recognised day of relaxation and enjoyment, and when every man
might feel, what few men do now, that religion is not incompatible
with rational pleasure and needful recreation.

How different a picture would the streets and public places then
present! The museums, and repositories of scientific and useful
inventions, would be crowded with ingenious mechanics and
industrious artisans, all anxious for information, and all unable
to procure it at any other time. The spacious saloons would be
swarming with practical men: humble in appearance, but destined,
perhaps, to become the greatest inventors and philosophers of their
age. The labourers who now lounge away the day in idleness and
intoxication, would be seen hurrying along, with cheerful faces and
clean attire, not to the close and smoky atmosphere of the public-
house but to the fresh and airy fields. Fancy the pleasant scene.
Throngs of people, pouring out from the lanes and alleys of the
metropolis, to various places of common resort at some short
distance from the town, to join in the refreshing sports and
exercises of the day--the children gambolling in crowds upon the
grass, the mothers looking on, and enjoying themselves the little
game they seem only to direct; other parties strolling along some
pleasant walks, or reposing in the shade of the stately trees;
others again intent upon their different amusements. Nothing
should be heard on all sides, but the sharp stroke of the bat as it
sent the ball skimming along the ground, the clear ring of the
quoit, as it struck upon the iron peg: the noisy murmur of many
voices, and the loud shout of mirth and delight, which would awaken
the echoes far and wide, till the fields rung with it. The day
would pass away, in a series of enjoyments which would awaken no
painful reflections when night arrived; for they would be