Show HEAL REAL AND IDEAL human life its ambitions and its trials in its lores lotes and hates s ought a to visit a theatrical performance was a question that presented itself afier after a visit to the second ward musical and dramatic entertainment on friday last and au an equally important query also a asserted helf ri namely amely 1 Is 18 novel reading beneficial X an idea undoubtedly prevails pretty generally against the novel and the stage aud and no doubt too much novel reading and theatregoing theatre going anre oner merva bating ting yet the stage flourishes and there ia is no end to the maki making tL of books boobs the novel and the play it ia is well known present more or I 1 lees m faithful or grotesque pictures of human humen life its ambitions ambitious and its trials its loves and hates batea and vices and virtues its heroisms and its it follies and meu men an of women are interested in these matters and when they are not busied in the tle engrossing claims of self like to be amused or excited or wrought upon by some story ofa of a fellow creatures life to be sure the sympathy and kindness of the play goer or the novel dovel reader burthe ideal hero or heroine are tran transient and superficial still even this mild and fleeting interest in the affairs of the world is better than nothing as is the taste for dance music or gaudy colored though vastly short of a cultured appreciation of and raphael preferable to a dull apathy and towards ert art in an any y form the mue ician who has once fell felt the magic hi influence fluence of of deep bar diony aud and the art lover luver who has been through the eyes of art will audber at auten waltz or tha tho cheap chromo and edep eo will the brudent who has conned the book of humanity or known the pathos and the wonder of a single e coonc in ta alio 11 vf 1 ay the novel and the play as fro frothy ti y and bodiless creations mere re t ipa paper per bullets bullet of thell brain which lan cies fond with gaudy shapes pos echo could we get got nothing stronger and in veeter than what tha the drama list or the nov lovelest ov elest provide our minds must be content with such light food but there is abundance of nobler provender all ready tu to our hand in the streets et in the workshops and in the mines mine on the deck odthe of the emigrant vessel or in the etui emigrant grant train in the soldiers barracks the gay saloons and the public market places for what are these but the bookshelves of nature whereon stand a myriad of books bound in cloth every one of them of thrilling interest ayery one of them true strange is the contrast between the real and the ideal stra strange ia is the fleeting sensibility of th the audience at a play or the readers of a tale the lady who passes the pallid solicitor fl for or aim too often to be teen in ja large 7 cities unheeded in the wintry streets sheds honest tears of pity over t the be imaginary ings ringa of a juliet julie t or a desdemona de niona the well fed well leaning gentleman who reputes the weary tain soaked tramp with a curt no nol will when at the thed theatre tre bagh badly for the simu wea weakness knets of a lka chapeau Coa peau or the sham grief of a lear the kindly matron who cries over the fate jaruth of ji ruth oakley can be ster 0 and cold enough in her judgment of au erring girl in real life what then n ij thia and why are mercy and charily charity and brother mylove te merely rely fine hue spun theories too delicate an and I 1 coebly to bear the strain of daily use that we so lavish them upon the picture or the leei and so cruelly husband them in our worldly dealings dea liuga are fi fie a tinious misery and pain mure more touching than the tears of the wretched and the deep groans of the Is iii sentimentality su so much sweeter or is it so much cheaper than sentiment in the whole wide world there is no interest so noble so pure pare so powerful and BO so deep as a the human iut erect the proper study of 11 afkind is man perhaps there is no gift soun un bouru 11 a as 8 the gift girt of reading the human book is no book iao little read yet mark it well ye slates nien and ye and alil soldat re r ye preachers and school tea cheri until men be he po poss seed eted se ed of this knowledge they shall be ignorant even though they have had 1 n university 1 education until nation learn to tu love and trust and eludy each other there can con he be no abiding peace no iuro i uro g government no trade no amity of claer cla fc i true LIBERTY oct 18 1886 |