The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1900-03-23
THE DRAMATIC ART.
DIR. Talmage Gives His Views Of
the Theater.
Says the Drama, Rightly Direc.ed.
Is n source of GOOd-ShOuld lie
Purified, Not suppressed
Good and had Plays.
copyright, 1900, by Louis Klopsch.l
Washington, March 49,.


is in controversy as never before con
corning the theater, and some plays
are being arrested by the police, and
Others are being patronized by Chris
tian people. this sermon of DR.. Tai
mage is of much interest. The test
is IsCorinthians viii. 31:' "Thcy that
use this world as not abusing it,
My reason for preaching this dis
course is that have been kindly invited
by two of the leading newspapers OF
this country to inspect and report on
two of the popular plays of the day
to go some weeks ago to Chicago and
see the drama Quo Nadis" and criti-
else it with respect to its moral eff
feet and to go to New York and see
the drama "Ben.IIur" and write my
opinion of it for public use. Instead
of doing that | propose in sermon
to discuss what we shall do with the
dramatic element which God has inn
planted i'm many of our natures, not
in 10 or 100 or 1000. but in the vast
majority of the human race. Some
people speak of the drama as though
IL were something built up outside
of ourselves by the Congreves and the
Goldsmiths and the Shalespeares and
the Sherdans of literature and that
then we attune our tastes to CORE
spond with human inventions. Not
at ALL The drama is an echo from the
feeling which God has implanted in
our immortal souls. 1t is seen first
in the domestic circle among the chill
dren three or four years of age play
ing with their dolls and their cradles
and their carts, seen ten years after
in the playhouses of wood. ten years
after in the parlor charades, after
that in the elaborate representations
in the academies of music. Thespis
and Aeschylus and Sophocles and Eu-
ripides merely dramatized what was
in the Greek heart Terence and
Plautus and Seneca merely drama
tized what was in the Roman heart.
Congrevc and Farquhar merely dram
atized what WIS in the English heart.
Racine, Corneil'e and Alfcri only
dramatized what was in the French
and Italian heart. Shakespeare only
dramatized what was in the great
worlds heart. The dithyrambic and
classic drama, the sentimental drama,
the romantic drama were merely
echoes of the human soul.
1 do not speak of the drama on
the poetic shelf, nor of the drama
In the playhouse, but / speak of the
dramatic element in your soul and
mine. We make men responsible for
it. They are not responsible. They
it, but not for the original impanta-
.tion. God did that work, and l sup
pose He knew what lie was about
when He made us. We are nearly
all moved by the spectacular. When
on Thanksgiving day we decorate our
churches with the cotton and the rice
and the apples and the wheat and
the rye and the oats, our gratitude
TO God is stirred. When ON Easter
morning we see written in letters of
flowers the inscriptions: "lle Is
Risen" our emotions are stirred. Ev-
cry parent likes to go to the school
exhibition with its Rotations and its
dialogues and its droll costumes. The
torchlight procession of the political
campaign is merely the dramatiza-
ton of principles involved. no intel
ligent man can look in any secular
or religious direction without finding
this dramatic element revealing. UNI
rolling. demonstrating itself, What
shall we 90 with il?
Shall we suppress it? You can as
easily suppress its Creator. You may
direct il, you nay educate it, YOU may
purify it, you may harness it to multi
potent usefulness, and that il is your
duty to do. just as we cultivate the
taste for the beautiful and the sublime
by bird-hamtcd glen and roisterinp
stream and cataracts let down in up
roar over the messed rocks, and the day
lifting its banner of victory in the east
and then setting everything on fire as
it retreats through the gates of the
west, and the Austerlitz and Waterloo
of an August thunderstorm blazing
their batteries into a sultry afternoon
and the round, glittering tear of {
world wet on the cheek of the night
as in this way we cultivate our taste fol
the beautiful and sublime, so in every
lawful way we are to cultivate the dra
matte element in our nature, by every
staccato passage in literature, by an
tithesis and synthesis, by every tragic
passage in human life.
Now, have to tell you not only tha
God has implanted this dramatic elc
ment in our natures, but have to tel
you in the Scriptures He cultivutos it
He appeals to it, He develops it. ! dc
not care where you open the Bible
your eye will fall upon drama. Here
it is in the book of Judges, the fir tree
the vine, the olive tree, the bramble-
they all make speeches. Then at tn,
close of the scene there is n coronation
and the bramble is proclaimed king
That is a political drama. Here il is in
the book of job: Enter Eliphal, iii
dad, Iophnr. Elihu and job. The open