SECULARISED SUNDAYS

PINS.

Cum grano salis.

To prove that the first day of the week should be devoted entirely to spiritual affairs is a difficult task for any one to undertake ; and so the Rev. Mr. Austin found it on Sunday last, when he preached on the "Christian Sabbath."  Mr. Austin was not altogether "at home" on this subject—as compared with his many other efforts—and this may be put down rather to his training than to a lack of intelligence. That the reverend gentleman laboured, was evident by the numerous quotations made (some of them even opposed to his pet idea) from Scripture, to strengthen his position ; whereas, generally, he quotes very sparingly, but trusts to his own clear brains to help him out. Of course, Mr. Austin, like many of his co-religionists, runs away with the idea that the attempt of liberal-minded men to secularise the seventh day in the week (or as he puts it, "the Christian Sabbath," or first day in the week, is simply a desire on their part to crush Christianity out of existence. Now, this is nonsense : those who prefer seeing seventh day—the day which most men, in common with Mr. Austin, admit is essential for man's physical welfare, secularised, are not particularly inimical to the teachings of Christ —much as they may be opposed to humbug, cant, phariseeism, and bigotry. Mr. Austin believes that one day in the week shall be set apart as a day of rest, but, pray, what is rest ? It certainly cannot be the same to all men ; what may be rest to the coal-heaver cannot be rest to the student, and so in regard to other opposite pursuits. There can be no absolute day of rest; necessity will not allow it—neither will sentiment. For instance, Mr. Austin and millions like him, believe that the first day of the week shall be observed for the purpose of prayer and spiritual communion with God ; a still greater number of persons believe that Friday should be so set apart, while that very ancient race, who, in their fond conceit, call themselves "God's chosen people," contend that the seventh (Saturday), is the actual day which the Divine will ordered to be observed. And besides these, there are millions of other civilised and semi-civilised people who believe that other days should be observed either as a day of rest, of prayer, or of fasting. Now, which are right, and does it really matter which day of the week is kept so long as it is one of the seven ? I think not ; but for the matter of public convenience it is necessary, in civilised communities, that a specified day be set apart—not for prayers in particular, but for rest from toil.
 The Sabbath, no doubt, is a grand institution, no matter whether of divine origin or otherwise ; the body requires rest and so also does the mind. To be strictly correct in this matter, one may fairly ask which day do the clergy keep—seeing that Sunday —the generally accepted day of rest among Christians—is their chief working day ? If they work for profit—which they do, on this day, why may not other men do so? But I am not desirous of seeing the seventh day, or any other day set apart for rest, smuggled in among the working days by greedy, soulless, men : not by any means! and there is not the slightest danger of any such calamity happening, seeing the temper of the working classes now-a-days. Messieurs the clergy may rest assured that the masses will no more be led by capitalists and money grubbers into working on the Sunday than they will listen with reverential awe to the State paid parson that they must work from sunrise to sunset for six days in the week, go to church twice on a Sunday, touch their hat to the Squire and his lady, and the parson and his wife, read nothing but the Bible and religious tracts, get drunk but once a year (on Fair days), bring into the world a fair number of human beings to follow in the same old ruck, and finally be laid up in the work-house with "rheumatiz" and then go to heaven—that is to say, that part of it where the seats are free, and where the upper crust do not congregate. Not a bit of it ! the day is past when such a convenient (to the aristocrat) creed has a hold upon the understandings of even clodhoppers.
 One of the most absurd—and I may say untruthful—statements made with regard to a secularized Sabbath, is that by the masses seeking a little rational enjoyment and recreation on that day, working men will be compelled to labour against their will, I don't believe anything of the kind in fact, I know different ; and without fear of contradiction, can safely say that men who work on Sunday—either in private firms or in the Government service, do so voluntarily, for the simple reason that they are paid for it. Those who transgress most in this way are those who engage servants by the year, and make them work twice as much on Sunday as on any other day—and among these transgressors may be mentioned ministers of religion as well as other people. Anyhow, ministers work on Sunday, and they expect their servants to work—calling such labour, no