Page 139 - UTOPIA

val that concludes a season, and not having yet broke their
fast, they thank God for their good success during that year
or month which is then at an end; and the next day, being
that which begins the new season, they meet early in their
temples, to pray for the happy progress of all their affairs
during that period upon which they then enter. In the festi-
val which concludes the period, before they go to the temple,
both wives and children fall on their knees before their hus-
bands or parents and confess everything in which they have
either erred or failed in their duty, and beg pardon for it.
Thus all little discontents in families are removed, that they
may offer up their devotions with a pure and serene mind;
for they hold it a great impiety to enter upon them with dis-
turbed thoughts, or with a consciousness of their bearing
hatred or anger in their hearts to any person whatsoever;
and think that they should become liable to severe punish-
ments if they presumed to offer sacrifices without cleansing
their hearts, and reconciling all their differences. In the
temples the two sexes are separated, the men go to the right
hand, and the women to the left; and the males and females
all place themselves before the head and master or mistress
of the family to which they belong, so that those who have
the government of them at home may see their deportment
in public. And they intermingle them so, that the younger
and the older may be set by one another; for if the younger
sort were all set together, they would, perhaps, trifle away
that time too much in which they ought to beget in them-
selves that religious dread of the Supreme Being which is
the greatest and almost the only incitement to virtue.

139