That the celebration of May-day, as a national festival, should have been abolished, is not surprising, when we consider the formidable attacks directed against it by the spirit of fanaticism, both from the pulpit and the press; a curious specimen of which is here inserted from “Funebria Floræ, the Downfall of May-games,” a scarce tract, published in 1661 “by Thomas Hall, B. D., and pastor of King’s Norton.”[149] It is, as the author observes, “a kind of dialogue, and dialogues have ever been accounted the most lively and delightful, the most facile and fruitfullest way of teaching. Allusions and similes sink deep, and make a better impression upon the spirit; a pleasant allusion may do that which a solid argument sometimes cannot do; as, in some cases, iron may do that which gold cannot.”—From this curious tract is derived the following, with some slight omissions—
“Indictment of Flora.”
“Flora, hold up thy hand, thou art here indicted by the name of Flora, of the city of Rome, in the county of Babylon, for that thou, contrary to the peace of our sovereign lord, his crown and dignity, hast brought in a pack of practical fanatics, viz.—ignorants, atheists, papists, drunkards, swearers, swashbucklers, maid-marian’s, morrice-dancers, maskers, mummers, Maypole stealers, health-drinkers, together with a rascallion rout of fiddlers, fools, fighters, gamesters, lewd-women, light-women, contemners of magistracy, affronters of ministry, rebellious to masters, disobedient to parents, misspenders of time, and abusers of the creature, &c.
“Judge. What sayest thou, guilty or not guilty?
“Prisoner. Not guilty, my lord.
“Judge. By whom wilt thou be tried?
“Prisoner. By the pope’s holiness, my lord.
“Judge. He is thy patron and protector, and so unfit to be a judge in this case.
“Prisoner. Then I appeal to the prelates and lord bishops, my lord.
“Judge. This is but a tiffany put off, for though some of that rank did let loose the reins to such profaneness, in causing the book of sports, for the profanation of God’s holy day, to be read in churches, yet ’tis well known that the gravest and most pious of that order have abhorred such profaneness and misrule.