ABSTRACT
Rational pursuits elevated workers, helping them improve their intellectual capacity and establish comfortable and happy homes. Middle-class critics of popular leisure shared this dedication to rational recreation with many radical working-class activists. The effects of cheap rational amusements in general upon the habits and morals of the working classes are so varied, and so beneficial, that they do demand a share of their attention and consideration, as well as their hearty support. There are many other cheap rational amusements which are continually springing up for the benefit of the working classes. If cheap rational amusements are of the highest importance to the moral and religious state of society, they are still more so in their domestic relations; for what enjoyment, what pleasure could a poor hard-working man find in his home, if there were nothing to amuse, nothing to gratify him, after his hard day’s toil.
