THISTLEDOWN.

Te Aroha News, Volume XI, Issue 1719, 2 March 1895, Page 2

THISTLEDOWN.

“ A man may jest and tell the truth.’L, .—Hoeace.

I should be loath to have my attitude on Sunday observance misunderstood, as I gather it has been, more particularly in these days when religion sits so loose on most of us. I fully believe, first in th) Physical necessity of one day’s rest in seven> secondly in the divine appointment of one such day from the Creation, and thirdly in the special appropriation of such day to special acts of worship What I deny is fhe transference of Jewish Sabbatarian rules to the Christian Sunday as a matter of universal obligation. The mode of observing Sunday is, however, a matter of individual conscience, and while fully recognising that it is better to err on the side of over strictness than of over laxity, I take my stand on Pauline principles and willingly concede to others the same liberty of conscience I demand for myself. I remember a controversy in the correspondence columns of Public Opinion in, I think, 1873, on the question of how children should spend Sunday. One writer gested Noah’s Arks and those scripture quartet cards, which were such a c( iimon feature in my young days, another wa3.quite hysterical in his indignation at mak-A ing the Bible a medium of play. I fancy if he lived in New Zealand he would welcome anything which would dispel the dense fog of ignorance of the Scriptures in which parents are content to leave their children. * . « 4? *

It can hardly be denied that churchgoing has lost its hold on the mass of the male population, and even those who attend two services during the day have a lot of spare time on their hands, and I fail to see a better way of spending this than in the study of the Book of Nature, or of those works of literature, art, or music, which are inspired only in an inferior degree to the Bible. I cannot help feeling, too, that the zelotic observance of the Sabbath instead of concentrating the worship of God on Sunday tends to confine it to Sunday, to exclude Him altogether from the weekday world, to make people ignore the fact that His truest worship lies in true work towards making the world physically, mentally, or morally better. I am full convinced that this inkimed Christianity has a large share in the alienation of men from church attendance; this and its corollary, which makes heaven the apotheosis of idleness and mocks the earnest worker with an eternity of rest as his reward Why, this would be a torture exceeding anything ever conceived of Hell. Mrs Beecher Stowe had a truer conception of Heaven; she was wont to flash up when she heard it remarked that a good man’s work was done when he was dead. * Do you think Theodore P rker has no work to do for God now ?* It must have been with an unutterable sense of weary disgust that Pascal replied to his friends’ entreaties to take a rest, * Have I not an eternity to rest in ?’

I have lately come across some interesting statistics of the religious census of Australasia which, though rather out of date, are new to me, and I fancy to the majority of my readers. Between 1881 and 1891 the population of Australasia excluding Tasmania, increased by 39 13 per cent. The only churches whose increase equalled this were the Methodist, 51*21, and the Baptist, 42*88. Salvationists, a new sect, in 1891, claimed 40,000. Queensland with 84* 48, and W r estern Australia 67*57 had the largest growth of population. Presbyterianism seems at a d.seount in South Austral? J* as its adherents increased only by I*6l per cent.

Mr Gladstone recently created a sensation at Home by denouncing Local Option as a fraud and backing up the Bishop of Chester’s advocacy of the Gothenburg system. Few have more than a vague idea, what this means. The average consumption of brandy per head in Sweden in 1830 was some 94 pints per annum; legislation made its manufacture a State monopoly and restricted the retail trade, with the result that in 1856 there were only 625 retail licenses in all the country districts of Sweden, whereas at the earlier date pretty well every house manufactured or sold , brandy. Not satisfied with this the Rigs- * vaad incorporated the Gothenburg Liquor Sales Company, which was given a monopoly of the manufacture and sale of ardent spirits in that town, the second largest in Sweden, existing patents excepted. Their nominees were obliged to sell brandy pure as received from the company, without any profit, to keep tea, coffee, malt and carbonic acid liquors (beer is thus classed with lemonade), and cooked food, out of which their profits were to come. They were forbidden to sell to persons under 18 or intoxicated, or on credit, and the profits of the company were to go to educational or charitable purposes. It is claimed as a great success. In 1880, the last date I have-* there were only 23 old-fashioned pubs in Gothenburg.

* Dirt is only matter in the wrong place,” is an aphorism generally credited to Lord Palmerston, and practical science of lateyears has strikingly confirmed it. The whole cost of the manufacture of gas has. of recent years been defrayed out of the-by-products, our most beautiful colours being almost entirely derived therefrom. In Paris all carcases are thrown into a pit -A round v hie i are holes just big enough to_ let the rats get half-way in. Every months the beautifully polished skeleton# are removed, and the rats grabbed by the tails. Their fur is valuable, „ their skins make the thumbs of kid gloves, their, thighbones tooth-picks, and their sinews the gelatine wrappers for crackers and bonbons. The skeletons are converted into phosphoros and in the end match-heads. It has been computed that the invention of lucifer matches has saved in the United alone, every man, woman and child, 78 hours, or 10 days work, and the nation, as a whole, .£62,000,000 in each year. * * # . .> *

The use of rags is an excellent test of acountry’s civilisation. Paper, made from linen rags mostly, is used in England at the rate of 121bs per head per annum, in th£ fetates 10, Germany 9, France 8, Italy 4. Woollen rags, after being reconverted three, or four times into shoddy, are mixed with' hoofs, horn shavings and blood, and melted down with wood ashes and scrap iron toi make Prussian blue. The man who geJS ov f r on port wine, pulls himself together next morning with a seidlitz powder, made from the dregs of last night’s bottle, a veritable hair of the dog that bit him. From street offal and gas tar, ladies get not only smelling salts for the nerves, but flavouring f or their blanc mange, busel oil, rotten cheese, and rancid butter, 1 give most delicate flavouring and scents. Fortunes have been made in Paris out of oiange peel from the theatres, and dirty cilists from lavpx.