The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 17, No. 477, February 19, 1831 by Various
page 19 of 52 (36%)
page 19 of 52 (36%)
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out-of-door recreation, or in idleness. In the former and better manner
it is passed by the majority of the middle classes; it is the day on which friends and relations meet, whom business keeps apart during six days of the week; and the stoppage of stage-coaches within twenty miles of London on the Sunday would take away more moral and wholesome enjoyment than any act of the legislature can produce. But supposing public worship were duly attended by all persons, as, according to what has now become a fiction of the law, it is designed to be, how are the remaining portions of the day to be disposed of by those who have no domestic circle to which they can repair--no opportunities for that refreshment both of body and mind, which the Sabbath, when wisely and properly observed, affords? Or who, if belonging to or placed in religious families, are not yet at years of such discretion as suffices to repress their natural activity and the instinctive desire of recreation? Rigorous gamelaws do not more certainly encourage poaching, than the puritanical observance of the Sabbath leads to Sabbath-breaking.--_Quarterly Review._ * * * * * BURNS. This extraordinary man, before he produced any of the pieces on which his fame is built, had educated himself abundantly; and when he died, at the age of thirty-seven, knew more of books, as well as of men, than fifty out of a hundred in any of the learned professions in any country of the world are ever likely to do.--_Ibid._ * * * * * |
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