The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1907-10-16

forms of amusement are incapable of
proper use and that 1he host of moral,
we~ll-meaning Christian people who
indulge in them are d perfectly sin
cere. I have seen card games that
were harmless, and horse-races tnat
were above reproach, and theatrical
performances that, with a 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, I am
painfully conscious that I became
disguised with cards because Of the
profanity, the unbridled vulgarity,
the total incapacity for s~elf-control,
the trickery, the dishonesty, of those
who played the game. The question
ableness Of most of the performances
upon the American stage make it
necessary for even a grown man who
possesses any remnants Of self-re-
spect to secure a theatrical Baedeker
before he attempts to go to see a
show. T have seen so many pure,
gentle, lovely girls (not in dance
halls, but at the dances Of approved
and conventional society of the best
type) locked in the embraces of lech-
erous, villainous men whom they
would not allow within a yard Of
them in the seclusion and privacy of
their own parlors, that I have passed
from wonder to disgust. Any one
who has ever taken a good, honest,
long look at the class of men who fire.
Quent the racetracks of a metropoli-
tan district will be convinced, if he
never was before. that the average
of the devotees of the turf go to the
track least of all to see the ponies
rum" If gambling was disallowed by
law at the tracks half the racing as
sociations of the country would go
out of business.
All these amuSementS are supplied
in some measure by church people.
All of them have been so perverted
that they have become stumbling
blocks to human souls. For they
have led many a man over the brink
of wretchedness into the depths of
despair. And these men have not
infrequently fallen into the meshes
of iniquity because Of the ostensibly
harmless pastimes of Christian men
and women.
AS an obsession it is paltry for m
to say that they are wholly evil. For
we are agreed that when they are al
lowed to dominate a life they are Of
the devil. The question is, shall the
Church sanction them or shall she
ban them?
Let us look them over n by one.
When did a game Of cards minister
to the enlargement of our conscious
ness of that which is divine and eter-
nal? Or when did it increase our
sense of responsibility to the world OF
God? Or when did the theatre or the
dance or the race? Seachingly,
honestly!
The truth is that the more we are
aware of divinity and eternity, the
more exalted our conception of the
demands of conscience, the less we
need these things and have time for
them. We find cur happiness else
where; we secure our pleasure
through unquestionable channels.
We neither care nor need to be
amused. When I know that amuse-
ments are stultifying the spiritual
efficiency Of the people Of God, when
II see the fragrant peryersions Of the
amusements of the day that exist,
then I am persuaded that the fathers
were right to condemn these things
with no uncertain sound. And I am
further convinced that it is not only
the duty of the Church to denounce
them, but also to transform and
purify them. I am certain that it is
our duty to divert the energies Of
the multitude from following their
cheap amusements to the service Of
Almighty God.