The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit. MONDAY, MAY 7, 1883. Sabbatarianism.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 936, 7 May 1883, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit. MONDAY, MAY 7, 1883. Sabbatarianism.

The old battle between the Sabbatarians and the anti-Sabbatarians has been fought in Melbourne, and the victory has been decided in favor of the latter. Henceforth the people of that city are to be permitted to visit the Picture Gallery and the Museum on Sundays, and an attempt is to be made to get the Public Library included. It is strange that in these enlightened times a proposal of this kind should meet with opposition, but it is an undoubted fact that there exists a large class which looks with horror upon any idea that men and women should be allowed to enjoy themselves on the first day in the week, except in the dismallest-way. The German poet Heine somewhere narrates a fantastic dream of how he saw the fields rolled up like a bale of green baize and- laid aside, while a beadle went up a high ladder and took down the sun. This exactly typifies the ideal of the extreme Sabbatarian, whose creed may be summed up in the words of a witty Scotch judge : We can’t for certainty tell. What mirth may molest us on Monday; But at least to begin the week well, Let us all be unhappy on Sunday.

Naturally enough perhaps, the churches are the principal opponents of the movement, and whenever the question is discussed we are sure to have a large quantity of nonsense talked about a “ continental-Sunday.” Allow the thin end of the wedge to be inserted, we are told, and before long we shall have the theatres open and race meetings held, as they are in Paris. This simply means that the people are not to be allowed any liberty, because it might degenerate into license, and the absurdity of such an argument need not be pointed out. Then, again, it is said that one day in the week should be devoted to rest, and if rest is synonymous with laziness there might be something in the contention. We are also asked to sympathise with those poor attendants who are forced to be in the museums on Sunday, but it is curious that we never hear any complaints from the men themselves. Even were the hardship that the officers of these public institutions are supposed to labor under greater than the Sabbatarians would have us believe, it would be no reason for depriving the majority of enjoyment and means of instruction on Jthe only day they are at liberty to obtain it. Let those who oppose the principle pay a visit to the Christchurch or Dunedin Museums on a Sunday afternoon, and, if honest, they will be forced to admit that their views were mistaken. Rooms that have been deserted all the week are filled with crowds, who evidently take an intelligent interest in the works

of nature and art that are exhibited. For what are these collections got together, if not to educate popular taste, and enlarge popular knowledge ? —and yet there are those who cry out when a suggestion is made that they should be thrown open to the publiaat that time when alone most people have any leisure to inspect them. Luckily, however, the narrow-minded are in a minority, in the colonies at any rate, and wherever the experiment of opening the museums and libraries on Sundays has been tried it has proved a success. Notwithstand-ing-the prophecies that were uttered by the Sabbatarians, we are no nearer to that dreadful bugbear, a continental Sunday, than we were before, while it is beyond question that hundreds in the larger towns are now able to obtain useful and innocent enjoyment of which under the old system they were deprived.