The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1897-08-07

oEl4h-
Many years ago for sermonic pur-
poses n in company with the chief
of police of New York 1 visited one of
the most brilliant gambling houses in
that city. 1t was night, and as we
came up in front all seemed dark.
The blinds were down; the door was
guarded; put after a whispering of
the officer with the guard at the door
we were admitted into the hall, and
thence into the parlors, around one
table finding eight or ten men in mid
life, we'll dressed-all the work going
on in silence, save the noise of the
rafting ''chips" on the gaming table
in one parlor, and the revolving ball
of the roulette table In the other par
lor. Some of these men, we were
told, had served terms in prison;
some were shipwrecked bankers
and brokers and money-dealers,
and some were going their first
rounds of vice-but all intent upon the
table, as large or small fortunes moved
up and down before them. Obi there
was something awfully solemn in the
~silence-the intense gaze, the sup
pressed emotions of the player. No
one looked up. They all had money in
the rapids, and 1 have no doubt some
saw, as they sat there, horses and car
riages, and houses and lands, and
home and family rushing down into
the vortex. A mans life would not
nave been worth a farthing in that
presence had he not been accompanied
by the police, if he had been supposed
to be on a Christian errand of observa-
ton. Some of these men went by
private key, some went in by
careful introduction, some were
taken in by the patrons OF the
establishment. The officer of the
law told me: "None get in here except
by police mandate, or by some letter
of a patron" While we were there a
young man came in, put his money
down on the roulette table and lost;
put more money down on the roulette
table and lost; put more money down
on the roulette table and lost; then
feeling in his pockets for more money,
finding nome, in severe silence he
urned his back upon the scene and
passed out. While we stood there
men lost there property and lost there
souls. oh, merciless place! Not once
in all the history of that gaming house
has there been one word of sympathy
uttered for the losers at the game.
Sir Horace Walpole said that a man
dropped e in n of b club houses
Of London; his body was carried into
the club house, and the members of
the club began Immediately to bet as
TO whether he were dead or alive, and
when 1t was proposed to test the mat
ter by bleeding him. it was only
hindered by the suggestion that it
would be unfair to some of the play
srsl In these gaming houses of our
cities, men have their property
wrung away from them and then
they go out, some of them to
drown their grief in strong drink,
some to ply the counterfeiter's pen,
and to restore their fortunes, some re-
sort to the suicides revolver, but all
going down, and that work proceeds
day by day, and night by night.
THAT cart rope" says some young
man, has never been wound around
my SOUL" But have not some threads
Of that cart rope been twisted?
1 arraign before God the gift enter
prises of our cities, which have a tend
ency to make this a nation of gamblers.
Whatever you get, young man, in such
3 place as that, without giving a proper
equivalent, is a robbery of your own
soul and a robbery of the community.
Yet, how we are appalled, to see men
who failed in other enterprises go in
to gift concerts, where the chief at
traction is not music, but the prizes
distributed among the audience; or
to sell books where the chief
attraction is not the book, but the
package that goes with the book.
Tobacco dealers advertise that on
a certain day they will put money in
to their papers, SO that the pur-
chaser of this tobacco in Cincinnati or
New York may unexpectedly come upon
a magnificent gratuity. Boys hawk
ing through the cars packages con-
tanning nobody knows what, until you
open them and find they contain moth
ing. Christian men with pictures on
their walls gotten in q lottery, and the
brain of the community taxed to find
out some way of getting things with
out paying for them. oh, young men,
these are the threads that make the
Ear rope, and when a young man con-
sents to these practices, he is being
bound hand and foot by a habit which
has already destroyed "a great multi
tude that no man can number"
Sometimes these gift enterprises are
carried on in the name of charities;
and some of you remember at the close
of our civil war how mony gift enter
prises were on foot, the proceeds to GO
to the orphans and widows Of the SOL
diers and sailors. What did the men
who had charge of those gift enter
prises care for the orphans and
widows? Why, they would have
allowed hem to freeze to death
upon their steps. 1 have no faith in
charity which, for the sake of reliev-
ing present suffering, opens a gaping
jaw that has swallowed down so much
of the virtue and good principle of the
Young man, ave moth
ing to do with these things. They
only sharpen your appetite for games
of chance. Do one of two things: BE
honest or die.
1 have accomplished my object if 1
put you on the lookout. 1t is a great
deal easier to fall than it is to get up
again. The trouble is that when men
begin to go astray from the path of
duty, they are apt to say: ''There's no
use of my trying to get back. I've
my responsibility, / can't re-
turn" and they go On until they are
utterly destroyed. / tell you, my
friends, that God this moment, by His
Holy Spirit, can change your entire
nature, SO that you will be a different
in a minute. Your great want
what is it? More salary? Higher So
cial position? No; no. 1 will tell you
the great want of every man, if he has
not already obtained it. 1t is the
grace of God.
Are there any who have fallen vic
to the sin that l nave been repre-
hendingP You are in a prison, and try
get out, and you fail; and you turn
and dash against the other
wall until there is blood on the CRATES,
and blood on your soul. You will
never get out in this way. There is
only one way of getting out There is
a key that ear unlock the prison house.
1t is the key that Christ wears at his
If you will allow Him to put
that key to the lock, the bolt will
shoot back and the door will swing
open, and you will be a free man in
Christ Jesus.
Oh, prodigal, what a business this is
for you, feeding swine, when your