The Scouring of the White Horse; Or, The Long Vacation Ramble of a London Clerk

by Thomas Hughes

For “thus saith the Lord,” to us as He said to the Jews, “these are my feasts.” They are his, my brethren, whether we like it or not; they are his, though we may try to make them ours, and so make them the devil’s. There is no neutral ground, no escape from the hard fact. Let us see now if we cannot accept them, and use them as his. Let us see whether they will be less or more to us if we do so. We shall find the trial worth making, I think, in the end.

They are his feasts: how, then, can we come to them as his guests—guests who will be pleasing to him, who will use his feasts as he would have us? For if we go to a man’s feast, the first thing we have to do is to go in such a temper and such a dress as will make us acceptable guests; and shall we do less as the guests of God?

The first thing, then, we have to consider is the temper, the state of mind in which we should go to our feasts; and here, as I said before, the Bible tells us all we want to know. The temper which he required of the Jews, he will require of us. At his feasts we have specially two things to do, to remember and to rejoice. To remember the loving-kindness which he has shown to our fathers and to us, in delivering us many a time from the hand of enemies who were stronger than we; in giving us a Church, where for many hundred years the prayers of generation after generation had gone up to him, the God of all truth; in giving us the rich increase of his earth, year after year. Remembering these things, then, we are to keep the feast in humility, for our own unworthiness; in thankfulness, for his tender care and unbounded love.

And we are also to rejoice before him, as members of a family, of a parish, of a country; thinking, therefore, of others, and not of ourselves; making up quarrels, exercising hospitality to all according to our means, seeking to do kindnesses to all who need them, to our debtors, to the oppressed and unfortunate amongst us, to the widows, the fatherless, and the stranger; and in all ways strengthening and deepening the bond which binds us to one another, and to him.

This, my brethren, is the temper and state of mind which he required of the Jews of old, and which he requires of us at these times especially. Think what our feasts would be, what our whole lives would be, if we tried to remember and to rejoice before the Lord thus.

If we come to his feasts in this temper, my brethren, it matters comparatively little what our outward acts of rejoicing may be. If our hearts are right towards the Lord of the feast and to one another, our dress and actions are surely right also, or will soon become so. Nevertheless, this is a matter of plain, practical importance, and I am not going to shrink from it. I wish to consider with you, how we keep his feasts and our feasts now; whether our method of keeping them is a true expression of that temper and spirit in which they ought to be kept, whether any thing better can be suggested.

On these points, as I said above, we have not the same help which we had before. We know very little of how the Jews rejoiced; we may be sure that we are not meant to copy the little we do know, such as the eating of a lamb roasted whole with unleavened bread. It is left for us to find out, and to do, such acts as may be done by those who are humble, and thankful, and loving in heart, towards God and towards each other.

Now there is one thing which one sees at once is wanting in our celebration of these feasts. In the times when they were established, it was the chief act of them, that which gave meaning to them, and kept alive that meaning. We have neglected and disused it, and so they have become all but meaningless to us, mere seasons in which we are to enjoy more pleasures than in ordinary times. This thing which we have forgotten is public fellow-worship, and it ought to be restored as soon as possible. At the yearly meetings of many of your benefit and other clubs, the members go all together to the church, and there worship before attending to their business and their pleasure. Why should not a parish do the same? I know nothing which would so easily and so effectually raise the tone of our village feast as the regular celebration of worship on that day, in the Church, the dedication and consecration of which, to the worship of God, was the cause of the holiday.

In one respect I believe that we are, to some extent, still keeping the feast as we ought. I believe that on that day young people who were born in the parish and have left it, make a point, if possible, of getting back to see their fathers and mothers, and friends, and to revive old associations, often bringing with them part of their wages or some present; that many of the silly quarrels and feuds which have arisen during the year are then set to rest; that the residents in the parish make some exertion to welcome their visitors hospitably, and that a general kindly feeling is common throughout the parish. I believe that this is still so, to some extent; but I fear that it is becoming less and less so. My brethren, all this is right, and true, and honest; this is the way to keep God’s feasts; you can’t go too far in this direction (except by spending more money than you can afford, which is always wrong). But the more you can deepen old family and local ties on these occasions, the more you can heal up quarrels, and forgive debts (both other debts, and money debts—remember that there is no duty more insisted on in God’s Word than this of forgiving money debts at these times), and exercise hospitality one to another without grudging, the more will you be keeping God’s feasts as he would have you keep them.