And the Crystal Palace, and still later, the Bethnal Green Museum,
have been, I believe, of far more use than many average sermons
and lectures from many average orators.

But are we not still far behind the old Greeks, and the Romans of
the Empire likewise, in the amount of amusement and instruction,
and even of shelter, which we provide for the people? Recollect
the--to me--disgraceful fact, that there is not, as far as I am
aware, throughout the whole of London, a single portico or other
covered place, in which the people can take refuge during a
shower: and this in the climate of England! Where they do take
refuge on a wet day the publican knows but too well; as he knows
also where thousands of the lower classes, simply for want of any
other place to be in, save their own sordid dwellings, spend as
much as they are permitted of the Sabbath day. Let us put down
"Sunday drinking" by all means, if we can. But let us remember
that by closing the public-houses on Sunday, we prevent no man or
woman from carrying home as much poison as they choose on Saturday
night, to brutalise themselves therewith, perhaps for eight-and-
forty hours. And let us see--in the name of Him who said that He
had made the Sabbath for man, and not man for the Sabbath--let us
see, I say, if we cannot do something to prevent the townsman's
Sabbath being, not a day of rest, but a day of mere idleness; the
day of most temptation, because of most dulness, of the whole
seven.

And here, perhaps some sweet soul may look up reprovingly and say:
"He talks of rest. Does he forget, and would he have the working
man forget, that all these outward palliatives will never touch
the seat of the disease, the unrest of the soul within? Does he