the apple-cuttings and the
sugaring-offs, the quilting bees and the singing schools and spelling
matches, wholesome, home-made neighborhood pastimes, which meant enjoyment
from within instead of mere amusement from without, have silently
disappeared. Little remains in many rural places but unmitigated toil,
relieved by an occasional social spasm in the nearest village. In short,
recreation has become commercialized. Instead of the normal expression of
the social instinct in cooperative and wholesome pleasures which were
natural to country life, social stimulus is bought for a nickel or a
quarter; and an electric age furnishes forthwith the desired nerve
excitement.

_Lack of Recreation and Organized Play_

This modern sort of recreation is not as good as the old for two reasons.
It is really a sort of intoxication instead of a mild stimulant; and it is
often solitary instead of social. Solitary pleasure is subtle selfishness.
Even the rural sports are apt to be solitary, such as hunting and fishing.
If the country is ever to be socialized and a spirit of cooperation
developed which will make possible strong team-work in business, politics
and religion, then we must begin with the laboratory practice of organized
play. As a successful country minister says, "The reason why farmers
cannot seem to cooperate when they are grown up is in the fact that _they
did not learn team-play when they were boys_." Faithfulness to the daily
work is a great character builder, but Dr. Luther H. Gulick rightly
insists that play, because of its highly voluntary character, trains men
in a better morality than work does.

Especially is this true of wage-earners, students in school, and all those
who work for others. As Dr. Wilson in his fine chapter on Rural Morality
and Recreation, so well says, "What we do for hire, or under the orders of
other people, or in the routine of life is done because we have to. We do
not choose the minor acts of study in school, of work in the factory, of
labor in the house, of composition in writing a book. All these little
acts are part of a routine which is imposed upon us and we call them
work. But play is entirely voluntary. Every action is chosen, and
expresses will and preference. Therefore play is highly moral. It is the
bursting up of our own individuality and it expresses especially in the
lesser things, the preferences of life. The great school for training men
in the little things that make up the