UNKNOWN

Wanganui Chronicle, Issue 12856, 31 October 1912, Page 2

UNKNOWN

A BIG QUESTION

OPINION OF A THEATRICAL

LEADER

The question of Sunday amusements is paramount in many places, and time and again efforts have boon made to induce the opening of theatres. Public opinion is dead against it in New Zealand, but at Home there is a, variety of opinion expressed. Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree had something to say on the matter recently^ and in discussing the problem remarked:

"It would be a pity indeed if tho opening of places of amusement on Sundays deprived people of religious exercises, and of the spiritual uplift and beauty .associated with tho English Sunday, on tho preservation of which the national character largely depended. On tho other hand, this uplift and beauty aro not to be found exclusively in the churches, and thoso who love tho stage and maintain that it 13 a great power for good have a right to -assort its claim in that direction. Assuredly it might be said that the humanity of Shakespeare was helpful rather than inimical to the teachings of Christ. The stage to-day preaches the wider religion of humanity. Our present Sunday is probably a more godly day than was "the Sunday of early Victorian times. Certainly the English Sunday has undergone a very considerable change during the past quarter of a century. Only a few years ago there were no rcstaarrr..nts, cricket, golf, or games of any kind on Sunday. Nov.-, in tiie proceit of evolution, wo have a Sunday which is not only a day of rest, but of healthy recreation. In tho parks on Sunday afternoon the bands" play by permission of the London County Council. All the great concert halls are thronged by people listening to music, sacred and mundane. The picture galleries and the museums are 'attended by ever-increasing crowds. Every year there are increasing facilities for travel on the seventh day, enabling hundreds of thousands of workers to find a T)Laoe in tho sun beyond the boundaries of the dark city. Does the rational amusement of the people on Sunday tend to their degradation, or to the greater happiness of the greater number of our people? Let us look the facts in the face. Statistics tell, us that the consumption of drink has been steadily decreasing. It has declined by as much as £2,000,000 per annum. Is not that decrease largely due to the fact that the happiness which the people formerly distilled from alcohol thoy now derive from rational amusements? Is it not potfiible to have a Sunday that should combine irodlinr,"« wiith early happiness? I take"it that were theatres permitted to entertainments on Sundays, doors would be only open in tho evening. The question is one besot with difficulties, and I think it will be solved by the public themselves. Tho theatre managers should be sure of the demand before offer'ng the supply. Although my mind ia onen v,n

many sides of tin's many-sided question, it is made up very clearly on one point, that it is undesirable that actons sb-oulci work more than six days a week. Thoy should, in fact, rest on a seventh <[■:.>.'