His CAPTORS. 255 



Supposed Remonstrance of a Delegation of Puritans. 



a little to vitiate public morals, and impair that 

 high sense of the Sabbath's sacredness which it 

 is of vital importance to have maintained. 



If the spirits of some of those upright old 

 Puritans were now again to come among us, 

 and see the whale ships of New England un- 

 scrupulously profaning God's holy day, steam- 

 boats and locomotives running, and stage- 

 coaches carrying the Sabbath mail, would they 

 not be likely to reproach us in accommodated 

 language like this ? In vain we made ourselves 

 exiles, for conscience and the love of God, from 

 the servile kingdoms of Europe. In vain we 

 crossed the boisterous ocean, found a new world, 

 and prepared it for the happy residence of civil 

 and religious liberty. In vain we toiled; we 

 bled in vain, if you, our offspring, thus need 

 principle and purpose to maintain inviolate the 

 sanctity of the Sabbath, and to defend the ob- 

 servance of that hallowed institution, which we 

 kept so strictly, against the encroachments of 

 hurrying worldliness and greedy gain. The 

 blessed institutions we transmitted you can not 

 long survive the desecration of that holy day, 

 when, too, the penitentiaries and pauper-houses 

 of Europe are disgorging upon your fair domain. 



