"'THE PLAY SPIRIT."

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 6 January 1923, Page 3

"'THE PLAY SPIRIT."

SOUND ADVICE TO STUDENTS. SPORTSMANSHIP AND COMMERCE An inspiring appeal to the scholars to play the game through life was made by Professor Shelley, of Canterbury Collecre. ft the pnVe-<rivin<r ceremony of the P.ilmc-sten Boys' High School, last week (states the Manawatu Stand-

ard). Professor Shelley's address waa based on "The Play Spirit." Referring to the school motto, "Nihil honi sine labore" nothing gained without labour), he remarked that the word "labour" had, for the purpose of his address better be deleted, and the word "work" used m its place, as the former had, m these days, come to mean something different from tlie latter expression. Labour must be guided m tho right direction. They should each remember that, in building their lives, they had to c-onscler the question from two standpoints, like they would the building of a city. - There was mu:-h more chance for the practical application of their motto now that the world was starting on a new and difficult age. In history they found that the pendulum had swune tr°m °ne side r° the other. This was called a revolution or a renaissance, the renaissance in England in the 16tH century being an example of this swing of tlie pendulum. The recent war was tne end of the old swing, and the world was now starting to swmrr the "ther way One indication of this was in the schools; educators were adopting a new attitude to their profession Ihey no longer regarded themselves as little martinets who looked upon the pupils as little worms, who had to be ted with morsels of intellectual knowledge. Teachers nowadays were c«adventurers with their pumls, and they had to embrace the pupils in the educational scheme. Another indication of the world change, the proiessor continued, was the broking down of our political institutions, there being a tendency for people to serve their, own interests instead of those for the benefit of'th© community. They must see to it that' the school "play spirit" was carried beyond it and mto the fields, and it, at the present time, they could apply the standards of fair play to politics and business, they would have the^niilenmum here in no time. The commercial spirit had crept in. British commerce, said the speaker, had always been associated with sportsmanship British merchants had gone right out into the world with that spirit in their hearts; that was why-we were such good colonisers, and the cause of the requests of native races to be placed under British protection. The timv was coming when the sportsman's spirit would he needed in the world more than ever before, and if they faced the difficult problems ahead cai that' spilt they would get safely through, but if. on the other hand,'thev faced the difficulties with the commercial spirit uppermost it would indeed be? difficult to say what would hanpen. It might mean the decay of civilisation. The problems of the. world had a close relationship with the one of winning a shield for the school, inasmuch as they had to work and train to overcome all obstacles in both. Life went on like a game of football—they could place a man here and one there; but when the game advanced they found perhaps thaj; the other men adopted tactics which were unknown to th© others, and unless they all developed in the fullest sense, their intellect and mentality they would never succeed in dealing successfully with the problems of life. Many of the hoys in the school felt, no doubt, that they come to view things from a different standpoint; they thought about things that.had not occurred to them '-twelve months previously; they f^lt as though they had suddenly grown up, and tnat- all they had to do was to conquer the world, which they might consider was an easy thing to do. As with the change of outlook in boys, so with the world of to-day, and if they could only face this rbnnge in the "play spirit" they would make civilisation what it had never been before. A good deal was heard about freedom, hut the only freedom lay in organisation, with every man conscious of his rijrht pla?e in the world. When this was done, then could they say that they were really free.