Year: 1873

| The casual and lawless New Englander,


who, some hundred years ago, was accus-


toned to spend Sunday in digging in the
garden or chopping wood or picking up
stones-for which he often was made to
{ suffer prescribed pains in this world, not


to speak of his fate in the other-would


now find his favorite method of protesting g
against the conyentionalities of society in
such common use as to be no longer
pleasant or desirable in his eyes. In one
one way or another Sunday has lost q


great deal of its distinctive character as
q day of rest The compact and artificial
| life of large towns. and cities absolutely
demands, in certain parts of its compli-


gated machinery, ceaseless labor, but


even in rural districts businesses have


sprung up or are so managed as to re-
quire men to work on Sunday The man.


agemGnt of cheese factories, of smelling


furnaces, of steam and horse railroad cars


of steamboat travel, and of those news


paper offices which publish Sunday edi-


tions indicates in an alarming way the


tendancy of modern custom, both in


town and country, to disregard the wise


provision which declares that in six days


we shall do all our labor and on the sew


enth rest.


The evils of this innovation are felt


grievously by those whose time for rest


is thus consumed. A striking example


of this is furnished in a paper which we


find in the report for 1918 of the New


York Sabbath School Committee, an or


ganization always earnest in its efforts to


perpetuate the first day ofSthe week, not


only as day of rest, but as the Sabbath


The paper referred to is in the form Qf


petition, iii which four hundred and fifty


locomotive engineers recently asked Mr..


Vanderbilt to put an end to the Sunday


traffic OH the New York Central and


Hudson River Railroads Some of the


evils of working seven days in the week
are therein recounted At first but one
train was run on Mr. Vanderbilt's roads
on Sunday; now there aye thirty trains
run each way, involving not only the la
Dor of the engineers, but of many brakes
men, station masters, freight agents, tel
egraph operators and other subordnates.
Fo4r reasons are urged against this Sun
day traffic: First, that this neVer-ending
toll destroys the health; second, that
those who thus work seven days in the
week are deprived of "all chnrch, family
and social privileges that other citizens
enjoy; third, that children observe and
instinctively initiate the example of their
fathers, thereby tending to make this
special evil a general one; and fourth,
because it destroys the selfrespect of
those who are thus deprived qf the
weekly rest which is commonly given
even to cattle. The petitioners further
declare that they can do as much work
in six days as they now do continuously
in seven-which is undoubtedly true
and therefore ask for some relief,


This question, looked at solely as a
matter of dollars and cents, is very i'm
in,
be decided in favor of the maintenance
of one day in seven as day of rest 1t
is true that the conditions of modern So
ciety are such as to require service eff
same kinds to be rendered on Sunday,
but there is no reason why any working
man-whether he writes for the public |
journals or drives pair of horses in front |
of orse-car-should be deprived of all |
time fer rest If there iG anything to |
W hch q man has a right it is to his time
and those who hire out their services to |
others ought to insist that one-seventh |
of that time is their own, to be used as
they see fit Indifference to or submiss-
ion on this point will lead to the degra-
dation and helplessness of labor, as com
pared with capital, more than any other
one thing, and so will unnecessarily and |
conlplioate q relation which |
is already sufficiently delicate and sensi-
tive. Such businesses as the public con-
venience requires to be done on Sunday |
are in their nature special, and they |
should be carried on by special workmen.
The profits derived from them are extra
ordinary, and it is only fair that the cost
of maintaining them should also be over
and above the ordinary expenses, 9th
erwise the workmen will be less efficient, |
will wear out sooner, and labor itself will |
become weaker and less respectable as
population and capital increase.