Cincinnati daily press. [volume] (Cincinnati [Ohio]) 1860-1862, 1860-04-05
Beecbor on the Besinnins of Vice.


No man, Isuppose certainly no young man,
ever began to gamble with the expectation of
being gambler. Nobody ever told a lie,
meaning to be liar. Nobody ever drank,
meaning to be drunkard. Nobody ever
stole meaning to, be thief Nobody ever
committed wickedness for the sake OF being
a wicked-act man. Wicked men thought
they could do wicked act, and not have the
moral quality of that act attach to them.
They thought they could begin course OF
wickedness and not go through that course.
And men never gamble that they may be-
come gamblers. Of that army, u thousand
strong, ofprofessional gamblers in New York,
do not believe one set out to be gambler.
A man goes to college to be a school-master;
he means to be professor from the day he
determines to be there. Another man says,
81 will be physician" another man says,
~ will qualify myself for civil engineer"
another man says, ~ will study fora lawyer"
another man says 81 will prepare myselffor
the ministry" another man says, 'Twill fit
myself for the navy but l do not believe a
man ever said, ~ will be a gambler" and
began to indulge in games of chance with
that idea in his mind. On the contrary, no
man ever beanie gambler that there was
not in his mind all through the earlier stages
of his progress toward confirmation in this
vice, rebellion against any such idea. No
man ever took the first steps toward be-
coming gambler, that he did not say, VI
will not be one.n
And yet, dry cards are very dry indeed.
Drinking and playing are so nearly connected
that they court each other as almost intimate
relations and inevitable friends. And so, as
playing for nothing is very insipid process,
men soon get to playing, not for money, but
for the drink, for some little token, for nuts
for the supper, or something Of the sort
They play for small amounts-just enough
to keep their hand nerved, just enough t.
keep an object before their mind, just enough
| to have the devil inoculate them with pas.
sion for gambling; and the moment they
have got the virus in them, then it is nc
longer at their option how far they shall 60
Suppose man should go to his physician,
and say to him, "Be kind enough to inoculate
me with the smallpox, so that l shall have
the smallpox littlel' Suppose a mar
should ask to be inoculated with the plague
so that he might have Just a tast of the plague
When once the disease is in your blood, it il
no longer you shall gay how little or how
| much you shall have Of it. 1t has work o
its own, which it will carry out irrespective
of your wishes.
| And that which is true of gambling i
true of tampering with Illicit pleasures--witl
this exception: that gambling works witt
slowness, while licentiousness works like
confagration. The spark rarely shoulder
long. When man has caught the infection
it is as if he were set on fire of hell. Their
may be outward guises which for time con
ceai his real condition from observation, bu
underneath these the passions rage almos
from the beginning, and he goes quickl.
through from the tentative sin into the yer.
wallowing of the mire of the iniquity. An,
do you suppose that in the beginning he pro
posed that TO himself! If it had been hinte
to him, he would have said, SIS thy servan
And vet he does il. -.....