Practicable Socialism, New Series

by S. A. Barnett; Mrs. S. A. Barnett

Pleasure should not only give enjoyment, it should also increase the capacity for enjoyment. It should strengthen a man’s whole being, enrich memory and call forth effort and co-operation.

Music, games of skill, books, athletics, foreign travel, cycling, walking tours, sailing, photography, picture galleries, botanical rambles, antiquarian researches, and many other recreations too numerous to mention call out the growth of the powers, as well as feed what exists; they excite active as well as passive emotions; they enlist the receiver as a co-operator; they allow the pleasure-seekers to feel the joy of being the creating children of a creating God.

As we consider the subject, the chasm between right and wrong pleasures, worthy and unworthy recreations, seems to become deeper and broader, often though crossed by bridges of human effort, triumphs of dexterity, evidences of skill wrought by patient practice, which, though calling for no thought in the spectator, yet rouses his admiration and provides standards of executive excellence, albeit directed in regrettable channels.

Still, broadly, recreations may be divided between those which call for effort, and therefore make towards progress, and those which breed idleness and its litter of evils; but (and this is the inherent difficulty for reformers) the mass of the people, rich and poor alike, will not make efforts, and as the “Times” once so admirably put it—“They preach to each other the gospel of idleness and call it the gospel of recreation”.

The mass, however, is our concern. Those idle rich, who seek their stimulus in competitive expenditure; those ignorant poor, who turn to the examples of brute force for their pleasure; those destructive classes, whose delight is in slaying or eliminating space; they are all alike in being content to be “Vacant of our glorious gains, like a beast with lower pleasures, like a beast with lower pains”.

Our Church and Recreation.

What can the clergymen and the clergy women do? It is not easy to reply, but there are some things they need not do. They need not promote monster treats, they need not mistake excitement for pleasure, and call their day’s outing a “huge success,” because it was accompanied by much noise and the running hither and thither of excited children; they need not use their Institutes and Schoolrooms to compete with the professional entertainer, and feel a glow of satisfaction because a low programme and a low price resulted in a full room; they need not accept the people’s standard for songs and recitations, and think they have “had a capital evening,” when the third-rate song is clapped, or the comic reading or dramatic scene appreciated by vulgar minds. Oh! the waste of curates’ time and brain in such “parish work”. How often it has left me mourning.

What the clergymen and women can do is to show the people that they have other powers within them for enjoyment, that effort promotes pleasure, and that the use of limbs, with (not instead of) brains, and of imagination, can be made sources of joy for themselves and refreshment for others. Too often, toys, playthings, or appliances of one sort or another are considered necessary for pleasure both of the young and the mature. Might we not concentrate efforts to provide recreation on those methods which show how people can enjoy themselves, their own powers and capacities? Such powers need cultivation as much as the powers of bread-winning, and they include observation and criticism. “What did you think of it?” should be asked more frequently than “How did you like it?” The curiosity of children (so often wearying to their elders) is a natural quality which might be directed to observation of the wonders of Nature, and to the conclusion of a story other than its author conceived.

“From change to change unceasingly, the soul’s wings never furled,” wrote Browning; and change brings food and growth to the soul; but the limits of interest must be extended to allow of the flight of the soul, and interests are often, in all classes, woefully restricted. It is no change for a blind man to be taken to a new view. Christ had to open the eyes of the blind before they could see God’s fair world, and in a lesser degree we may open the eyes of the born blind to see the hidden glories lying unimagined in man and Nature. In friendship also there are sources of recreation which the clergy could do much to foster and strengthen, and the introduction and opportunities which allow of the cultivation of friendship between persons of all classes with a common interest, is peculiarly one which parsons have opportunities to develop.

And last but not least, there are the joys which come from the cultivation of a garden—joys which continue all the year round, and which can be shared by every member of the family of every age. These might be more widely spread in town as well as country. Municipalities, Boards of Guardians, School Managers, and private owners often have both the control of people and land. If the Church would influence them, more children and more grown-ups might get health and pleasure on the land. I must not entrench on the subject of Garden Cities and Garden Suburbs—but the two subjects can be linked together, inasmuch as the purest, deepest, and most recreative of pleasures can be found in the gardens which are the distinctive feature of the new cities and suburbs.