Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 October 1894 — DANGERS OF DANCING. [ARTICLE]

DANGERS OF DANCING.

. it An Influence for Evil that Can Not Be Estimated. A Famoni Danunege nnrt Her Bloody Reward—Dr. Talmage’s Eloquent Appeal for Social Purity and ------ Moderat.ou. ~ The Rev. Dr. Talmage, who is still absent on his round the world tour, selected as the subject of last Sunday’s, sermon through the press “The Quick Feet,” the text chosen being Matthew xiv, 6, “When Herods birthday was kept, the daughter of Herodias danced before them and pleased Herod.” . It is the anniversary of Herod’s birthday. The palace is lighted. The highways leading therto are all ablaze with the pomp of invited guests. -Lords, captains, the merchant princes, the mighty men of the land are coming to mingle in the festivities. The table is spread with all the luxuries that, royal purveyors can gather. The guests, white robed and annointed and nerfumed, come in and sit at the table. Music’ The jests evoke roars of laughter. Riddles are propounded. Repartee is indulged. Toasts are drunk. The brain is befogged. The wit rolls on into uproar and blasphemy. They are not satisfied yet. Turn on more light. Pour out more wine. Music! Sound all the trumpets. Clear the 1 floor for a dance. Bring in Salofne j the beautiful and accomplished princess. The door opens and in bounds the dancer. The lords are enchanted. Stand back and make room for i the brilliant gyrations! These men never saw such “poetry of motion.” Their soul whirls in. the reel and bounds with the bounding feet. "

Herod forgets crown and throne and everything but the fascinations of Salome. Ail the magnificence of i his realm is as nothing now compared with the splendor that whirls on .tiptoe before him. His body sways from side to side, corresponding with the motions of the enchantress. His soul is filled with the pul-' sations of the feet and bewitched with the taking postures and attitudes more and more amazing. After a while he sits in enchanted silence looking at the flashing, leapi ing, bounding beauty, and as the i dance closes, and the tinkling cym- ; bals cease to clap, and the thunders of applause that shqok the palace begin to abate, the enchanted monarch swears to the princely performer, “Whatsoever thou shalt ask of me I will give it thee, to the half of my kingdom.” Now, there was in ’ prison at that time a minister of the gospel of the name of John the Bap- j tist, and he had been making a great deal of trouble by preaching some very plain and honest sermons. At the instigation of his mother, Salome takes advantage of the extravagant promise of the king and says, “Bring rnethe head of John the Baptist on a dinner plate.” Hark to the sound of feet outside the door and the clatter of swords, j The executioners are returning from I their awful errand. Open the door. 1 They enter and they present the ■ platter to Salome. What isenthisj platter? A new glass of wine to continue the uproarious merriment? No. Something redder and costlier—the ghastly, bleeding head of John the Baptist, the death glare still in the eye. the locks dabbled with gore, the features still distressed with the last agony. This woman,who had whirled so gracefully in the dance, Wnds over the awful burden without a shudder. She gloats over thwblood, and with as much indifference as a waiter might take a tray of empty glassware out of a room after an j entertainment Salome carries this ' head of John the Baptist, while all the banqueters shout with laughter ; and think it a good joke that in so etsy and quick a way they have got rid of an earnestand outspoken minister of the gospel. Dancing is the graceful motion of the oody adjusted by art to the sound j and measures of musical instrment j or of the human voice. All nations have danced. The ancients thought I that Cantor and Pollux taught the art the Lacedaemonians. But whoever started it all clime have adopted it. ' In ancient times they had the festal i dance, the military dance, the mediatorial dance, the bacchanalian dance, and the queens and lords swayed to and fro in the gardens, and the rough backwoodsman with this exercised awakened the echo of the forest. There is something in the sound of lively music to evoke the movement of the hand and foot, I whether cultured or uncultured. | Passing down the street we uncon- i sciously keep step to the sound of ' the brass band, while the Christian ! in church with his foot beats time while his soul rises above some great harmony. While this is so in civilized lands, the red men of the forest have their scalp dances, their green corn dances, their war dances. In ancient times the exorcise was so utterly and completely depraved that the church anathematized it. But we an; not to discuss the customs of the olden times, but customs now. We are not to take the evidence of the ancient fathers, but our own conscience, enlightened by the word of God, is to be the standard. Oh, bring no harsh criticism upon the young. I would not drive out from their soul the hilarities of life. Ido not believe that the inhabitants of ancient Wales, when they stepped to the sound of the rustic barp, went down to ruin. I belfbve God intended the young ] e >ple to laugh and romp and play. Ido not believe God would have put exuberance in the soul and exuberance in the body if he had not intended they should in some wise exercise it and

