The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1859-09-02
The Piety and Patriotism Of
Lotteries.

very patriotic affairs when they were ap-
piled to objects of benevolence and
charity, such as hospitals and asylums, or
to educational institutions, such as col
leges and academies, or to public works,
such as roads, bridges, and the improve
ment of the navigation of rivers. About
the earliest account we have of a lottery
is one at Amsterdam in l549, where some
of our pious Dutch ancestors employed it
for the purpose of raising money to build
the tower of church. In the early his
tory of Rhode Island we find it was en-
ployed for the building of churches and
other sacred uses. In 1882 and 1888 lot
teries were established in the Old World
by Louis de Gonzaga for purpose almost
equally good-the providing of dowries
for the poor girls of his estates. A lottery
could not be established for a more ap-
propriate object, for there is no greater
lottery in life than marriage. DR.. John
son. shrcwd observer of the world, re-
marked that marriages could not be worse
assorted than they are if they were drawn
by lot. The truth is, that they are regu-
lated. by chances and circumstances as
variable and uncertain as the drawing of
the blanks and prizes in a lottery.
In 1912 q lottery was granted by the
English Parliament in aid of the Virgin
ian Company, which founded the first
Anglo-Saxon colony in the New World
that which may be regarded as the nucleus
of the United States. The cause of
American independence was helped along
by the same kind of aid, and the practice
of lotteries prevailed in every State till
comparatively recent period, when, part
ly owing to the new lights of evangelical
religion pretending to be better than our
honest forefathers, and the fact of those
who directed lotteries finding more
profitable business in other games of
chance, such as stocks and banks and
railroads, lotteries have been abolished
il. every State except three. Lotteries
were too honest for the rogues who wanted
to make rapid fortunes by the swindling
operations carried on in stocks. So re-
Gently were lotteries legal and moral in
this State, that Horace Greedy began life
as an editor of lottery paper, called the
Constitutionalist. BY what process of
spiritual alchemy does that which was
moral and pious few years ago become
now immoral AID impious?
The general abandonment of the br,si-
ness has thrown it completely into the
hands of few persons. who are making
enormous fortunes by the monopoly which
the laws give them in those States which
have lcgalized it: for: so long as there i.
a lottery legally open in any State, the
tickets will he bought and sold in all the
other States, in despite of every law to
the contrary. In this city alone the
agents of these lotteries realize annually
million of dollars. The present outcry
against lotteries is the most absurd and
hypocritical ever uttered by the Phari
secs. When the lotteries were wanted tc
pay off State debts or to build churches
! they were excellent things: but wher
men try to make money with them fol
their own benefit, then their character
becomes changed. During the last TWEEN
ty-five years, in those States where lot
tcries have been abolished there ha
been a greater amount of rascality anC
roguery than was ever witnessed before
In lotteries properly regulated by thu
State there is more fair play for the maj
who invests his money in them than TO
those who buy railroad stocks, or deposi
their money in rotten banks. There i
no more immortality in fair lottery thai
there is in life, fire and marine insurance
companies, which are all founded on tn,
doctrine of chances, like lotteries. Fo
instance, i'm the case of life insurance,
man should die in the first year afte
he has obtained a policy, the compan.
loses, and his surviving relatives gain b,
it, But should the insured live very lon,
he pays three times over what the com
pany are bound to pay at his DEATH
Thus he loses, and the company wins
If house that has been insured is burn
ed, or ship insured goes down, the in
sured is fortunate and the insurance com
panics are unlucly but if a man has in
sured his house, year after year, all hi
life, or another man his ships, voyage al
ter voyage and neither suffer loss by fir
nor water, then these men have been un
; fortunate in paying so much money to in
surance companies for which they hav
received no equivalent. In this case tn
, companies have been fortunate, and tn
chances have come out in their favor
Now we ask who lifts his voice agains
the immortality of insurance companies
Are not members of the church-the yer,
pillars of piety-among the president
and directors? Life itself is u lottery
One man succeeds and another fails il
business, owing frequently to good or ba,
3 fortune more than to any superior indus
try or ability of the one above the other
Often mans whole destiny is aficcte,
by going to his home OF to his office on
certain day through one street rathe
than another. So much are men til,
creatures of circumstances which the,
cannot control. The cry against lotteries
therefore, is neither sustained by piet,
nor common sense-neither by philoso
ply, morality nor religion. Ii is chief,
raised by men who want to divert tn
money from these channels and to brin,
; grists to their own mills.
RESy- The London Atheneum speaks O