matter, that the world
may know the truth and detect the falsehood.

It is confessed by some that they have given the subject no attention.
They have accepted the traditions of the church as they found them, have
preached and have tried to enforce them, or else have settled down upon
the assumption that the matter is of minor importance. I simply ask if
this is justifiable in view of the facts; in view of the contradictory
position of the church on this subject; in view of the important part
which amusements must play in the education of youth; in view of their
great and patent abuses; in view of the point urged in these discourses
that many of the popular diversions of the day may be wrested from the
devil's hands and turned to good purpose in keeping the young from evil
influences and associations?

Some _positively refuse_ to consider the question under any new aspect. It
is settled, once and for all. The books are balanced, shut and sealed. The
wisdom of a past generation exhausted the question. Its dictum is to be
received as gospel. Little needs to be said here. Such declarations demand
the utmost stretch of Christian charity. They betray an ignorance which,
in a popular teacher, is unpardonable, and a blind acquiescence in the
conclusions of the past which is pitiable.

The truth, moreover, is not promoted, _in any direction_, by abusing those
of more liberal views on this question. The man who conscientiously
believes them wrong, and boldly says so, and does not simply declaim
against them but opposes them by fair argument drawn from scripture, is to
be honored. I would there were more such. But it will not in the least
tend to conciliate favor for the more stringent aspect of the question,
for its advocates to cast slurs upon the sincerity and piety of those who
differ from them, to announce them as corrupters of youth, enemies of the
church, underminers of pure religion, and the like. The day for this has
gone by. The best men may differ even on this question, which some think
so firmly settled; and the liberal view of this subject is supported by
too many shining names in the Christian ministry, by too large a mass of
Christian devotion and consistency and learning and intelligence, to
entitle such assertions to any notice whatever. The want of Christian
charity which leads one public teacher to asperse his brother's Christian
consistency and purity of motive upon such grounds, is at least as
reprehensible