Much more significant is the secularization of Sunday. This is not merely a change, but a change conspicuously for the worse. The amount of church-going always differed in different circles; religious people went often and careless people went seldom, but almost every one went sometimes, if merely from a sense of duty and decorum. Mr. Gladstone, whose traditions were Evangelical, thought very poorly of what he called a "once-er," _i.e._ a person who attended divine service only once on a Sunday. He himself was always a "twice-er," and often a "thrice-er"; but to-day it would puzzle the social critic to discover a "twice-er," and even a "once-er" is sufficiently rare to be noticeable. But far more serious than the decay of mere attendance at church is the complete abolition of the Day of Rest. People, who have nothing to do but to amuse themselves, work at that entrancing occupation with redoubled energy on Sundays. If they are in London, they whirl off to spend the "week-end" amid the meretricious splendours of the stockbroker's suburban paradise; and, if they are entertaining friends at their country houses, they play bridge or tennis or croquet; they row, ride, cycle, and drive, spend the afternoon in a punt, and wind up the evening with "The Washington Post." All this is an enormous change since the days when the only decorous amusement for Sunday was a visit after church to the stables, or a walk in the afternoon to the home farm or the kitchen garden; and, of course, it entails a corresponding amount of labour for the servants. Maids and valets spend the "week-end" in a whirl of packing and unpacking, and the whole staff of the kitchen is continuously employed. In old days people used to reduce the meals on Sunday to the narrowest dimensions, in order to give the servants their weekly due of rest and recreation, and in a family with which I am connected the traditional bill of fare for Sunday's dinner, drawn by a cook who lived before the School Board, is still affectionately remembered-- Soup. Cold Beef. Salad. _Cold Sweats._ In brief, respectable people used to eat and drink sparingly on Sunday, caused no unnecessary work, went a good deal to church, and filled up their leisure time by visiting sick people in the cottages or teaching in the Sunday School. No doubt there was a trace of Puritan strictness about the former practice, and people too generally forgot that the First Day of the week is by Christian tradition a feast. Society has rediscovered that great truth. It observes the weekly feast by over-eating itself, and honours the day of rest by over-working its dependants. LII SUPERSTITION "Superstition and infidelity usually go together. Professed atheists have trafficked in augury, and men who do not believe in God will believe in ghosts." To-day I take up my parable concerning superstition, to which, time out of mind, the human spirit has betaken itself as soon as it parted company with faith.