22 THE SABBATH. 



as Glanvil calls them have also to be considered in 

 imposing disciplines which affect the public. For the 

 ages, like the individual, have their periods of mirth 

 and earnestness, of cheerfulness and gloom. From this 

 point of view a better case might be made out for the 

 early Sabbatarians than for their survivals at the pre- 

 sent day. They were more in accord with the needs 

 and spirit of their age. Sunday sports were barbarous ; 

 bull- and bear-baiting, interludes, and bowling were 

 reckoned amongst them, and the more earnest spirits 

 longed not only to promote edification but to curb ex- 

 cess. Sabbatarianism, therefore, though opposed, made 

 rapid progress. Its opponents were not always wise. 

 They did what religious parties, when in power, always 

 do exercised that power tyrannically. They invoked 

 the arm of the flesh to suppress or change conviction. 

 In 1618 James I. published a declaration, known after- 

 wards as ' The Book of Sports,' because it had reference 

 to Sunday recreations. It seems to have been, in itself, 

 a reasonable book. Puritan magistrates had interfered 

 with the innocent amusements of the people, and the 

 king wished to insure their being permitted, after divine 

 service, to those who desired them ; but not enjoined 

 upon those who did not. Coarser sports, and sports 

 tending to immorality, were prohibited. Charles I. 

 renewed the declaration of his father. Not content, 

 however, with expressing his royal pleasure not con- 

 tent with restraining the arbitrary civil magistrate the 

 king decreed that the declaration should be published 

 ' through all the parish churches,' the bishops in their 

 respective dioceses being made the vehicles of the royal 

 command. Defensible in itself, the declaration thus 

 became an instrument of oppression. The High Church 

 party, headed by Archbishop Laud, forced the reading 

 of the documents on men whose consciences recoiled 



