The Sun.
London, England, 1838-12-20 00:00:00

standing we have such an opulent Church Esta-
blishment, is a " godless Government." It is not
merely godless, it is actually a persecutor of the
Saints, and we cannot conceive how those who en-
tertain Sir A. AGNEW'S opinions can stop short of
revolting against a Government which constrains men
to be guilty of this " breach of the fourth command-
ment." Nor can we conceive how Sir ANDREW and
his friends, if they be sincere and consistent, can re-
frain from disavowing CHRIST, for he worked on the
Sabbath, and refrain from rebelling against Nature, for
she compels hundreds and thousands of men and
women in this empire to violate the " Divine law" as
interpreted by Sir ANDREW and his friends. They
ought to resist every kind of secular occupation, and
memorialise the Treasury to stop all the mail-
coaches, all railway trains, and the sailing of all
ships, on the Sabbath. They ought also to procure
a law, that when a ship is at sea, her sails shall be
furled on Saturday night, and the steam blown out ;
and, perhaps, while they are about it, they will ask for
a legislative enactment to ensure a calm every Sunday,
so that no lives may be lost by not " breaking the
fourth commandment." Nay, it would be better still,
for all but the Priests, for whose especial behoof the
Swiday is made sacred from secular occupation, if Sir
ANDREW could only procure an Act of Parlia-
ment to stop the course of Nature, between twelve
o'clock on Saturday and Monday nights, though how
they would then count the time, we pretend not to
explain—or at least to make all men and women sleep
right through the interval. If they can only accom-
plish this, the Sunday will be generally observed as
they think it ought to be ; and they will deserve the
name of despicable canting hypocrites, if they strive
for any less complete cessation of labour.

The Morning Post is, we see, prepared to carry
out the doctrine of the Saints to a considerable extent,
and in an article which we extract, has the following
recommendation :

" Why do not the religious people of the metropolis exert
themselves, in conjunction with the religious portion of the
inhabitants of our provincial towns, to secure for the Sabbath
of the latter the same immunity from Post-office desecration
and disturbance which London happily enjoys? In such exer-
tions we might recognise the character of wisdom, benevo-
lence, and genuine piety."

No metropolitan Saint will, after this, ever write a
letter which will reach his correspondent on Sunday,
for otherwise, he will be just as instrumental in dese-
crating the Sunday, as the person who receives the
letter. All the Sir ANDREW AGNEWS of the empire
will act, we trust, on this suggestion, and memorialise
the Treasury to shut up all the provincial Post-offices
on Sunday. If no letters are to be delivered in any
part of the country on that day, it will be of no use
writing on the corresponding days, and the Saints'
schemes, if they are consistent, will suppress, not one
day's inter-communication in the week, but in some
cases two, and others three. Perchance that may
touch the pockets of some people, and when avarice
comes into conflict with Saintship, the latter will go to
the wall.

But the poor Post, like others who halt between two
opinions, has not pleased the Saints by its recommenda-
Con, for it unfortunately added—

" While in those which, whatever may be their design, are
effectual ci.iefly to prevent the writiag of letters on the Fridays
and Saturdays and the receipt of letters on the Mondays and
Tuesdays throughout the greater part of England, we confess
our inability to discover anything but an arbitrary and silly
disposition to impede the useful and genial intercourse of corn-
merce, literature, and affection."

Such an allusion roused the watchful piety of the
Standard, to whose love of truth and morality, in
turn, the Post bears the following testimony, having
also proved that it bore false witness against the Post
on the Sabbath question ; and both are examples of
the conduct of the Saints :

" Our readers may now judge what is the peculiarity which
attends the veracity and the caution of the Standard. The
plain matter of fact is this—our Contemporary said what was
very ridiculous about Russian influence and the King of
Holland's son. We laughed at our Contemporary, as we had
a right to do—whereupon be becomes furiously angry, and
asserts the things which are not !"

As the Saints care nothing for truth, so they are
regardless of Christianity. PAUL, the great Apostle
of the Gentiles, in the Epistle to the Collossians,
chap. ii., verse 16, expressly says " Let no man,
therefore, judge you in meat or in drink, or
in respect of a holiday, or of the new moon,
or of the Sabbath day, which are a shadow
of things to come, but the body is of
CHRIST"—who, as is well known, worked on the
Sabbath. He did not sit still expounding the law,
nor listening to it, but went about doing good ; so
that, for violating the Mosaic Sabbath, which our
Pharisees insist on making binding on us, the Jews,
according to John, c. v., ♦erse 18, " sought the more to
put him to death." If Sir ANDREW had lived in
those days he would have been one of the foremost at
the work of crucifixion, and the editor of the Standard
would probably have been one of his right hand men.
All our modern'Saints must have taken the same side ;
for those who now bawl the loudest for the observance
of Sunday in the name of Christ, prefer Moses
and his sanguinary laws to the author of Christianity,

A letter from Mr. CHILDS, of Bungay, appears in
another part of our paper, to which we beg the attention
of our readers. Men who, like JOHN JAMES, suffer
for conscience sake, must not be treated with neglect,
and we trust that Mr. CHILDS' example, in subscrib-
ing to defray the expenses incurred in that case, will be
followed by others.

We agree with our Correspondent, that the perse-
cuting spirit manifested by EBENEZER MORRIS, and
others of his kidney, towards Dissenters, ought to be
a warning to the latter not to become office-bearers in
a Church to the worship of which they cannot con-
scientiously conform, and which has the power of
punishing their nonconformity. A Dissenter cannot
be compelled to undertake the office of Churchwarden,
for, according to the celebrated decision of Lord Chief
Justice MANSFIELD, in the case of EVANS, con-
firmed by the House of Lords, " Dissent is established
by law," and no Dissenter can be punished for re-
fusing to serve any office the duties of which involve
compliance with the rites and ceremonies of the Church.
Why, then, should a Dissenter .voluntarily undertake
an office which cannot fail to be disagreeable,
which may be made the instrument of his grievous
oppression by an intolerent priesthood, and from which
we doubt whether any benefit can ever be derived to
the Dissenting cause ? It appears to us that, in all
cases in which a Non-conformist is elected Church.
warden, it would he more advantageous to the Dissen-
ters, and more prejudicial to the Church—particularly
in the matter of Church-rates--if a liberal Churchman,
one on whom reliance can be placed in conflicts with
the Estoablishment, were placed in that office. It is very
desirable, too, that at all public meetings, where
the two
parties are arrayed against each other, such
men as we have described should take the leading part
against the unjust claims of the State-endowed Church.
They cannot be suspected of the sinister motives
hich are so often, and so unjustly imputed to the
Dissenters by the defenders of priestcraft, while their
example and their influence will draw over others to
their side.

Thereof the matter which bears ex-
clusively uponis th
frequenters of the Church, and which
anow
the
rvie
it becomes them well to consider. One of the heinous
offences for which the Churchwarden of Llanon was
sent to prison by his parish minister, the worthy EBE.•
NEZER MORRIS, was his not having provided the
bread and wine for the communion service, although be
had done all in his power to procure the necepAry