[7] Punch is unjust to George Hadfield, member for Sheffield from 1852 to 1874, a prominent Congregationalist and advanced Liberal who took an active part in forming the Anti-Corn Law League and rendered valuable assistance in the House in promoting legal reform.
RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY
Punch's efforts on behalf of Sunday recreation, already alluded to, exposed him to a great deal of hostile criticism. In 1854 the English Journal of Education declared that Punch was not suitable reading for Sunday: it was "worse than useless literature." But Punch gave as good as he got. When the Record attacked the Queen for having a band at Windsor on Sunday, and alluded to Nero fiddling while Rome burned, Punch unblushingly called the editor "a brimstone-faced Mawworm."[8] The question of the opening of the British Museum and National Gallery on Sunday came up again in 1855 on the motion of Sir Joshua Walmsley, but was defeated by 235 to 48 votes, to Punch's great disgust. He advises constituencies to watch closely the conduct of the triumphant Sabbatarians. "If one of the 235 saints who opposed the resolution of Sir Joshua Walmsley has his boots cleaned on Sunday, or takes a drive, or eats a warm dinner, unless by medical order, he is a humbug and a hypocrite, and unworthy of the suffrages of free and independent electors." A year later the anti-Sabbatarians resumed their attack, and in his "Essence of Parliament," distilled by Shirley Brooks, Punch summarizes the debate:—
The debate to-night was brief, and chiefly left to men of small calibre. The principal exceptions were Lord Stanley, who manfully stood out as an Anti-Sabbatarian; Mr. Napier, who saw "poison" in seeing pictures on Sunday; Mr. Heywood, who denied the truth of the Jewish history of the Creation, but described the Sabbath as a divine ordinance to be kept as a day of rejoicing; and Lord Palmerston, who thought there would be no harm in opening these exhibitions, but that there would be much if the House acted in defiance of the opinions which had been expressed against doing so. This eminently House-of-Commons logic and morality was too suited to the audience not to be successful. On division, 376—add four who were "shut out" and say 380—gentlemen in comfortable circumstances, most of them with carriages and country houses, decided, against 48 opponents, that the only holiday Mammon has left to the poor man shall not be better spent than in a squalid house, a dirty drinking-yard, or a debauching public-house.
This Parliamentary opportunism, to which Palmerston adhered in the matter of Sunday bands in the parks, was one of the qualities which Punch liked least in "the judicious bottle-holder," as he loved to call Palmerston. In the controversy which raged round this question throughout the year Punch gladly recognized the enlightened zeal of Sir Benjamin Hall, the Member for Marylebone and Commissioner of Works. For a while the bands played in the parks on Sundays, and Punch celebrated the concession, which had been sanctioned by Palmerston, in an "Ode to Sir Benjamin Hall."
But the boon was short-lived. "The Sunday Band, Hall's grant," was "abolished by the influence of Cant," and on May 19 Palmerston, while retaining his personal opinion as to the propriety of having Sunday music in the parks, stated that such "representations" had been made to him that he had felt it his duty to give way. The Sabbatarians were jubilant, as may be gathered from Punch's reference to the Record in his issue of August 16:—
We doubt very much whether we can any longer conscientiously call the Record our serious contemporary. That doubt is suggested by the following passage occurring in one of its leading articles:—
"We are taught to expect the blessing of God on the conduct of our affairs when we act in accordance with the divine will; and it almost seems as if Lord Palmerston acquired new strength from the moment when he agreed to put down the Sunday bands. The attempt to make Government responsible for the loss of Kars was defeated by a great majority, and the subsequent attempt to censure Lord Clarendon on account of the American dispute was defeated by a majority still more overwhelming."
We can conceive a person devoid of all veracity and conscience, writing in a great hurry to a set of imbecile fanatics, perpetrating such stuff and nonsense as the above, but we cannot well conceive any other person guilty thereof.