The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-01-28

Are they not doing boldly, ~ the face of the
world, what others of less note are doing in con-
cealmentY when we have "utt concerts,n at
which hundreds of people are gathered together
under the thin disguise of some trfilng per-
iofmance, for the purpose of participating in
lottery, are we not gambling Just as really as n
we sat down at cards and played for large heaDs
OF currency To such questions there can
be but one honest answer, and that ia,
that the lottery, the gift enterprise, the
hoTse-race, the ratfie, are ali forms OF gam
bling, all games of chance, in which money or
property Is risked. So numerous are the gift
enterprises becoming, and so do they threaten
TO damage public morals, that even the secular
press, slow as it usually is 10 attack fashionable
vice, is beginning to resist.
But perhaps we had better select as an illus
tration the most recent and notable instance of
tins form OF gam mbhng-we refer, of course, to
the great Crosby Opera House Lottery. For
lottery IL was, nOrhing more nor less. The
tickets and prizes we're drawn in the usual way
and the drawing was as much game OF chance
as II cards or dice had been used. The case of
this famous lottery seems to be this:-A certain
MIR. Crosby, heretofore unknown, but famous
now for the TEST of the century, had run him
self hopelessly in debt in building an opera
house IN the city of Chicago. Some of his in
eenious friends suggested the formation of an
art association, which shall add some three
hundred pictures 10 the luckless opera house, and
establish alottery, ofwhich the house and PIC
lures shall be the prizes. The scheme was that
theI should be 100000 tickets at So apiece, and
3O2 prizes. The Opera House they valued at
$500, coo, and the pictures we're supposed TO be
worth 100000, making 500, 600, nOminally,
TO be contested for by 100000 ticket-holders,
bringing the lottery men, If all sold, l,050, 900.
But rs, 600 tickets remained unsold.
According to members of the press with
whom have talked the account stands about
thus, namely:-The Opera House is worth about
S3OO,OO0, instead OF twice tnat; the pictures,
100000; the expense of advertising, etc, amounts
TO about $500, 900, making the outlay by the pro-
jector of the lottery, $500, 900. The amount Of
money received, If the tickets had all been sold,
WOul0 have W WOnld
lett in the purse of Mr.. Crosby S450,000. Bat
$4,000 of the tickets renamed unsold, and there
lore were so many chances for Mr.. Crosby to
draw from his own lottery. The whole receipts
from the lottery therefore, instead of 81, 900
would be only $925,000, from which, deducting
the six hundred thousand Tor Opera House,
pictures, and expenses of advertising, we have
clear profit from the affair, for the protector, of
S325,0O0 But still further, each ticket-holder
had only one chance in every 666 TO draw
prize, while Mr.. Crosby, with $4,000 tickets LETT
on his hands, had about one chance IN every
nine, and actually did draw about O,OO0 worth
OF the prizes. Philadelphia bought over 27,0G0
tickets, eypendng tor them well on to $4,000
She drew l6 prizes, losing at the estimated
value of the pictures drawn, about 100000, a
sum half sufficient for the endowment OF re-
spectacle college, quite enough to erect so neat
residences Tor the poor; enough to furnish for
the destitute 1886 tons of coal; or to build at
least ten neat missionary chalels and Sunday
Schools.
We need hardly call attention 10 the fOly of
SUCH uueQual gamluy' Auu IL IL dltO1eIueI
astounding that any sane person would be will
ing TO play at such game, game IN Whlca
only one ticket in every six hundred and sixty
SIX could win in which there could only be
three hundred winners in population of
100000 tlcket-holders; a population ABOUT equal
m that of Boston or Chicago. Why the chance
was L. Horer in Mr.. Crosby's lottery than 1t would
he at Mo yrissey's faro bank, perhaps worse than
il would be in any den in this city, IN thp igbl
of cool quiet atter-thought, and the resnlts of
the drawing, it looks as thOugt no one would
have given such wild scber-n ne a moments con-
/ sideration. AND YET the whole country was
tossed mo {, ,tmpest Of excitement about it;
! The people saw it in every paper, ana talked
themselves out Of their reason respecting 1t;
! and to such pitch did the tuyOr rise that this
city, the Quaker City" proverbial for sLeqdi-
ness sent at least one reporter all the way to
Chicago to report the drawing as 1t proceeded.
And such was the excitement among our
ticket-holders that when the magic messages,
reporting the names OF the fortunate persons,
began TO arrive, the newspaper office to Whlcn
they were sent was thronged TO excess, ana the
street iu front was literally crowded, so tnat
there was no getting out or in.
But is it true that this opera-nouse lottery is
synonymous with gambling? Is every lottery,
by whatever name known or disguised, gam
bling? Was not the lot, 1t is asked, used In
the olden times, and that too by the men VINO
are presented in sacred history as examples OF
purity? We have heard this defense set up
even by men whose piety, If not their learning,
ought to have taught them better. The lot as
used by the eleven apostles, Tor instance, was a
solemn, prayertul appeal TO God in certain
emergency. They wanted to fill the place
of Judas, vacated by his trcachery and
death, and they selected the two best
men in their Judgment for the pac',
and then casting lots, prayed that God woul
in this way decide between them. was thert
any money at stake here? Was any one trying
by this method to restore broken fortune
Was any earthly business, any gain OF any sort
put at hazard here? The simple fact is, tina
the lot, as used by the apostles and as sane
TONED in the Scriptures, Is purely religious IN
r stltution; and it Is as much a DEGRADATION an(
. blasphemous prostitution OF 1t TO use IT 10
2 proane or worldly purposes, as 1t Is to perver
4 the lawful oath before the civil magistrate int
. proane swearing. May a man abandon himsel
: to Drunkenness, and plead as an excuse tina
. wine is used in the sacrament? Nav q maj
e curse and swear like pirate, and plead as al
9 apology that an oath before magistrate !
y alloWableY May an incendiary set fire to house
c and urge as an excuse that God sometime
= strikes the dwellings OF men with lightning
s An appeal to God by lot in the true spirit OF IT
{ ligIon in an emergency, especially by an IL
/ spired man, is emlnently proper, bu
TO drag the institution down to que
g tions and purposes OF gam Is to ga nblC
!, Even in modern times, when good men, in som
4 iuncture of the religious llie have stood
q doubt as 10 the course to be pursued, they hay
II resorted to deVout and prayertul use OF th
:, lot But the idea of employing IL for the pu
's pose of getting money without an equlYalen
IF was as far from their thoughts as the sin
a Acclaim Just think Of an apostle turning Il
ys wheel of a modern lottery Tor an opera-hO Ist
~ If any one had proposed such thing to Pete
~ he would have responded as he did to the of
in of Simon Magus: "ThY money perish vii
n thee; thou art in the gall Of bitterness and
In tue bond of iniquity." One OF the most solem
In of all RELIGIOUS acts is an appeal 10 Goa Oy 10
st while lotteries are acknowledged to be me
;F | pames of chance so injurious that our legisl