San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1890-12-06
SUNDAY ENTERTAINMENTS.
[From the Boston Globe


The great majority of the opponents
of Sunday entertainments occupy the
too common position of special plead.
ers; and, as is too commonly the case
also, these special pleaders are ig.
norant of the question from any Other
point of view than their own narrow
location, while they willfully close
their eyes to anything beyond that
very limited horizon. What does the
average clergyman with the excep-
ton may be of the clergy
of the Roman Catholic Church)
know regarding the theatre, or its
community of patrons Little or
nothing. From his earliest lessons
he has been taught to avoid them.
Now, If one who has avoided churches
and church services from his youth
I'D should criticise he would be con-
siIered presumptuous and impertin-
emit. The analogy is obvious to an
unbiased mind. But in order that
Especial pleading" shall not be as
serted as the writer's condition in
turn, let him say imprinis that tor
twenty years he was Sunday-school
teacher, and certainly ought to
have some knowledge of both
sides of the question. In any
large city the majority of its inhab-
itants are not church-goers. They
deserve q hearing. Years of earnest,
honest, true-hearted endeavor have
not succeeded in making this MAORI
ty a minority. Again, the majority
of church attendants are also COM
municants. They need the incite-
ment of church service and church
associations only to keep them to
their duty and in the right path; not
TO direct them to it. One means Of
ten offered for this purpose, and to
gain a new audience, is the Sunday
school concert. Well, of what does
such 8 concert consist? or singing
recitation, reading, talks, prayer.
At 8 years of age, many a time, at
a Sabbath. school concert, the writer
sang, in childish treble. II want to
be an angelo and such like compost
tons. Considered as a performance
his young efforts may have been
good, bad or indifferent: considered
as q tact" it was untrue. No child
of wants to be an angel. No child
of that age Gf any one really does)
know what an angel is. Being a boy,
he ought to have sung ~ want to be
a cherub,n but that would never
do. His poor little brain used
to fashion q woman with long white
robe and great heavy wings-that
was his only idea of an angel. But
putting all this aside, what real diff
ference is there between child actor
h ,,I
at q Sunday night concert in one
place, and an another child actor flor
he is an actor unless he really be-
lieves and means what he sings or
recltes Singing, 81 want to be an
angelo in another place? On the
whole, probably the former would be
the source of more benefit to an au-
dience. Is there any real difference,
except in topic, between descriptive
lecture on Jerusalem, in a church
the lecturer using maps and paint
ings and utensils of the far-away
land as illustrations-and lecture on
Paris or London, with like proper
ties" in theater? Or, for argu-
ment's sake, the lecture on Jerusalem
shall be in the theater, and the one
on London shall be in the church.
Would either be harmful necessarily?
If so, which?
There are thousands upon thous-
ands in q city whom no amount of
eloquence and no form of entertain
ment could Influence to cross the
threshold of a church. And they are
often true hearted, honest, well-mean
ing and worthy people. They have an
idle day Sunday. A theater offers a
decent, wholesome, harmless and
GENERALLY instructive entertainment t;
often it is given for sweet charity's
sake, and they will attend that. They
are bound to get some educational
good, often to hear a reading, better
to their understanding than any SER
mon, and surely they are in place
harmless in itself, if the opponents
will investigate and find out. Edu-
cation is good, rest is good, amuse-
not the great Teacher himself rebuke
some busy bodies with the remark
that 1t was "lawful to do good on the
Sabbath day." VIII some one object
if we, on our side, say that what is
''lawful" is fright" and that the
Masters dictum is authoritative?
The foundation of the special plead
er's argument is that anything in the
theater except (at least on sunday
sermon is wrong. In short, that
the things theatrical are wrong-ln
fiuence, association, everything. Req
knowledge would knock away tina
foundation, and the writer will no
Jay, for fear of the charge O
special pleading, that il
an equal experience will
church and theater, not separated b,
time or dates, but concurrent, he an