It was not without unusual pleasure, and a sensation of relief, that after a few minutes more of inusing, not at all satisfactory, he beheld the return of Evelyn from his visit." Vol. 2. p TREMAINE, OR, THE MAN OF REFINEMENT. CHAPTER I. A DISSERTATION ON PRAYER AND GOING TO CHURCH. How he solicits Heaven himself best knows, SHAKSPEARE. UPON forms and ceremonies, no man was so strong as Tremaine; and the prejudice he felt against what he called prejudice was so great, that at the hazard of hurting, and even displeasing, not only his friend, but his friend's daughter, he reverted to what had fallen from Evelyn in respect to the sabbatical institution. 66 Granting you a sabbath," said he, "I own you have defended this matter well; and I believe we must bring in a bill to transpose the Opera from Saturday to Friday." "From your principle just elicited," answered Evelyn, "it would be rather more desirable, I think, to have a bill for the annihilation of Sunday itself; and I recollect your favourite philosopher, Voltaire, in his Country Priest's Catechism, while he condescends to allow the people to say a few prayers on this day, computes that one hundred and fifty millions of livres a year would be saved to the state, by only depriving it of its character of a day of rest*. "You do him injustice," said Tremaine : "he only would make the labourers work as usual, when church is * Diction. Philosoph. VOL. II B over, instead of going to the ale-house, to make themselves beasts." "He has no right to assume they will do so," answered Evelyn: "in fact, only a small part actually do so, and these few would be still less in number if their masters went to church.' "You would then make us go to church, merely that our servants may not get drunk?" observed Tremaine. "How much do you assume in that merely?" replied Evelyn. "No! I would have you go, that you may not get drunk yourselves; drunk with irreligion, drunk with philosophy, which always begins by a lazy habit of Leglecting the forms of our worship." "Forms again!" cried Tremaine. "My dear friend," said Evelyn, with emphasis as well as kindness, "this is a most important, yet surely a very clear subject. I only hope, and I do it earnestly, that our difference is really about forms, and that you have not quitted the substance." The good Doctor here grasped his hand with friendly fervour, and surveyed him with a penetrating eye. "I cannot possibly have an objection to people saying their prayers," answered Tremaine. "That's something," said his friend; "but why not then pray with them?-why not join in kindling one another's devotion?" "You have hit a great part of my objection,” replied the speculatist. "It is with that kindling I quarrel; for devotion, to be pure, ought to be spontaneous: if it depends upon others to be kindled, it is factitious. Hence I never could bear any stated hour of prayer, any ceremonial, anything that I call mechanical, in a matter which must always be beyond the reach of mechanism. Nor can I be persuaded that he who, upon surveying the glory of the heavens, or feeling his heart swell with any great happiness, falls down in the fields or in his chamber, to pour out his mind in thanksgiving and adoration, is not more really devout than he who prays because he is just awake, or just going to sleep, or because the clock strikes ten. The real fervour of religion must surely be lighted up by feelings far removed from all cold dependencies upon time, or even place. Some places, indeed, may be found that inspire us, sooner than others, with ideas of the more immediate presence of the Deity: Presentiorem conspicimus Deum "Beautiful!" exclaimed Evelyn, letting his love of poetry for a moment suspend his argument; "thou almost persuadest me to turn savage, and fly the tame scene 'where bell hath knolled to church.'" "I fear, however," continued Tremaine, "this feeling would not avail the generality, or give place any great advantage over time in this respect; for not only must we feel a portion of the Divine afflatus with which he who wrote these charming lines was inspired when he conceived them, but even with a warm imagination, the tame scene, as you justly call it (I mean our places of worship), seldom or never can influence. A church, for example, possesses in this matter no advantage whatever over a private room." "Where is your enthusiasm for times past, your love of ancient lore?" said Evelyn. "You have surely forgotten the most venerable, the most soul-inspiring of all things." "I do not comprehend," cried Tremaine. 66 My father means a Gothic cathedral," observed Georgina. "I do," said Evelyn; "and defy any man who has fervour of any kind in his soul, to tread the pavement of * The classical reader (if I have one) will recollect the most beautiful of all modern odes, by Gray, to the Religio Loci of the Grande Chartreuse, whence this fragment is taken. Tremaine thus freely translated it afterwards, for Georgina. "We seem to behold the Deity more immediately present amid pathless rocks and savage fells, amid broken crags, in sounding waterfalls, and the darkness of the forest, than in a temple resplendent with cedar and gold, the work of Phidias." |