Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1873-10-03
Tho Moral Discipline OF Croquet.
BY HENRY WARD BEECHER.

One of our religious exchanges
which one we have forgotten-wise-
ly remarks as follows:
The Christian Union says: Any
body who is too pious to play cro-
quet ought to be done up in starched
linen, put in bag, and hung up
like a suit of Sunday clothes, and
not let out till meeting time. And
yet it is a severe test of Christian
character. A Baptist minister told
us that croquet had been means
of grace to him. He said it took
him six months to learn to play it
in Christian spirit. We have seen
some ministers and laymen who
made much slower progress than
that. 1t often requires much more
vigorous exercise Of fairness, pa.
tience and good temper, than it does
of the merely physical powers.
Croquet is like almost everything
else, it may be made a source Of
good or evil. 1t depends on how
you take it. But it is a rare lest of
character. We have played with
men whose high position warranted
us in expecting the utmost honora-
blcness and fair dealing. But cro-
quet was too great strain upon
their moral natures-the weakness
Of their characters showed itself.
We remember a college president
who could not hep stopping his
ball in the most accidental fashion
when it was likely to roll too far.
We know fair ladies who, in close
ly contested game, always happen
to dislocate their balls with their
dress skirts, and who claim every
advantage in replacing them. What
shall we say of such people? That
their honesty of character will not
stand croquet-will not stand any
Of the severe tests to which emula-
tions of life subject them.
Plato well understood the moral
discipline of games. He advocates
in two separate works the education
OF boys by means of games governed
by strict laws, that they may thus
learn submission to just regulations.
A game played honestly devclopcs
the moral nature more than it does
the muscle.
In croquet, rs in life, we have to
learn to submit to defeat, and he
who can fight hard for victory, and
then take defeat with undiminishcd
cheerfulness, is the greatest con-
queror in the world. So that cro-
quet may be used as a sor, of moral
gymnastic, a developer Of patience,
of fairness, and Christian forbcar-
ance.
But it was not to advocate GRO
quet that we took this text. 1t was
to call attention to the fact that the
chief discipline of life comes from
little things. Much has been writ
ten about the usefulness of great
trials. It is an cxhaustlcss theme
for preachers and book makers.
But what of the little cares and vex-
ations? If there is moral discipline
in great bereavement, is there not
also benefit to be had from the trial
of your patience by careless hire
ling or a fretful baby? II we may
climb toward heaven on great gricfs,
may we not also make a ladder of
little vexations?
The aggregate trial from small
things is greater than that from gil
gantic affections. The daily fret
ting of business, the CALLING cmbar-
rassments of purposes crossed by
the counter purposes of others, are
hard to bear because we must bear
them always. Every man who
stands in organized relation to other
men is daily tried by the irritability
of a superior, or the intractability
of subordinate. Women, Of all
others, especially those who have
the cares of housekeeping and the
management of children, are subject
to annoyances much more grievous,
in the long run, than the greater
sorrows of life. When the child
cries, the father, unless he be par
agon of fathers, finds business sud
denly calling him down town; he
remembers an important errand at
Jones'ithat he had forgotten, until
the cross child refreshed his men,
ory. The mother is prisoner in
her bedlam, and what wonder it
sometimes the patience fail, and if,
with some long-tried and heavily
burdened soul, heart and hope gave
out at last? The great heroes are
not those who have carried heavi-
est sorrows meekly, but those men
who have endured daily contradic-
tions of people and daily embarrass-
ments Of circumstances with meek
ness; the great heroines are those