The Sun.
London, England, 1830-05-10 00:00:00

hose noblemen, gentry, and clergy, who, during► the I
'ate agricultural pressure, have remitted any port;on
rf their rent and tithes % A word more upon the
•object of gaming and of gaming-houses, one of
which has been lately opened within a few doors
of my own residence !" as the swelling man says.
We must beg leave to inform his Lordship, that the
public press is the very scourge and terror of gam-
blers,--that some of the scoundrels themselves have
icknowledged in this office, that they dread nothing
else, or nothing so much. The public press of this
country does more towards keeping the character and
profession of a gambler in its due state of infamy,—
more towards the suppression and concealment (and
concealment is a species of suppression) of gam-
bling-houses, than al) the efforts of all the Bishops
of the realm : we have also been assured that Mat
broad and towering structure, which still seems to
affront Heaven by its magnificence, has failed as a
gamlAng speculation, and thus the ruin of thousands
of families have been prevented, through the notice
only which has been taken of it and its detestable
projector, by the British press—by those papers
which a Christian Bishop has described as panders.
However, upon this word, anti the application which
his Lordship has been pleased to make of it, 'we
shall consider with some of our brethren, whether it
may not be thought advisable to adopt some other
mode of repelling the odious charge, and setting our-
selves right with the public.—Times.

It was a judicious policy which placed in the great
dignities of the Church men of gentle manners and
quiet character. The elevation of Dr. Blomfield
to the See of London proceeded on a different prin-
ciple, and has been attended with consequences
which may teach Ministers how much more prudent
was the practice of their predecessors. His is one
of those spirits which no accumulation of riches
and dignities can (to use Hume's striking phrase)
" bribe into indolence." He is in a perpetual fer-
ment; one while haranguing upon ali manner of
topics in the House of Lords, at another moment
drilling his Clergy with a rigour which almost drives
into rebellion and contumacy the most submissive
of men; then attempting to enforce the constant
use of an ecclesiastical habit ; again proceeding on
his visitation throughout the country, so escorted,
and accoutred as no Prelate ever was seen since the

days of Wolsey ; and now descending from his
Cathedral to lecture the inhabitants of. the metropo-
lis, in a pamphlet, on their neglect of the Lord's
Day. Not that we should object to the zealous
Bishop chiding, in proper temper, time, and place,
the inattention of his flock to the religious duties of
the Sabbath. Had he kept to his function, and
sermonised till doomsday, his homilies should have
passed us unnoticed ; but this pamphlet is a produc-
thin of such a character as challenges animadver-
sion. In style, to .be sure, it is a very pitiful per-
formance, showing that, with all his Greek ei udi-
tion and Parliamentary eloquence, the Bishop would
be much the better for a little of that instruction in
the, properties of language and grammar, which his
neighbour, Mr. Cobbett, affords with so much good-
will to Lords lay and prelatic ; and for a first lesson,
we would suggest to our friend of the Register the
second page of thepamphlet, where one pronoun may
be found referring to three different antecedents in
the space of as many lines. But these things are not
very important ; and, upon the whole, the Bishop
is sufficiently intelligible, although not very consis-
tent or rational. The great evil of which he com-
plains is the present employment •f the Sunday,
which he would have set apart for " religious wor-
ship and rest ;" and the strict observance of which,
in such manner, he insists upon as absolutely " es-
sential to keep alive the sense of religion in any
people" (p. 5), and as " the grand bulwark of
Christianity" (p. What then is to be Said of
Christianity in every other part of civilized Europe
(Scotland excepted), where, in Lutheran and Cal-
vinistic, as well as • Catholic States, Sunday is uni-
versally celebrated as a festival, and where leisure
and innocent grafficatiens arc not so strangely and
unnaturally separated as in Great Britain ? Can it
be gravely asserted that there is no religion at
Frankfort, Berne, and Geneva, because the Sunday
evenings are not observed in these places in the
same way as here ? The Bishop is, however, no
advocate for a " Pharisaical observance of the Chris-

tian Sabbath ; nor would . he interfere with those
quiet recreations which individuals may think fit to
alloW themselves." Now the question is, what he
really means ? Would he prevent Sunday dinners
—the Speaker's for example; or to what extent
would he permit them ? Is it reasonable or pos-
sible to define the limits ; and if not, is it not mere
cant to declaim against them ? We observe
that there is a special saving for the Squire's
„inner to the parson, or, as it is quaintly ex-
pressed, " the ancient and accustomed hospita-
lity of entertaining those who attend Divine
Service in their official capacity!" (page 25.)
But the most objectionable part of the pamphlet is
its spirit of hostility to the enjoyments of the lower
orders ; the short stages, the steam vessele, anti
barges, which enable the citizen" to gulp his weekly
air," give Dr. Blomfield infinite scandal. And this
Christian Bishop, writing from his pleasant villa at
Fulham, surrounded by all the means and appliances
to health and comfort, is grieved to relate " that
the steam-packets up the Thames to Richmond, and
downwards to Margate and the Nore, are crowded
with gaily-dressed Sabbath-breakers, and that in the
month of August last, 6,000 persons availed them-
selves of this convenience, and that more than five
hundred boats have been known to pass under Put-
trey Bridge on a fine Sunday (p. 15)." What
enormities ! For our poor part, but with all defe-
rence to the Bishop's superior discernment in these
matters, we much doubt whether a Sabbath passed
in that " melancholy indolence" which he recom-
mends, and relieved only by a homily from his Lord-
ship, though the best he ever conned, is likely to
leave the mind of a hard-working tradesman in a
better state, or to inspire more lively sentiments of
piety and thankfulness to the great and bountiful
Giver of all things, than the inward satisfaction
which such a man may be supposed to experience ie
seeing hiz wife and children go forth gaily and trimly
dressed in their Sunday clothes, to inhale the pure,
sweet air of the country, and to taste the little
feast with which he may be able to regale them.
It is all very well for the Bishop to desire people to
take 'their pleasure on some other day, but what
answer has he for those whose condition condemns
them to unremitting toil throughout the week ?
En the same way may be met all he urges against
the shops open on Sundays for the poor to pia—
chase their Sunday provisions. They must buy,
when and es they can, after receiving their wages on
the Saturday everting. '1 he exigencies of our social
state will not allow of that strict and inflexible rule
which Dr. Blomfield insists upon ; and the ab-
surdity to which such notiens tend, might surely
have eteiech a less intelligent mind, when the diffi-
culty presented itself with which he is so sorely
gravelled in respect of the Sunday newspapers, they
being printed on the Saturday,'bue sold on the Sun-
day, while the Monday papers are necessarily got
up on the Sunday, to be ready for sale on the Mon,
day. So muc't for the doctrine of the pamphlet.—
In page 17, however, we fine! a passage, which, if
doubtful in its import, may be abundantly illustrated
by reference to others of a kindred spirit. Or.
Blomfeeld says —" It is surely an vet of kindness
to the ungodiy, es undoubtedly it is to those who
might be perverted by their example, to restrain
them, if possible, by advice and exhortation; but,
if rtee4s be, by authority, from inflicting e public
injury upon. the cause of piety and virtue." In at
least twentyothee places the same ominous word
" Authority" recur:;. lit is needless to observe that
the principle stated in this quotation is precisely the
same on which the Church of Rome establiehetl the
itcpit;ition, and other similar irhtitutions. The
&Shop everil!l not leave it to a man to determine
for himself whetleer to take the air upon a Sun-
day. Ile would restraie men to their dwellings
after the hours of service, and whip them into
Church at the tolling of the bell. Here is a
precious proposal for the nineteenth century !
But it. will not do. Bishop Blomfield has fallen