The Hillsborough Recorder

FOR THE HILLSBOROUGH RECORDER.

Mr. Editor: As the benevolent Founder of our religion did sometimes seem to lay aside the meekness and gentleness so characteristic of his general manners, and even with a scourge drive out those who prostituted the very courts of his "Father's house" to the purposes of traffic and gain; so it becomes his ministers sometimes to "reprove sharply," as well as to "rebuke with all long-suffering and kindness."

I have often wondered at the tameness with which ministers of the gospel submit to the levities and indecorums so frequently perpetrated in the house of God; and was gratified, yesterday, by hearing a long-merited reproof well administered to the various classes of ill-behaved persons who infest our places of worship.

To show the immorality, the sinfulness, of misbehaviour in church, whether it develope itself in the ogling glance, the suppressed whisper, the lounging posture, the contemptuous sneer, the immodest dress, or the ill-concealed desire of admiration, is the legitimate province of the preacher: while to denounce any overt act of levity, as a breach of politeness and good-breeding, is the common privilege of every citizen—may I not add, the common duty of every parent and every patriot? "Fools," says the wise man, "mock at sin." There are many who will, with unruffled serenity, submit to be catechised as sinners against God, whose choler would kindle incontinently against the man that should dare to charge them with any thing ungentee or ungenteel. With such persons, an offence against good manners is a much more serious thing than an offence against good morals. Now, Mr. Editor, you will oblige a goodly number of your patrons, as well as their wives and daughters, by instructing a portion of our church-going population that all the matters and things herein after enumerated, are considered, by those whose good opinions the perpetrators affect highly to value, impolite and ungenteel, while the last is regarded ungentlemanly and mean; viz. Staring at a lady in church, especially when the starer incurs the risk of dislocating the vertebra of his neck; winking, smiling, laughing and whispering in church; stalking heavily along the aisles in high-heeled squeaking boots or shoes, especially after service has commenced; leaving the church before the congregation is dismissed; staining the furniture and flooding the floor with tobacco juice; whittling with a knife in church, whether the action be performed on the benches or the finger nails; lounging or going to sleep in church, especially when the sleeper snores so loud as to interrupt the devotions or the dreams of his neighbors; assembling round the church door before service; and, finally, standing before the church door after service, and looking at the ladies' ankles as they are walking down the steps.