Gluttony… drunkenness… dancing and card-playing

Sun 26 Dec 1742: From those words, ‘Sing we merrily unto God our strength; make a cheerful noise unto the God of Jacob,’ I took occasion to show the usual way of keeping these days holy in honour of the birth of our Lord; namely, by an extraordinary degree of gluttony and drunkenness; by heathen, and worse than heathen, diversions (with their constant attendants, passion and strife, cursing, swearing, and blasphemy); and by dancing and card-playing, equally conducive to the glory of God. I then described the right way of keeping a day holy to the Lord: by extraordinary prayer, public and private; by thanksgiving; by hearing, reading, and meditating on his Word, and by talking of all his wondrous works.