demonstrate it. If a mother join hands with her children and cross, the floor to the sound of music, I se< no harm. If a group of friends cross and recross the room to the sound oJ piano well played, I see no harm; B a company, all of whom are known to host and hostess aS reputable, cross and recross the room to the sound of musical instrument. I see no harm. I tried for a long while tC see harm in it. I could not see any harm in it. I never shall see any harm in that. Our men need to be kept young—young for many years longer than they are kept young. Never since my boyhood days have I had more sympathy with the innoi cent hilarities of life that I have now. What are the dissipations jf social life today, and what are the dissipations of the ball room? In some cities and in some places reachingall the year round, in other places only ' in the summer time and at the watering places. There are dissipations of social life that are cutting a very wide swath with the sickle of death, and hundreds and thousands are going down under these influences, and my subject in application is as wide as Christendom.

Social dissipation is the abettor o! pride, it is the instigator of jealousy, it is the sacrificial altar of health, it is the defiler of the soul, it is the avenue ollust, and it is the curse oL every town on both sides of the sea. Social dissipation. It may be hard to draw the line and say that this is right on the one side, and that is wrong on the other side. It is not necessary that we do that, for God ' has put a throne in everyman’s soul, and I appeal to that throne today. When a mtm does wrong, he knows he does wrong, and when he does right he knows he does right, and to that throne which Almighty God lifted in the heart of every man and woman I appeal. As to the physical ruin wrought by the dissipations of social life there can be no doubt. What may we expect of people who work all day anddance all night? How many people have stepped from the ballroom into the graveyard! Consumptions and swift neuralgias are close on the track. Amid many of the glittering scenes of social life diseases stand right and left and balance and chain. The breath of the sepulcher floats dp through the perfume, and the froth of death’s * lips bubbles up in the champagne. I am told that in some of the cities there are parents who have actually given up housekeeping and gone to boarding that they may give their time inimitably to social dissipations. I have known such cases. I have known family after family blasted in that way in one or the other cities where I preached, father and mother turning their hacks on all quiet culture and all the amenities of home, leading forth their entire family in the wrong direction. Annihilated, worse than annihilated—for there , are some things worse than annihilation. If there is anything on qarth beautiful to me, it is an aged woman, her white locks flowing ■ back over tho wrinkled brow—locks not white with frost, as the poets” say, buy whit© with the blossoms of the tree of life,, in her voice the tenderness of gracious memories, her face a benediction. As grandmother passed through the room the grandchildren pull at her dress, and she almost falls in her weakness, but she has nothing but candy or cake ora Jcind word * for the little darlings. When sh© gets out of her wagon in front of the> house, the whole family rush out and cry, “Grandma’s come!” and when she goes away from us never to return, there is a shadow on the table/ and a shadow on the heart. But if there is anything distressful it is to see an old woman ashamed of the fact that she is old. What with alt the artificial appliances, she is tqp much for my gravity. I laugh even in church when I see her coming.! The worst bird on earth is at peacock when it haslost its feathers.! I would not give one lock of my old 1 mother’s gray hair for 50,000 sueb caricatures of humanity. , With many life is a masquerade ball, and as at such entertainments gentlemen and ladies put on the garb of kings ahd queens or mountebanks or clowns and at the colse put off the disguise, so a great manv pass their whole life in a mask, taking off the mask at death. While the masquerade ball of life goes on thev trip merrily over the floor, gemmed hand is stretched to gemmed hand, and gleaming brow bends to gleaming brow. On with the dance! Flush and rustle and laughter of immeasurable merrymaking. But after awhile the languor of death comes on the limbs and blurs the eyesight. Lights lower. Floor hollow with spulehral echo. Music saddened to a wail. Now the maskers are only seen in the dim light. Now the fragrance of the flowers is like the sickening odor that comes from garlands that have lain long in th© vaults of cemeteries. Lights lower. Oh, how many of you have floated far away from God through social dissipations! And it is time you turned. For I remember that there were two vessels on the sea and in a storm. It was very, very dark, and the two vessels were going straight for each other, and the captain knew it not. But after awhile the man on the lookout saw the approaching ship, and shouted, “Hard a larboard!” and from the other vessel the cry went up, “Hard a-larboard!” and they turned just enough to glance by and passed in safety to their harbors. Some of vou are in the storm of temptation? and you Are driving on and coming toward fearful collisions unless you cha ige your course. Hard a-larboardi Turn ye, Urn ye, for “why will y« die. 0 house of Israel?”