Transcribed from the [1853?] Arthur Hall, Virtue, & Co. edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org using scans from the British Library. [Picture: Public domain cover] THE SABBATH, THE CRYSTAL PALACE, AND THE PEOPLE. * * * * * “GO YE, AND LEARN WHAT THAT MEANETH, I WILL HAVE MERCY AND NOT SACRIFICE.” * * * * * BY JAMES BALDWIN BROWN, A.B., MINISTER OF CLAYLANDS CHAPEL, LONDON. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * LONDON: PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY ARTHUR HALL, VIRTUE, & CO., PATERNOSTER ROW. MDCCCLIII. _Price Sixpence_. * * * * * THE SABBATH, THE CRYSTAL PALACE, AND THE PEOPLE. THE relation between the Church of Christ and human society has long been ill-defined and unsettled. The Church has to present to society, in its struggles and sufferings, an aspect in which the kindliness of human sympathy and interest is blent with the severity of truth; and this is always difficult. Between worldly compliances on the one hand, and bigoted formalities on the other, it is hard to strike the mean. Between the two extremes the Church is prone to alternate. This question,—“The opening of the Crystal Palace during a portion of the Lord’s Day,” demands the statement of the feeling and thought of the Church upon this subject at the present time. The spirit of a party is quite as significant as its acts and expressions, for that spirit is a living fountain, out of which other acts and feelings will flow forth; and as the utterance of the mind of the Church upon this great question will probably determine the character of its relation to, and influence on society for some years to come, we should watch most carefully, not over our words and deeds only, but over the spirit in which we address ourselves to this discussion. We must be prepared either to reform or re-affirm our first principles, as to the relation between the Church and the human world—for this is, emphatically, a question of first principles; it has been dealt with too much in detail; we must look to the foundations if we would settle it aright. Nor is it a matter of merely casual and momentary importance to which party we attach ourselves, and what cry we raise. The party will do more work on us personally than we shall do for the party. It is possible (it has been so before, it may be so again) that we may be taking for ourselves and for the Church many backward steps, by joining ourselves unthinkingly to