g many things for which I have to thank my father
and mother not the least is, that they would allow no gamblers, nor
gambling, nor the instruments of gambling about our home. Better keep
a pet rattlesnake for your child than a deck of cards; for if he
gets poisoned by the snake he may be cured; but if the passion for
card-playing should happen to seize him, there is little chance of a
cure. The inmates of our penitentiaries to-day, almost to a man, testify
that "card-playing threw them into bad company, led them into sin, and
was one of the causes of their downfall." Dr. Talmage was asked if there
could be any harm in a pack of cards. He Said: "Instead of directly
answering your question, I will give you as My opinion that there are
thousands of men with as strong a brain as you have, who have gone
through card-playing into games of chance, and have dropped down into
the gambler's life and into the gambler's hell." A prisoner in a jail
in Michigan wrote a letter to a temperance paper, in which he gives this
advice for young men: "Let cards and liquor alone, and you will never
be behind the gates." Friends, not every one who touches liquor is a
drunkard, but every drunkard touches liquor; so not every one who plays
cards is a professional gambler, but every professional gambler plays
cards. Is there nothing significant about these facts. "A word to the
wise is sufficient." "In a railway train sat four men playing cards. One
was a judge, and two of the others were lawyers. Near them sat a poor
mother, a widow in black. The sight of the men at their game made her
nervous. She kept quiet as long as she could; but finally rising came to
them, and addressing the judge, asked: 'Do you know me?' 'No, madam,
I do not,' said he. 'Well, said the mother, 'you sentenced my son to
State's prison for life.' Turning to one of the lawyers, she said: 'And
you, sir, pleaded against him. He was all I had. He worked hard on the
farm, was a good boy, and took care of me until he began to play cards,
when he took to gambling and was lost.'" Dr. Guthrie writes: "In regard
to the lawfulness of certain pursuits, pleasures, and amusements, it
is impossible to lay down any fixed and general rule; but we may
confidently say that whatever is found to unfit you for religious
duties, or to interfere with the performance of them; whatever
dissipates your mind or cools the fervor of your devotions; whatever
indisposes you to read your Bibles or to engage