eaching, it will be by letting it out into society to speak for
itself. Nor am I begging the question at issue here. Even an error is
better outspoken than cherished in secret. It comes into the field of
discussion, and is turned over and examined and exposed, and so truth is
the gainer after all. But I think it will be difficult to prove an error
in this case. The gospel truth is "_put the leaven into the lump_;" and
why the gospel should not be put into our amusements, even into those
which are confessedly abused, I cannot see. The more liable to abuse they
are, the more they need regulating; and the practical workings of this
principle when men have the courage to face prejudice and carry it out,
triumphantly vindicate it. The man who furnishes his son a billiard table
in his own house, where he can practice that beautiful game with his
friends without the adjuncts of liquor and rowdyism, does a good deed. He
keeps the youth at home, he keeps his associations under his own eye; he
gives him a good, healthy, intellectual amusement purged of its abuses.
The college board that erects a bowling alley for the students; that says
to young men, "rolling ten pins is not evil, but rolling ten pins in bar
rooms, surrounded by drunkards and swearers and indecent pictures _is_
evil, and we therefore give you the amusement without these associations,
and bid you enjoy it, and draw health and strength from it,"--that college
board I say, has promoted something more than _muscular_ Christianity. It
has given the young men a better opinion of religion; has withdrawn them
from the influence of temptations to which they expose themselves only
because they cannot find the amusements freed from these vile
associations. It has drawn just so much patronage from the grog shop. The
parents in whose family circle dancing in proper modes and with approved
associates and within reasonable hours is encouraged, are doing just so
much to keep their daughters from the unhealthy hours, the immodest
displays, and the indiscriminate associations of the ball room. They
deserve the thanks, not the reprobation of the church. They are the
friends, not the enemies of religion. Let us not be scared by names. Let
us not deal, as the pulpit has dealt too much, in vague generalities on
this subject. Let us see what those terrible words "billiards" and
"dancing," and others of a similar cast mean. Let us see if they are evil
and evil only. Let us not assume that