RELIGION OF THE VILLAGE 123 



The farmers and well-to-do residents gener- 

 ally tend to be Churchpeople and regard their 

 presence in the Sunday congregation as 

 " setting an example " to the poorer villagers ; 

 there are certainly worse motives than this 

 for going to Church. 



It is a commonplace of contemporary criti- 

 cism that in our urban centres the ancient sanc- 

 tions of religion are rapidly tending to lose 

 their efficacy. But in the air of the country 

 the flowers of faith fade more slowly. Amid 

 the unfailing regularity of haytime and harvest, 

 and the close connection between natural 

 phenomena and one's daily livelihood, Love 

 and Nature seem less at strife. The even 

 tenour of the rustic life is secure from the perils 

 and vicissitudes of the city, and fewer appal- 

 ling catastrophes occur to shock religious 

 confidence. The Harvest Festival, with its 

 semi-pagan offerings, forms an annual reminder 

 of man's dependence on the Creator which has 

 infinitely more significance to those who till 

 the soil than to the townspeople who find their 

 fruit and vegetables on costermongers' barrows. 



and dresses from the towns are bought in the villages. 

 These are sometimes patched or ill-fitting, and the country- 

 man feels keenly the sting of ridicule on this score 

 Nil habet infelix paupertas durius in se 

 Quam quod ridicules homines facit. 



