, any more depraved than any of
your Northern cities. The only difference is, here everything is done
open and above board; what sin there is, is before your eyes, and you
don't feel when you tread our streets, that you are walking over hidden
hells, and sunken purgatories, which is, I think, more than you can say
in behalf of your Northern cities. Now, isn't it?"

"The fact of all the dissipation and Sabbath-breaking here being openly
carried on, is the very worst argument, Mr. Clinton, you could bring
forward. It proves how much worse the tendency, when it can so harden
the heart of society as to regard it without a shudder, and to look upon
such things as right. Sunday absolutely loses its identity here, in the
manner in which it is kept; and a little more law, more rigidly
enforced, would, I am certain, elevate the standard of society into a
purer and more ennobling atmosphere. If men still persisted in sin, the
fear of punishment would force them to keep out of sight of those who
would be Christians, which, for some, must be really a hard matter now.
Yesterday, in coming from church, I met a full company of soldiers, in
complete uniform, out for a drill. I passed many stores thronged with
customers, even as on a week-day, and received an invitation to attend a
horse-race on the Metarie Course; all of which, you will admit, was in
jarring discordance with the sermon upon which I was trying to reflect,
and the Prayer-Book in my hand."

Clinton burst into a loud laugh.

"The time will come when you'll know better than to reflect upon sermons
here, and will put your Prayer-Book in your pocket, instead of carrying
it in your hand. People go to church in this place to see and be seen;
to learn the fashions and see new faces--not to remember sermons or read
prayers. I heard a minister declare, the other day, that he could preach
a sermon over every six weeks, and not one in twenty of his hearers
would remember to have heard it before. I've had serious thoughts of
turning minister myself; donning a gray wig and white cravat, and
'spounding the Bible, as the blacks say, to my deluded hearers. 'Pon
honor, it's the most lucrative situation a poor devil can have.
Preaching a short sermon, morning and night, to an inattentive but
fashionable congregation, who are sure to make a minister popular among
'em, if he don't touch their peculiar sins too closely, give him an
immense salary, let him off on full pay for four months in