* * * * *
Making hay on Sunday is here condemned in some very choice lines.
--> There is much more PIETY than POETRY in the following
stanzas:--And though the employment condemned, cannot occur for a
season at least, the MORAL inculcated we trust, will have a
tendency to prevent other breaches of Holy Time.
_THE PIOUS FARMER._
SHOULD it rain all the week and the Sundays prove fine,
Though others make hay, yet I'll not work at mine;
For, I don't think, for my part, such sun-shine was given,
Us mortals to lure from the path-way to heaven.
Some to work on the Sabbath will make a pretence,
That taxes are high, and they can't pay their rents;
But my rents and my taxes I'll still hope to pay,
Though on sun-shiny Sundays I do not make hay.
For this shall my heart never call me a sinner,
While I still hope in God I shall ne'er want my dinner;
To lay up a store, I'd try every fair way,
But on Sundays, though sun shines, I will not make hay.
Some plead in excuse, that, not waiting for Monday,
Great battles are won, though they're fought on a Sunday!
At famed Waterloo too,--there's none greater than it,
But then, 'tis well known, the lost Tyrant began it.
'Tis a custom with me to spend godly that day;
But while French go to war, and the English make hay,
Though the season proves wet, and hay gets in but slowly,
Yet I would not do other than keep the day holy.
Far, far be from me, to ape those saving Elves,
Who rob God of his due, to grow richer themselves;
But be mine the pursuit, which all good men approve,
To strive to be rich in the Regions above.
If it rain all the Week, then on God I'll recline,
And not work on Sunday, although the sun shine:
In this Faith deeply rooted, no ills I forbode,
That a man's seldom poorer for serving his God.
_Columbian Centinel_, Nov. 27, 1816.
* * * * *
From the "Essex Register," Salem, May 18, 1822, we learn that there had
been trouble caused by ill-bred young men congregating at the public
corners on Sunday evening, and also that some females had behaved badly at
that time.
One of those ill bred and riotous fellows, who have become
notorious for their bad conduct of late, at the corners of our
streets, was arrested by one of our most vigilant constables, at
the corner of North and Essex streets, on Sunday evening last,
carried before a magistrate, committed to prison, and bound over
for his future good conduct. Our municipal authorities, and all
others concerned in bringing this person to punishment, deserve
the thanks of their fellow-citizens. The town of Salem, once so
distinguished for the purity of its manners and the good order of
its society, has been disgraced of late, by outrages upon the
peace and quiet of the community, committed by noisy assemblages
of young men at the public corners--and even _females_ have been
seen to exhibit a demeanor in the streets disreputable to the
town, and disgraceful in the highest degree to themselves. This
conduct should receive not only the discountenance, but the
decided reprehension of the respectable part of the community.
Every citizen is interested, and is moreover bound to manifest
his interest by his acts, in bringing every offender to prompt
and condign punishment. The stake which every one has in the good
order of the community, is great--it behoves, then, every one to
exert himself to re-establish and preserve it.
* * * * *
In 1819 in New York there were loud complaints of the violation of the
Sabbath, as we see by an account taken from the "Salem Gazette."