Orange County observer. [volume] (Hillsborough, N.C.) 1880-1918, 1907-10-03

of divinity, to draw us into correct
relationships with God BY these
standards we have right to meas
ure our amusements and by these
judgments they must stand or fall.
If they can meet these tests they may
remain steadfast and they will. If
they cannot be justified by them or
squared to them they will fall and
they ought to. For life lis short.
Time advances. Opportunities come
and go. There is much, to be done. !
We must do it. We have little time
to waste. Our efforts must tend, be-
they little or momentous, to the en-
largement Of humanity's comprehen-
siqp Of those things that are eternal
ana divine. II happiness lies in the
achievement OF these graces we have
stipulated then we ought to be about
the Masters business.
No country in the world needs the
white light Of publicity and, phi1os-
Ophy and 0k uncommon sense to glare
upon its amusements more than
America. For we are amusement
crazy. Our catch-penny, tinseled,
gaudy summer places Of amusement
are evidence Of our amusement fever.
Our theatres are jammed with peo-
pie who want not to be compelled to
think or to be brought face to face
with reproductions of real life in
miniature. They go largely to be
wholly superficial. They minister to
the needs of the mind that is mo-
mentarily surfeited, to the jaded
spirit. They are strictly. temporal.
They are very nearly always mex
pressibly cheap and tawdry when we
sift them to the bottom They are
unrelated to duty. For they are
primarily intended to aid us to forget
duty.
OF our multitude of amusements
we shall consider four: the card
table, the dance, the theatre, the
| racetrack. And they are taken for
consideration, not because they are
| pA SO evil, but because they have
become perverted, because tae9 axo
the means Of entertainment for the
| mighty majority of our population,
because there is wide difference OF
| opinion as to their morality 3nd
propriety in the hands of Christian
| men and women or of anybody else
to-day and under present social con-
| ditions.
| It is scarcely necessary for me to
say that a pack of cards in itself is
not evil. It is far from my purpose
| to insinuate that either the dance,
the theatre or the race is, under
proper and normal conditions, wick
ed. They become so, however, when
men control them. It is far from
my intention to assert that these
forms of amusement are incapable of
proper use and that the host of moral,
well-meaning Christian people who
indulge in them are not perfectly sin
cere. have seen card games that
were harmless, and horse-races that
were above reproach, and theatrical
performances that, with little ref
ormation, could have been immacu-
late, and dances in which it was per
fectly safe for young men and women
to glide through the mazes of the
waltz. But on the other hand, am
painfully conscious that became
disgusted with cards because OF the
profanity, the unbridled vulgarity,
the trickery. the dishonesty. of those
who played the game The question.
ableness of most of the performances
upon the American stage make II
necessary for even grown man who
possesses any remnants Of self-re
spect to secure a theatrical Baedekel
before he attempts to go to see 9
show. I have seen so many pure
gentle, lovely girls (not in dance
halls, but at the dances Of approved
and conventional society of the bes
type) locked in the embraces Of lech
erous, villainous men whom the,
would not allow within a yard o.
them in the seclusion and privacy o.
their own parlors, that ]. have passed
from wonder to disgust Any ont
who has ever taken a good, honest
long look at the class of men who fre
duent the racetracks of metropolf
tan district will be convinced, II h
never was before, that the. averag'
Of the devotees of the turf go to tn
track least of all to see the "ponie
run" II gambling was disallowed b!
law at the tracks half the racing as
sociatfons Of the country would g
; out of buAness.
All these amusements are supplied
. ! in5some measure by church people
. All of them have been SO perverted
that they have become stumbling
blocks to human souls. For the.
have led many man over the brtnl
of wretchedness into the depths o
| despair. And these men have no
infrequently fallen into the meshe
of iniquity because of the ostensibl