whole civilized world bears witness , that " Public amusements help to keep the people from Private vice . " Give men , as at present , no Sunday choice but the church or tho tap-room , and , as we see and know , thousands and tens of thousands
choose the tap-room . But give them a third choice—some such choice , for instance , as " tho show" at Sydenham : are Doctor Croly and his friends bold enough to assert that none of the drinkers iu public-houses ( drinkers , because drinking is the only Sunday amusement which Sabbath observances now . permit ) would go to see that " show , " and , going to see it , that they would get drunk in the midst ; of the sight P Men do not intoxicate themselves in
public ; men do not degrade themselves where the eyes of all classes are turned on them . They get drunk privately in tap-rooms , notpublicly inCryst . al Palaces . How many eases of intoxication u ero there in the streets , or in the building , when the ( jl reat Mxlhibition was filled by ils hundreds of thousands a diiyP Doctor Croly must have been thinking of that period when he stated the results of his experience , in the observation . of London drunkenness .
Other arguments were brought forward hy the Doctor and his reverend brethren—such , for instance , as comparing the ah-use . of Sunday : is it is in Paris , with the -use . of Sunday as it- might be in London- — -to which a \ e have not . space to advert in full . And we the less regret , tins , because we find , on referring to the archdeacon's proposed address to Lord Derby , at the end of the report of the meeting , thai the strongest argument ayainst the opinions of tin . ' reverend Sabbatarian agitators , is supplied by themselves . In the third paragraph of the address to which we liavu referred , occur these words : ¦ --
" It , is not , however , the tf ignntio eh . uactor of the preparations wliidi uni milking to draw myriads <> 1 people ; to one hjioI , on tho Lord ' s day , which tills uh wit . li upi > iohi'iiHioiJH of tho demoralising olVcd , n of such an assemblage , ' >•«'' rather tho intr / lrctitd / character of tho piirmiitH which \ vc / mr (!) will there lu > otloml to tho public , and which , however they may refino I ho mind (! !) teach nothing which relates to ( ., 'hritttiun religion" (! ! !) & o . & e . &«•
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 6, 1852, page 11, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_06111852/page/11/
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