Thursday, May 27, 2010

So much drunkenness, cursing and swearing

Thu 27 May 1742: We left Birstall, and on Friday 28 came to Newcastle upon Tyne. I read with great expectation, yesterday and today, Xenophon’s Memorable Things of Socrates. I was utterly amazed at his want of judgment. How many of these things would Plato never have mentioned! But it may be well that we see the shades too of the brightest picture in all heathen antiquity.
We came to Newcastle about six, and after a short refreshment walked into the town. I was surprised: so much drunkenness, cursing and swearing (even from the mouths of little children), do I never remember to have seen and heard before, in so small a compass of time. Surely this place is ripe for him who ‘came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance’.