The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1882-12-26
PRESS PULPIT AND STAGE.
The Reciprocal Distrust Between
the Three Great Teachers.
The Church q Devotee to Mammon
The Stage Better than Ever.

Central Music Hall, to hear Mr.. J. H.
McVicker tell the truth and nothing
but the truth about the Press, Pull
pit and Stage" enjoyed a treat. the
lecture, or talk as it was called, being
unusually interesting. An outline of
it is subjoined.
The faculty which enabled us to
discriminate was rarely cultivated to
any extent even by those who set
themselves up as teachers and leaders
in the affairs of everyday life. In
modern civilization, the press. the pull
pit and the stage were three great
powers for good and evil. WI lie he
he might think 1t was about time for
the stage co assume the position anG
talk back. he was not there tn apollo
gize for it, nor was he there simply to
condemn the pulpit and censure the
press. The two powers set up an
ideal Of perfection and each thought
itself infallibIe. Editors and ministers
assumed to be little better than the
rest of mankind, ard both expected
and exacted from all poor humanity
perfection equal to their inspired holt
ness. That was no; fair, All could
not he editors and ministers, and some
wouldn't be if they could.
The stage like the press and the
pulpit. had its weaknesses. but it was
not so pretentieus as its fellows, hence
its sins are not so heinous. Editors
and ministers were set before us as a
scrt of models, but the world was
taught to look upon the actor as a
mere rollicking. good-natured. worth
less fellow. The press and the pulpit
assumed to instruct and to guide; the
stage sought to amuse. When we
read q vicious article in a newspaper
or listen to an intoIerable and unchar-
liable sermon from leading pulpit We
felt that the Offense
sMELT RANK TO HEAVEN,
that great trust had been betrayed,
that the instructors had missused their
power to vitiate public opinion, de-
grade public morals, or to instill false
principles into the public mind. He
needed not to apologize for the mis-
takes of the stage; its ofenses were
easily forgiven. He could not apollo.
gize for the more deliberate, enduring
and far reaching errors of the pulpit
and the press.
In one respect the press. pulpit and
stage stood upon the level-that of re-
ciprocal distrust. The pulpit was con-
tinualIy inveighing against the stage
and the press; the press was always
CT, ing out against the pulpit and the
stage, and the stage could not help
bit feel that the pulpit and the press
were not always the truthful. righteous
things they would have the people be-
lieve them to be.
When the stage was pressed for
material it tell back on something of a
local or sensational kind. So when it
was noted that the attendance at
church was dropping of and the dea-
cons returned after collection with
empty plates, the ministers pitched
into the stage-the standing sensation
Of the pulpit. Many a minister had
made himself known TO the commune
ty through philippe against the the
ater-going who otherwise would have
remained in obscurity all his life long.
To this notwithstanding class of min
listers the theatre was of more import
ance than the old orthodox hell for
the devil and his pitchfork had come to
be locked upon as mythical even by
the church itself, but the theatre and
It's viciousness were terribly real to the
poor trembling soul, who felt that il
could not mourn sufficiently in this
life TO gain everlasting happiness in
the life to come. Sensible people,
whose judgments were not warped by
prejudice. believed that there was good
in the pulpit, the stage and the press
The trouble was We did not d:scrimin-
ate between the good and the bad.
did not always get things just in the
right place. The average man was
VICTIM TO HIS ENVIRONMENT
took the world as IT came. and drifted
on in the channel in which it started.
The good frequently passed for the
bad, and the bad for the good. We
were hive Of busy bees, but lacked
their wisdom-did not extract che
sweet trem life and avoid the bitter
The trinity Of modern civilization
the press, the pui;t and the stage
should work in harmony for the good
of the human race. but they pulled
apart for selfish motives.
He then considered the three i'm the
order IF their birth, the stage being
first. The mOlern drama i'm every
lonouaoe and of every country traced