day, has the theater asked for the support of Church members. And
the ideal stage, with virtuous performers, and with pure dramas, are
held up as a sample of what Christian people are invited to attend. Dr.
Cuyler says: "Every person of common sense knows that the actual
average theater is no more an ideal playhouse than the average pope
is like St. Peter, or the average politician is like Abraham Lincoln. A
Puritanic theater would become bankrupt in a twelvemonth. The great
mass of those who frequent the playhouse go there for strong, passionate
excitements..I do not affirm," says Dr. Cuyler, "that every popular play
is immoral, and every attendant is on a scent for sensualities. But the
theater is a concrete institution, it must be judged in the gross and to a
tremendous extent it is only a gilded nastiness. It unsexes womanhood
by putting her publicly in male attire--too often in no attire at all."

"So competent an authority as the famous actress, Olga Nethersole,
recently declared that the only kind of play which may hope for success
with English-speaking audiences at the present day is the play which is
sufficiently indicated by calling it immoral. There is no doubt about it
that the theater, as at present conducted, is pulling the stones from the
foundations of public morality, and weakening, and in many quarters
endangering, the whole structure of society. The atmosphere of the
modern theater is lustful and irreverent. It is a good place for Christians
to keep away from. It is a good opportunity for the strong man to deny
himself for the sake of his younger or weaker brother."



PART II.

WORTHY SUBSTITUTES.