[Footnote 5: I take the first example which comes to hand, for whatever
it may be worth:--“Luttrell was talking of Moore and Rogers--the
poetry of the former so licentious, that of the latter so pure; much
of its popularity owing to its being so carefully weeded of everything
approaching to indelicacy; and the contrast between the _lives_
and the _works_ of the two men--the former a pattern of conjugal
and domestic regularity, the latter of all the men he had ever known
the greatest sensualist” (Greville’s _Memoirs_, vol. iii. p. 324).]
[Footnote 6: For another side of life we may read his description of
the English Sunday:--“On Sunday one dares neither to play at cards
nor to perform music. The numerous spies who infest the streets of
this capital listen to the sounds which come from the parlours of
the houses, and if they suspect any gaming or singing they conceal
themselves and slip in at the first opportunity to seize those bad
Christians who dare to profane the Lord’s Day by amusements which
everywhere else are counted innocent. In revenge the English may go
with impunity to sanctify the holy day in the taverns and brothels
which are so plentiful in this city.” One may compare with this Mme.
de Staël’s almost Dantesque description--so at least it remains in the
memory--of the gloom of the Scotch Sabbath in the days of Burns. This
statement of the matter remained substantially accurate until almost
yesterday. So long it remained for the English spirit to re-conquer
Sunday! It must be remembered that Puritanism, while always a part of
the English spirit, was not originally its predominant note; it only
became so as an inevitable reaction against the exotic Renaissance
movement. Mary Stuart made Knox, Charles I. made Cromwell, and
both monarchs were intimately associated with the last wave of the
Renaissance.]