“I am sorry to disappoint him; but, indeed, I cannot.”
“I will teach you the step and figure in half an hour.”
“I do not wish to learn. I have both conscientious and womanly scruples against dancing.”
“I forgot. The Methodists do not sanction dancing, I suppose; but you must admit, Phyllis, that very good people are mentioned in the Bible as dancing.”
“True, Elizabeth; but the religious dances of Judea were triumphant adoration. You will hardly claim so much for the polka or waltz. All ancient dances were symbolical, and meant something. Every motion was a thought, every attitude a sentiment. If the daughter of Herodias had danced a modern cotillion, do you think that John the Baptist’s head would have fallen at her feet?”
“Don’t associate modern dancing with such unpleasant things. We do not want it to mean any thing but pleasure.”
“But how can you find rational pleasure in spinning round like a teetotum in a room of eighty degrees temperature?”
“All people do not waltz; I do not myself.”
“The square dances, then? What are they but slouching mathematical dawdling, and ‘promiscuous’ bobbing around?”
“But people must do something to pass the time.”