start the street cars and watch the effect; let the working classes
ride to church too, if they feel like it. If the weather prove
inclement and the children of the working man, as is not un-
frequently the case, illy-protected against it, the cars afford
protection to the feet and shelter to the head. Let the pale-
faced and care-worn wife, and the toil worn husband have their
ride to church, too, if they prefer it, and our own word for
it, if this were the case, the Sabbath Schools and Churches
would be well filled. The poor man's church (probably not
a "West End" fashionable one) is remote, and it is not from
native depravity or inborn wickedness he does not go to the
house of God; but, as we have before said, the church is re-
mote the weather perhaps too cold, too warm, or too wet.
His comment is, the rich do not labor, and they have their
carriages and horses to drive to church. I work and toil all
the week, and on Sunday I must foot it to church. Sunday
is a day of rest, and I will rest. Thus he reasons, and in
time falls from grace, not from disinclination to serve God or
act the part of a good and upright man, but from an indiffer-
ence upon the part of his fellow-man to consider his comfort
and convenience. He would go to church in the morning,
and he would like in the afternoon, perhaps, to take his
wife and children to the Park or Gardens, but there is no ac-
commodation tor the poor man and his family. It is very
true the "Sunday Law" does not interfere with the livery
stables, but the working man, with an income of from $12
to $15, or $18 per week, cannot afford to pay from $5 to $8 and
$10 for a carriage. If the street cars were only running he
might be able to take those puny pale faced little ones for a few
hours into a purer, more healthful atmosphere, out of those
small class rooms, and pent-up and densely populated streets
and alleys, but, alas! for him and his family, he sits moodily
brooding over "man's inhumanity to man," until, like Ish-
mael, he feels his "hand against every man and every man's
hand against him." He would take his children to a confec-
tioners for a few pennies worth of candy or cake, but the
good Christian law makers, who have plenty of money, and
can go to a confectioner's every day in the week, say there
must be no sale of coufectienery on Sunday. He would like
a cigar or a pipe of tobacco, but there again he is foiled.
His wife would like a glass of soda water; it can't be had.
His wife, or perhaps himself, from over-indulgence at the
Sunday dinner, may have an attack of the cramp cholic, or
cholera morbas, his child an attack of croup or spasms; he
knows the remedy to apply, but he must first get a physicians
prescription before the druggist can give him What he requires.
"Sunday Law," like the handwriting on the wall, stares him
in the face which ever way he turns, until he feels disposed,
and perhaps does consign the 'Sunday Law' and law-makers
to a very warm place. Let us have a modification of this