Church and Stage.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 394, 21 December 1889, Page 2

Church and Stage.

(XBOU OVa OWS COBMSfOSDgXT.) Brasav. Dr Jefferies has been addressing the public on the subject of 11 Christianity and social amusements.'* Ho had a good word to say for the theatre, recognising its necessity, and its place in the social scheme, and the groat power it poaaessed as a teacher of morality, or the reverse, Somewhat inconsistently, however as it appeared to me, he classed himself “ among those old-fashioned Christians who regarded theatre-going as dangerous.” He acknowledged trouble is to be found in the vitiated tastes of a section of the eudience. Managers, like other tradesmen, provide what their customers desire, not what they may deem beet io the abstract for them. What, theo, could so powerfully tend to bring about a change for tbe worse as the total abstention from attending of those whose tastes are refined and elevated j. If a theatrical audience were a fair reprasontation of the general public, if it contained a due proportion of “ the salt of the earth,” the same self-interest which now prompts managers to p.nder to the basest end most animal foibles of the worst side of human nature would be as powerfully determined in the direction of decency and decorum. Dr Jeffries says ha awaits the time when tbe Theatre shall be reformed, and then, he wjlj occasionally attend, and take hie family with him. But how it it to bo reformed, if the reforming element ’in eootetv studiously passes it by “ on the other aide " like the. priest and the Lovite in the parable! I believe Dr Jeffries to be a very able man, and what Is more, a good and sincere man, but I- don't think that in thia instance he grasped tbe method of his Divine Master, who went where he was., moat wanted, especially among the publicans and sinners. I don't attend the theatre myself, because in the first place I can't afford the luxury, and in tffe next my time jo top. fully occupied. But I should be sorry to Write s Word whloh would deter good people who have time and money at their disposal from exerting their practical influence in a direction where it la very much needed. Meanwhile, the spirit of the age is decidedly in the direction of the greater and more cordial and generous appreciation of tho efforts of the real actors amongst ns. Mr O. Rignold, for instance, was publicly banqueted yesterday by t very representative gathering of the ci Meno of Sydbey, and hie health jyas proposed by the for lustreeV&‘