Bating in Church.

Auckland Star, Volume XXI, Issue 288, 6 December 1890, Page 3 (Supplement)

Bating in Church.

A nBMAKKAEiLE assertion is made that American ladies find it necessary to resort to the use of stimulants in church. In England wo have reached a period when the average sermon is a short affair, and when the hour long discourses to which our progenitors listened as a weekly penance, are speedily becoming horrors of an unregrefcfced past. _ There is, therefore, very little excuse in this country for indulgence in 'secreb pick-me-ups' as a preventive against pulpib dulness. Preachers, it must be admitted in sorrow, are occasionally tiresome ; bufc if they preach for only twenty minutes flesh ana blood ought to be able to survive the strain without resort to strychnine. I-b musft not, however, be rashly concluded that all consumption of clandestine eatables id. church or chapel is necessarily an ecclesiastical offence. There is the lozenge which the mother of a .church-going family slips into the mouth of a fretful youngster at the commencement of the sermon, and which produces a most beneficial effect. Can it be said that there is any harm in this lozenge, considering that ib preserves the congregation from possible infantile and allows tha preacher to go on hi 3 way rejoicing and uninterrupted ? Then, supposing materfamilias is not above enclosing one of the jujubes intended for hor progeny in her own handkerchief, and adroitly conveying it to her own mouth, the offence is one that is easily forgiven. There are natures which are unabie to givo attention to a speaker or a book unless'; they are ab the time enjoying some mild (pleasure of the senses. Men smoke when occupied in hard mental work j the music-kaJl visitor, enjoya the performances on the stage far better if ho is engaged in quaffing .'the latest American drink ; and ' euekin« ia cherry-stone ' ig said to be a great assistance in the solution of mathematical problerhs. The only indispensable condition about the church lozenge is that it should nob be peppermint.