The Day of Rest.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 839, 30 March 1888, Page 28

The Day of Rest.

We heartily commend the decision of the Postal authorities to discontinue

the practice of sorting and delivering English mails on Sunday, when, as often happens, the steamer arrives on that day. It was au unquestionable hardship upon the officials to lose two Sundays’ rest in each month, and the small benefit which the public derived cannot be pretended to have warranted this sacrifice. All encroachments on .that weekly rest-day, which is such a valuable and valued" possession of the British nation, cannot be to j jealously guarded against. We say this .on no Sabbatarian grounds, for we have never been able to understand upon wbat basis the Sabbatarian view of Sunday can possibly be justified. Whatever else Sunday may be, it certainly is not the Scriptural “ Sabbath.” The Scripture says, “ The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God,” and no fair or rational argument can make out that thejfo’s* day ot the week is the seventh. Again, the English Prayer-book provides a religious service for every day in the year, but none specially for Sunday any more than any other day in the week. As we have said, however, we look at the question not from an ecclesiastical but from a social and practical viewpoint, and we assert unhesitatingly that it would be a fatal aud suicidal blunder to weaken the existing obligation to observe the first day of each week as a holiday. Six days' work in every seven is quite as much as human beings can do with advantage. If they try to do more it is detrimental either to themselves—mentally or physically or morally, or all three—or else to the quality of the work done. No man or woman can work all the week round for auy length of time without suffering much direct injury and receiving still more damage indirectly. We were very glad to notice by a recent cable message that a resolute stand is being made in Sydney against the sale of newspapers ou Sunday, and than the Court of Appeal has decided against the legality of such sale. The Sunday newspaper is an institution which we sincerely hope will never be tolerated in these colonies. Some work has, no doubt, to be done on Sundays, but it should be rigidly minimised and should be avoided whenever this is practicable. The Postal authorities deserve credit for sparing their officers a burdensome, aud, in reality,supererogatory Sunday task, and we should be glad to see the Sunday sailings of steamers from this port discontinued so far as possible. It is the interest and the duty of every man, woman, and child in the country to cherish as a sacred and inalienable inheritance the weekly day of rest.