varieties of its observations might have led us to expect. Surely, then, the difference between the authorities quoted by Heylin and Bingham justify us in our assertion, that the question was an open one, to a great extent, from a very early period. But, with respect to one thing, it appears that there was no difference of opinion, and that one thing is, that games and sports, in the common sense of the terms, are things unsuited to the Lord's day, festival though it be. (See Bingham, lib. xx. cap. ii. sec. 4.) Few people are aware that the Jewish Sabbath was properly a feast-day, a day on which men might innocently entertain their friends and exercise a proper hospitality; and that our Lord sanctioned this view of the observance of the day by His own presence at a banquet: and many would be still more surprised to see how differently the Jews kept the day from what they had been accustomed to suppose; to read of their revelries and dances and excessive mirth, and of the instruction which christian bishops took occasion to give from the evil example of the Jews as to the true nature of the christian festival. (See Bingham, lib. xx. cap. ii. 84.) In old times, the Christian kept the Lord's day more holy than the Jew his Sabbath, and they who would have sports and public spectacles on Sunday, do, in truth, Judaize more than those who would devote it wholly to God's service. This consideration does not, indeed, encourage a rigid observance of the day, nor the conversion of a time of rest into a time of mental labour, nor such an exclusive attention to religious subjects, as to make the festival, through very wearisomeness, lapse into a fast. We have already warned the managers of Sunday Schools of the great risk under the present system of making the Lord's day and all religious exercises an object of dislike to the young; and the same remarks are good of all men in various degrees. But, assuredly, if other holydays besides those of the Lord's day, and other times of public worship were observed, there would be neither so much impatience of the religious duties of the Lord's day, nor so great a need of them, as is too frequent among those to whom this day is the only time of relaxation from incessant toil of mind or body. The more the other holy-days are kept as seasons of rejoicing, the more our Sundays will be reverenced and improved. Admitting, then, the necessity of holidays and sports, and that it is incumbent upon us to furnish them, from time to time, out of the six days which are left to our own disposal, there yet remains a question as to the nature of the sports and recreations which should be encouraged amongst the poor. In the country there is not much difficulty in this subject either * Justin Martyr, Chrysostom, livine institution of the Mosaic rejudices of the Jewish people. Theodoret, and Cyril, all concur in pronouncing the sacrifices to have been an accommodation to the See Magee on the Atonement. to the squire or the parson. Old customs have not so died away from amongst the rural districts, and reverence for the authority of the master or clergyman is not so extinct, as to preclude the revival of many of the more harmless of our old English sports, such as the maypole, football, running, leaping, &c. &c. Wrestling and single-stick, and such games, are now hardly compatible with the preservation of good temper and harmony. But in the dense populations of our towns, mines, and potteries, the case is widely different. These places are inhabited by a new people, a people who have no sympathy with, or knowledge of, the past, nothing in their minds which would respond to English sports because they are English. And it is on this account chiefly that we look upon all fair visions like our author's, such as that of shooting at the butts, and of other ancient and manly sports held around the walls of our churches, as little more than visions. Independently of the expense and other difficulties connected with these sports, there is this one insuperable objection to them, that they have died away out of the hearts of the people. When the club was the weapon of the apprentice, and the bow the glory of our English yeomen; when the memory of Flodden was fresh, and a king thought it not beneath him to excel in bowmanship, there was that in the minds of men which gave an interest to the sport and which endeared it to them. This is gone, and to attempt to go back to the habit without restoration of the impulse, is worse than vain. We have before now had occasion to observe that we may not endeavour to live out of our age; that we must work out of the materials which we have, that which will supply our wants. Nor is it more unnatural and out of taste for the present to despise and destroy all remembrance of the past, than it is to force upon the unwilling present the institutions of former days. There is great danger of this error, or we would not say so much upon it and we entreat all who feel dissatisfied with these remarks, to remember the temporary revival of old times towards the end of the history of Sparta, or the more obvious absurdities of the French Revolution in its republican masque, if they would see how utterly vain it is to restore in, or engraft upon, any people that which is not congenial to its spirit. Free institutions, said the immortal Niebuhr, cannot make free men; nor can any institution benefit any man unless it be adapted to his state. All attempts to impose upon us bare customs for which we have lost our sympathy, are but to reenact the Eglinton tournament on a larger scale, and to masquerade the nation for the short time during which it will endure the disguise. Another reason against the encouragement of such sports in populous districts, and even of those games which are more in unison with men's feelings, but are liable to produce disturbance, is the total absence of all check except that of physical force, It cannot be in such places as it was once, and still may be, in the country, where the squire's presence is a law to his tenantry. "When there the youthful Nortons met, These scenes, and such as we read of in Old Mortality and the Forest of Arden, cannot be found in that population for which we are most anxious to furnish amusements, because they stand most in need of them; and for this one single and sad