CHAPTER X. HOLY REST. ""Tis Sabbath morn.-Thy morn, O Toil, The morn of morns! Time's richest blessing, Is this the way to meet its smile, With gross debauch the brain oppressing? DAVID WINGATE. EACH of the three names by which we are accustomed, more or less, to denote the day of holy rest, has a charm and beauty of its own. "SABBATH" means just rest,-that name therefore indicates a primary property of the day,-the rest-day, as opposed to the work-days; the LORD'S DAY introduces the Christian element, and places us in the Saviour's company, with our thoughts swinging between the remembrance of His great victory, and the prospect of His coming again in glory; and SUNDAY,-the day of sunshine,-may be held as denoting the result when the idea of rest, and that of fellowship with Christ are brought together the peculiar lustre and radiance of the day-and the pre-eminent happiness and blessing which it brings. The Divine appointment of the Sabbath is surely a blessing of peculiar value to working men. If God had not stopped the wheels of labour for them on one day of seven, they would have had very hard work in getting them stopped for themselves. As regards the health and strength of the working classes, it has been proved, we conceive, to demonstration, that a periodical day of rest from labour is as indispensable as the interruption of toil during the night. It is about as inconsistent with experience and physiology to suppose that men could labour every day in the year in succession without impairing their health and hastening their death, as that they could work day and night without sleep. On this subject a few facts and testimonies will be useful and interesting. During the war in the beginning of this century, it was proposed to work all Sunday in one of the royal manufactories for continuance, not for occasional service; and it was found (according to Mr. Wilberforce), that the workmen who obtained Government's consent to abstain from working on Sundays, executed more work than the others. Captain Stansbury, the leader of the United States' surveying expedition in the Salt Lake district, in his official report to the Government, bears this testimony to the value of the Sabbath: "I here beg to record, as the result of my experience, derived not only from my present journey, but from the observation of many years spent in the performance of similar duties, that as a mere matter of pecuniary consideration, apart from all higher obligations, it is wise to keep the Sabbath. More work can be obtained from both men and animals by its observance, than where the whole seven days are uninterruptedly devoted to labour." Mr. Bagnall, an extensive iron-master, discontinued the practice of working his blast-furnaces on Sunday, and seven years after he bore his testimony thus: "We have made a larger quantity of iron than ever, and gone on in all our six iron-works much more free from accidents and interruptions than during any preceding seven years of our lives." Lord Macaulay has said very truly :-" If the Sunday had not been observed as a day of rest, but the axe, the spade, the anvil, and the loom had been at work every day, during the last three centuries, I have not the smallest doubt that we should have been at this time a poorer people, and a less civilized people than we are. Of course, I do not mean that a man will not produce more in a week by working seven days than by working six days. I very much doubt whether, at the end of a year, he will generally have produced more by working seven days than by working six days a week, and I But firmly believe that, at the end of twenty years, he will have produced less by working seven days a week, than by working six days a week." As Burke remarks, "they that always labour exhaust their attention, burn out their candles, and are left in the dark." Experience goes, moreover, to show the advantage of one day of rest in seven, above one in eight, one in nine, one in ten, or in any larger number. It may be an advantage that a day of rest, or a partial day of rest, should come in more frequently than this, but it cannot be an advantage that it come in less frequently. In 1794, the Revolutionary Government of France abolished the division of time into weeks, as well as the Sabbath and the worship of God, and substituted a system of decades, that is, nine working days succeeded by one day of rest. It is well known that this arrangement was an entire failure; the decades had to be abolished, and the week and Sunday restored. An interesting illustration of the practical working of the decades has been given by a working man in an essay, entitled The Escape from Toil, or Workman's Weekly Refuge. The author of that essay was employed, at one period, in a shop in Paris. He worked beside a Frenchman of extraordinary industry, who never wasted a minute. One Saturday, the Frenchman was regretting that he could not touch his work again till Monday. His British companion remarked in joke, that he must have been far better off, and made more money, in the time of the decades. "No," said the candid Frenchman, "quite the reverse. It is true, I never allowed the Revolution to withdraw my attention from work; on the morning of the 10th August 1792, I crossed the Tuileries on my way to work, and did not lose ten minutes in gazing at the mangled bodies of the Swiss guards. My employment suffered very little, if at all, from the Revolution. Notwithstanding (exclaimed the man), Sunday is the thing, after all that has been said and done. When there was no Sunday there was no working day. The tenth day was not obligatory, and the workshops were not shut up. We worked whenever we liked, and sometimes more than we liked; but not one month of the whole time did I ever make so good a bill as we do now, and did before. I was glad when the decades went to the dogs, and the weeks came round. again. No, sir, Sunday for ever! When there was no settled holiday, there was no settled or sedulous labour. I caught the infection of laziness, I suppose, in some degree, as well as the rest; at any rate, I got less money for my time." A well-spent Sunday is invaluable for freshen |