doubt, "a work of necessity." The running of trains on Sunday (that is past certain points where whole colonies of city clergymen reside) excites much wrath in the clerical mind—quite unnecessarily so, for many persons who travel by rail on Sunday do so to attend church— just as their pastors do. Then the idea of a lecture hall or concert room being open on Sunday is another sore point—which clearly shows that the clerical mind cannot rise above the commonest of mundane jealousies. Unfortunately in this colony we have no good lectures delivered on Sunday—bigotry has done its level best towards stamping out that sort of thing ; but in London and other large centres in England the people may listen every Sunday evening to a Proctor on the glories of the stars, to the incisive and eloquent oratory of a Bradlaugh ; to the learned discourses of a Tyndall or a Spencer—and how much worse do our clerical friends suppose are these Londoners to we who have nothing else to do but sit out an uninteresting sermon, or sneak round to the back door of a pub, in order to get a wet at the publican's risk.
 The idea of an universal Sabbath is chimerical —it is impossible ; and it would puzzle a Philadelphia lawyer, a brace of cardinals or bishops, and a whole army of tub-thumpers to prove that God Almighty intended Sunday to be kept in any other than a rational way—suitable to the climate and conditions of the several races of men inhibiting this small circle he has set apart for us. With regard to the difference between the seventh and first days of the week, there is really no foundation whatever for the change from the seventh to the first—and the Jews have, by long odds, the best of it. I once knew a man—a member of the Plymouth Brethren—but who preferred calling himself a Christian, par excellence, who had a very, comical idea of Sunday observance. He worked on Saturday the same as other mortals, and on Sunday harnessed up his moke and drove to a conventicle of his own persuasion some four miles away. When appealed to on the matter of breaking the Fourth Commandment, he argued that Sunday did not come under the ban, as it was the first day in the week. Why then did he work on the seventh ? "Oh, that was quite a different matter ; the Christian dispensation had superseded the Mosaic law in respect of Sabbath observances!" So that this man, by making use of these two arguments, availed himself of the opportunity of using these two days as he pleased—the one for profit the other for pleasure. Let things rip, then, as they are ; and our Sabbatarian friends will find that the Anglo-Saxon men are too fond of their day of rest ever to surrender it to monopoly of any kind ; and that the fact of our people going in for pleasure gardens, museums, picture galleries, open air concerts, and perhaps a little boat sailing, will in no wise detract from their stamina—as men, or their self-respect as citizens.
 As for such exploded stuff as England owing her superior position among nations to her people's general observance of the Sabbath, it is as great a fallacy as the Queen's childish remark about the Bible and England's greatness. England owes her power; 1st, to her insular position ; 2nd, to her vast coal supplies ; and 3rd, to the physical vigour of her people. A dead-and-alive Sunday—closed shops, public houses, and concert rooms, and open churches, does not mean immunity from vice ; and facts may be produced to show that a puritan English or Scotch Sabbath is more productive of downright evil than the free and easy Sundays one finds in Antwerp, Brussells, Paris, Hamburg, and, in fact, throughout Protestant Germany. What says the fatuous Dr. Guthrie ? "During the six months we lived in Paris (himself and wife) with its open theatres ; its gardens filled with living multitudes ; streets full of gaily dressed excitable people ; open wine shops, casinos and stalls, whereat one could purchase as well as on Saturday or Monday, we saw less real vice, less drunkenness, less rioting, than we would have seen in London, Edinburgh, or Glasgow in a month. These are not the Doctor's exact words, but are near enough to show what a big brained man, trained in Puritan Scotland, thought of the matter ; and yours truly has found in the several cities mentioned like experiences. I do not expect a very great many of your readers to agree with me ; but as one of a probable minority I claim a right to be heard on a matter that affects the comfort and happiness of thousands of my fellows. We don't want to prejudice anyone against a place of worship ; but we do ask that we may be left alone in quiet enjoyment of the one and only day in the week we can spare from labour—to spend it as we please in a rational, healthful, and intelligent manner, without being denounced as Godless, and enemies to religion, law, and order.

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ASMODEUS.

Hawkesbury Chronicle and Farmers Advocate (Windsor, NSW : 1881 - 1888), Saturday 10 July 1886, page 2