"And then let any man explain to me, if he can, how it happened that Scrooge, having his key in the lock of the door, saw in the knocker, without its undergoing any intermediate process of change -- not a knocker, but Marley's face."
Sabbatarianism
"Sabbatarianism, the Christian doctrine of strict observance of Sunday
as a holy day reserved for worship, was attacked by Dickens throughout
his life. In 1836 he published the pamphlet Sunday Under Three Heads
in opposition to a Bill that would have extended already strict limitations
to Sunday recreation. Dickens felt that these Bills were an attempt by
the upper classes to control the lives of the lower classes, disguised
as religious piety.
He argued that Sunday was the only day that the poor and working classes
could enjoy simple pleasures that the upper and middle classes enjoyed
all week. Some of these Bills ensured that public inns and bake shops
were closed to the poor on Sunday. The wealthy had kitchens equipped with
ovens and stoves - they were assured that their dinners would always be
cooked for them. The poor, on the other hand, had only an open fireplace
over which they could place a cooking kettle. They depended on bake shops
for roasting their meat and poultry and because of these Bills, they would
have to make do with cold food. In A Christmas Carol Dickens
again voices these concerns through the exchange between Scrooge and the
Ghost of Christmas Present in Stave 3." (Perdue):
"Spirit," said Scrooge, after a moment's thought, "I wonder you, of all the beings in the many worlds about us, should desire to cramp these people's opportunities of innocent enjoyment."
"I!" cried the Spirit.
"You would deprive them of their means of dining every seventh day, often the only day on which they can be said to dine at all," said Scrooge. "Wouldn't you?"
"I!" cried the Spirit.
"You seek to close these places on the Seventh Day," said Scrooge. "And it comes to the same thing."
"I seek!" exclaimed the Spirit.
"Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your name, or at least in that of your family," said Scrooge.
"There are some upon this earth of yours," returned the Spirit, "who lay claim to know us, and who do their deeds of passion, pride, ill-will, hatred, envy, bigotry, and selfishness in our name, who are as strange to us and all our kith and kin, as if they had never lived. Remember that, and charge their doings on themselves, not us."
Perdue, David. "A Christmas Carol." Charles Dickens Page. 20 Oct 2008. 23 Oct 2008 <http://charlesdickenspage.com/carol.html>.
