Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-12-21

Abho ohN
on Christmas morning looking at a
Santa Claus laden with gifts. His action
was a scornful shrug Ills observation
was! I don't believe in you any more
but You may leave the things
Fol Those who Qualify
Il am for Sunday concerts, certainly
Tor people who qualify. They ought to
Dc an incident, however, a merest factor
out of many in the holidays enjoyment.
after that day has been earned by its
observance as a holy day. They are
1000 In themselves, but they are not a
substitute for something better. Music
can supplement worship It can W
take its place. Play is an adjunct to
prayer 1t Is not d form of escape from
~. A symphony is not a re Deum. But
mere Is place on the same day for both.
moreover, the Sunday we seek nova
days Is a twentieth century day. II
must be thought of in a twentieth cen-
Jury way. The trouble is, this whole
matter has been dealt with in a merely
negative manner. People are told onIv
what they may not do: whereas n a.
more important to find out What they
ought TO do. People who have positive
IDEAS as to their duty will have littIe
dlf1culty in knowing what they ought
10 avoid. The Issue Is bigger than anv
question of detail in conduct. The things
TOT a long time prescribed have been in
Gloentals: To lay emphasis on those alone
IS 10 FINDER a grasp Of the true principle
involved. 1t Is time to look frankie at
this larger principle
matters had been moving RAPIDLY
enough, in the collapse, the breakdown.
vi an old ideal, even before the war
uahle on TO throw us into cataclastn
mere were readjustments coming to
seem necessary. The trouble with too
many was their inconsistency. They
prevented to keep hold on the Puritani-
cal Saboath, in theory yet, in practice.
tney found themselves emulating the
Continental Sunday. Things had already
reached the point where the Church was
not SATISFIED with the day, while the
World was contemptuous of 1t. No one,
priest or layman, was content with the
SITUATION as it was. And no one,
christian or unChristian, is today
exempt from the trammels of our anti
quated laws, all shot through as they
are with ~inslncerity.
Quickening Of Process
Suddenly came on the quickening of
process of this dissolution. Suppose, in
this country, with its hundred millions
or mixed population, there were myriads
l'eVen one yea ago whom we in this
region did not give due credit to as still
adherent to tenets and practices we
thought were obsolete. This will never
be so again. Red Cross Pageants and
Liberty Loan parades have put upon the
streets, to march and to look on, the
most reticent heretofore h~ome-bodies..
Anxiety to scan casualty lists n to
read reports of their sons dolngs over
seas has. gained admission for the Sun
day newspaper into the close-shuttered
rooms of every most sequestered ham
let. The exigencies Of only a few days
furlough home, or the admission as visi-
tors only on Sunday to the c~antonments
where boys were training, ave taken
parents there and brought their boys
home visiting, both travelling without
conjunction on that day whereon they
would not have stirred formerly.
Causes for Sunday Labor
The need for workers in munition
plants and shipyards, the enttcements Of
time and a half for over pay. the feeling
that their work was patriotic, these all
have been causes for Sunday labor IN
the part of multitudes who never had SO
wrought before.
"All this at home; but more among
the men in camp and most among those
on the battlefield. Millions of men-and
women will return who never will
keep Sunday any more as they had
once interpreted that phrase. And they
will be the leaders in all lines of con-
duct. Theirs will be the standard for
their fellows imitation. All this was
true, in marked degree, after the Civil
War;. It will be more so this time, and
for this reason; those who come home
now will come from having seen and
lived the continental Sunday.
What Was Origin
But just what was the origin of that
from which those started to drift, half
a century ago, who have now arrived?
If it was something good in itself; then
they are bad; IL 1t was bad, they may
have drifted forward-with a tide,
although against a current. AS a mat
ter of fact, not in any land of any
other continent, outside of Scotland and
some parts of England, was there ever
anything corresponding to a Boston or
a Philadelphia, a New England or q
Southern Sunday, of the early part Of
the last century. Those forget this
they forget their negligible number
who, upon a 80 partial a practice, try to
rest a universal principle. And it Is
these who are trying to prevent such
lIlIlOCcHt InlnBS do ouhuo
Origin of Traditions
1.-THE point Is that, in the eastern
portion of the United States, we have
all beer living under the domination of
n set Of traditions which came original
ly from two sources: the Puritans and
Scotch-Irish. Differing widely in many
other things, these two were at one In
the emphasis they laid upon the Sab
bath Day. They, n they alone, of
all the Christian world, called it the
Sabbath. This mare itself is slgnif-
cant as showing w t they thought the
day to be. Their view Of 1t was greatly
different from that ever taken by the
Lutheran, the Roman Catholic and the
Anglican world. But the Sabbatarian
tradition, brought hither by those two
groups. with n stern degree of per
manency, has become deeply impressed
upon the whole of this country" 1t is this
tradition that Is every year becoming
less and less regarded. Is it not re-
markable, in view Of this fact, that, In
spIte of the efforts of Sabbath Alliances
and ALI the other orders OF that ilk, the
drift of our time has been away from
that kind of observance. 1t never was
normal 1t always was hybrid
Now Sunday Needed
"The thing we need in this connection
"a a new nomenclature. We need q new
name 10 describe a new thing. But, first,
we need the thing. We need a brand new
kind'of Sunday. I have Travelled enough
both at home ad abroad, TO make COM
parisons. / have lived Ions enough &c