The Hearts of Men

by H. Fielding

But in the East it is not so. With them the night is the time for being out of doors, and when they go to their houses it is only to sleep. The nights are cool after the hot day, and on the full moon nights the world is full of light. The night of the full moon, when the scent of flowers is on the still air and all about is full of magic, is one of the great beauties of this world. But of it we know nothing in Europe.

Therefore in colder climates the month by the moon was abandoned, and reckoning the year by the sun took its place. And as civilisation progressed it was inconvenient to be uncertain about which was the day of rest, so it became the custom to make it every seventh day, regardless of the moon. This seems to have obtained first in Egypt and to have spread over the civilised world, the seventh day being the Sabbath. But it still remained a day of rest, unassociated, except by the Jews, with religion.

The early Christians kept no Sabbath. They kept the first day of the week as a day of rejoicing, to celebrate the rising of Christ. Indeed, the Jewish Sabbath was considered as abrogated, and the first day of the week was kept, much as it is now kept on the Continent, as a day of rest, of rejoicing, of relaxation after work.

So it was observed till the Reformation.

The Reformers, whatever they altered, did not alter this. They gave no command to return from Christian observance of the day to Jewish observance, and all over the Continent, among those of reformed churches as among those of the Catholic church, Sunday is the day of rest, of worship, and of relaxation.

It was so, too, in England and Scotland.

The change back to the Jewish Sabbath seems to have come with the Puritans and to have been introduced by them to Scotland. And this is but one example of how Puritanism was practically a rejection of Christianity and a return to the codes of Judaism, which suited those iron warriors much better than Christian ethics.

In England the feeling has been tempered, but among the Scotch, who are in so many ways like the old Jews, it took root, it flourished, and it is the Jewish Sabbath both in name and observance that we see now there.

Why was there this reversion? For what reason has the Jewish Sabbath appealed more nearly to the Scotch than the Christian Sunday? What feelings were those that caused this?

If you turn to the people who have done this and look into their characters you will note one strong and marked instinct. It is the dislike to art of all kinds, to painting and music, to dancing and acting, their strong distrust of beauty and gaiety. They are a sober people, hard and stubborn and dour, to whom art and amusement appeal, as a rule, not at all; and when they do appeal it is too strongly. They would not have organs in their churches and cards were to them the devil's picture books. They had in them then, they have now, no single fibre that responds to the lighter and brighter things of this world. Their very humour is grim. Have they, then, no idea of pleasure? Do they never enjoy themselves? It would be a mistake of the greatest to suppose that. They, too, as all other men, have their times for relaxation, for enjoyment, for mental rest and refreshment. Only that what gives pleasure to them is different from what gives pleasure to other people. They take their pleasures sadly; the chords of their hearts are tuned to other keys than that of gaiety and art. These latter they cannot understand, they awaken either no echo or far too strong an echo; and, like all men when they cannot understand a thing, they hate it. There is no medium in these matters that appeal to the emotions. You must either like or hate. You may see this always. Either you enjoy Wagner's music or you abominate it, either you appreciate old masters or they are to you daubs, either you are in tune to laughter or it seems to you the veriest folly.