Lotteries and Gift Enterprises.
By D. Hildreth
GAMBLING in one form or another has become very common. I can well remember when public opinion was against this vice, and it was confined to narrow limits. But year by year it has grown until it has assumed enormous proportions. The meshes of this vice are spread all through the business transactions of community, and have invaded the sacred domain of the church. You are asked to buy a candy box because it contains a prize. You are requested to buy a box of collars because it contains a prize. You are induced to go to the concert because every one who buys a ticket gets an envelope which contains either a blank, or a prize worth from twenty-five cents to fifty dollars, and here is an additional inducement to attend the concert, and a form of gambling which seems to be entirely harmless. The regular gambling saloon where money is put up and a game played for the stakes, is only one thread in the web of evil, and is harmless compared with other forms of this vice. Games of chance are getting to be very common, and are associated with business, pleasure and religion; and it becomes those who wish to keep the commandments of God to consider well the principle which underlies this whole thing. If it is right, then we can join with the rest and take our chances of losing a few dollars, or making a few dollars or a few thousands. If the lottery business is an evil, it is terrible to think of the influences and inducements that are thrown around it. It is not confined to narrow limits. Firms and corporations organize gigantic schemes where the prizes amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars. And the churches have opened their doors and turned the temples of God which have been dedicated to his service into gambling saloons, thus giving the influence and sanction of the church of Jesus Christ to this infamous practice. If this practice is wrong, it is time the principle on which it rests should be thoroughly understood. Every action is right or wrong compared with that great standard, the law of God. A takes chances in a lottery for which he pays ten dollars. He gets a blank and receives nothing. B pays ten dollars and draws a prize worth five hundred dollars. Now let us look at this transaction in every possible light and see if it is right. 1. Considered simply as a business transaction it is a fraud, because there is no equivalent for the money. When you buy a piece of cloth at a store, you give the merchant an equivalent for it, namely, money; and the merchant gives you an equivalent for your money, namely, cloth. If you buy a horse or any article whatever, whether you pay for it in money, wheat, wood, or anything else, there is an equivalent given and received by both parties. In the case before us, the lottery owner has ten dollars of A’s money for which he has given no equivalent. B has received $490 for which he has given no equivalent. 2. And more than this, there is not a shadow of a consideration in the matter. You may give to C one hundred dollars, because he is a relative and has claims upon you; you may give D ten dollars, because he is preaching the gospel and should be sustained; you may give E five dollars, because he is sick and cannot earn his bread, and in case of a gift there is always some consideration. 3. Let us consider A and B as Christians and consequently stewards of the Lord. A is enjoined in the Scriptures to give of his Lord’s money for worthy objects which are plainly specified, but when A gives an account of his stewardship, what excuse will he make to his Lord for giving of his money to a professed swindler? For those that follow lottery business are nothing more nor less than swindlers, and were it not for the perverted morals of community, would be prosecuted as such. They follow it to make money, and do make money at it. But what135about B? He has $490 which he did not obtain legitimately. I infer from Deut. 23:18, that money which is not honorably and legitimately obtained, cannot be used in the Lord’s cause. A Christian must feel at least uncomfortable who has money in his pocket that he cannot use in his Master’s service. 4. What is the moral effects of gambling in its varied forms? Anything but good. In olden times when moral principle had a much deeper hold on the community than it has now, it was considered a vice. Has it become so modified and improved that it is now virtuous? Nay, verily. What is wrong at one time, is wrong at all times, and under any phase which it may assume. Pretended communications with the dead, was wrong in the time of Moses and is wrong now, though it has assumed an entirely different phase. The authorities of a certain city recently took measures to abate the gift enterprise business, on account of its moral and pecuniary damage to the city; and I know from personal knowledge that these same authorities cannot be suspected of having better morals than the average of citizens. Does gambling tend to industry or idleness? Who patronize gift enterprises? It is generally those that are inclined to idleness and dissipation. The industrious mechanic and prosperous merchant seldom risk money in such uncertain investments, but it is that class who are not closely following some honorable avocation. It is the loungers and idlers who wish to make money without working for it that patronize these concerns. That this class should fall into this practice is not much wonder, but that good and reliable citizens should countenance this thing is a great calamity; and that Christians and Christian ministers should encourage this vice is terrible to think of. It seems as though the foundations of society were fast breaking up. 5. The principle of gambling is financially unsound. One man buys a farm and improves it, another buys a lot and builds a house on it, several others build a railroad, and so on. Well-cultivated farms, thriving cities and villages, railroads, telegraphs, in fact, all the comforts, conveniences and luxuries, wealth and happiness, of the nation, come through the patient toil of its industrious citizens. Labor and capital continually add to themselves instead of diminishing. But what about gambling considered as a business? What advantage is there in simply changing money from one man’s pocket to another? Manifestly none, and money obtained in this way is generally squandered. Money earned by patient labor is carefully expended; but if it comes without effort, it is not appreciated; and “easy come, easy go” is a true maxim. Useful employment is beneficial to individuals and to society as a whole, but gambling is not. Suppose ten men enter a room with one hundred dollars each and spend a day in playing games for each other’s money, what will be the result? When the day is past, perhaps one man will have ten dollars, another fifty, another one hundred, another five hundred. Let them do the same every day for a week, for a month, for a year, what is the advantage to the ten men taken collectively? Manifestly none. The one thousand dollars which they had at the beginning cannot be increased a single dollar by this process, be it continued longer or shorter. Here is time spent without any advantage to the ten men collectively or to society. Time spent without useful employment is idleness, and here is idleness of the worst type, for the idler indulges the hope of good luck at some future time, and so have money without working for it; and if he should get money in this way, he certainly would not work as long as it lasted. And then gambling is very exciting, and tends to disputes and contentions with more or less serious consequences. It also leads to cheating and deception for the sake of gain. And here is the principle and effects of this whole business, a useless waste of time, and demoralizing effects on those who engage in it. It makes no difference if those who are considered great and good countenance it. It makes no difference if the majority practice it. That does not make it right. Every Christian and true citizen should discountenance it as something that is undermining the morals of society. Every one should have a principle in this matter in order to be able to resist temptation to engage in this practice. Some friend may ask you to engage in a lottery scheme simply as a personal favor, or you may be persuaded to go with the rest in something that looks very harmless, but the safest plan is to let it entirely alone. A clear conscience is a pearl of great price, and a principle should never be deserted even if circumstances seem to justify it, for if we step over the line once, we shall be more apt to do it again, and then again until the power of principle has little or no hold upon us. We should if possible have our minds made up as to what is duty in every respect and then perform it, leaving the consequences with Him whose law we are trying to obey.