reason, that there is no moral bond between those who should direct and those who should enjoy such pastimes. The richer man, be he what he may, in most cases does not even know the poorer. Whilst this is the case, it will be at a risk of all their influence, of the peace of their neighbourhood, and of great moral evils, if the clergy attempt to direct the boisterous sports of a holiday crowd in one of these dis tricts. One way, however, is so open to us, and presents so cheerful a promise, that we feel bound to call attention to it. The national schools are in the power of the parochial clergy. At a small cost, either of time, money, or thought, the parish priest may cause every "diviner morn" of the Church to dawn with the promise of some recreation to the young of his flock. To them, too, he has means which are in great measure denied to him as regards others, of explaining the meaning of the festival, and leading them to associate their pleasure with its sacred occasion. Who can calculate the amount of religious elevation, the catholic temper, which such proceedings, with God's blessing, might be the means of imparting? But to return to the subordinate, though highly important object, which has been before us at present; such communication of pleasure to their children might well be counted on as a road to the hearts of their parents; a kindness done to the former would be felt as a kindness to the latter also; the joy of a holiday would not stop with the former, but would pass through them on to the latter. The benevolent and rightminded of the aristocracy could hardly fail to take a hint at once so practical and so pregnant: there would be found little limit to their means of carrying it out; visible and conspicuous results would then ensue, and even the middling classes of employers would discern the advantages of a line of action, conducive not merely to the pleasure, but to the bodily and mental health, the cheerfulness, the energy, and the patience of their labourers: and we have but to suppose the ex tension of such practices into our manufacturing districts, to find ample materials for re-creating our country-for, with God's blessing, healing her sore disease and rendering her once again the merry England which God eminently designed her to be. A Tract upon Tombstones; or Suggestions for the Consideration of Persons intending to set up that kind of Monument to the Memory of deceased Friends. By a MEMBER of the Lichfield Society for the Encouragement of Ecclesiastical Architecture. Rugeley, J.T. Walters. London: Burns. Oxford: J. H. Parker. 8vo. pp. 25. Churches of Yorkshire. No. IV. Bolton Percy. Leeds: J. W. Green. London: Rivingtons, &c. Imp. 8vo. pp. 18. EXPOSED in the open field to the undistinguishing tread of men and cattle, in an extra-parochial and remote nook of Northamptonshire, the curious observer of records of by-gone days may perchance stumble upon (for no one cares enough, and perhaps few know enough about the matter to direct him to it, but he may perchance stumble upon) the top of a stone coffin, bearing on its surface a budding cross of Calvary, and an abbot's crosier. The stone is as silent as it is unnoticed. There is no legend to tell whose bones rested beneath it; only the Christian is indicated by the cross, and the spiritual office by the crosier. And this stone is the only remaining memorial of a whole fraternity, of a family noble as the noblest among men: it is all that remains of an abbey at whose gate the poor of the neighbouring villages were fed, and from whose "high monastic tower, The bells rang out with gladsome power " at matins and at even-song, to tell of a GOD to be worshipped, and of a holy service to be offered. This one stone, nameless and speechless, (and yet how eloquent, how venerable!) is all that remains of Sulby Abbey, and of one of the Fathers of that religious house. Let us turn to a far different memorial of frail mortality. * Or a cross of Calvary, botonè, as a herald would describe it; but for our present purpose we prefer the word that tells of hope and vitality springing from the cross; and finds a type of the emblem of our salvation in Aaron's rod that budded. Even the ecclesiologist may, however, thankfully borrow from the herald the name of the cross of Calvary, to designate the cross set on steps, as of painful ascent, which represents that on which our blessed Redeemer was suspended. One of the sides of the chancel arch in the beautiful church of Bolton Percy in Yorkshire, is mutilated to receive the following inscription, on a tablet of wretched taste: MS. Amplissimi, desideratissimique Ferdinandi Domini Fairfax, Baron de Cameron. Sed bello insuperabilis Dextra gladium sinistra stateram tenens Literarum patronus, Humanitatis repumicator: Nobilissimæ prolis numero, et pietate felix, Quid igitur novi? Si (quos singularis amor tamdiu Etatis 64. "Obiit anno {Salutis humanæ 1647."* Surely no one can help being struck by the contrast between these two monuments. The first utterly merges self in a spiritual office, sanctified by union with Christ, under the form of deepest abasement; the name is not seen, the crosier and the cross alone appear the cross upon the toilsome steps which our divine Redeemer ascended, and on which we, too, must follow Him, if we would arise to glory; the crosier, the ensign not of the reward but of the ministry of the pastor. The other swells the name with superlative epithets, and gives the titles and offices for the sake of the individual who reflects glory on whatever he touches. England is happy in the services of Fairfax, Baron Cameron, and Yorkshire is rendered illustrious by his birth. He enjoyed every earthly blessing, performed every secular office, was glorious in peace, and in war invincible: he was even "Religionis cultor;" but it was just as he was "literarum patronus," as if he gave more than he received: and he was "pietate felix," but by a kind of joint-stock company of piety and a noble progeny, as if her ladyship were one of his children: but with all this not one word to show that the man himself, throughout his life, and those who erected this monument in his pompous memorial, had a thought of Christ and of true religion. Yes, we forget; they do not date his being by Lustrums, or Olympiads, or the Hegira *Churches of Yorkshire. |