There is No Harm in Dancing written by W. E. Penn
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W. E. Penn >> There is No Harm in Dancing
THEY HAVE LOST ALL SELF-RESPECT.
They are now at sea without chart or compass. When a man or woman loses
their self-respect, they are moral wrecks. "WANDERING STARS." There is
nothing left to build upon. It is from this cause that thousands commit
suicide, both men, women, and girls. It is the continual gnawings of the
conscience over the secret sins and crimes they have not the moral
courage to confess. Like the hidden spark of fire in a bale of cotton,
it continues its ravages until the whole bale is reduced to ashes. This
will account in great measure for the hundreds and thousands of
_unaccountable_ suicides of to-day, which are principally confined to
the young of both sexes.
I do not mean to say that all the young men go to drinking saloons as
soon as they carry their girls home, or as soon as the ball or dance is
over. No, many of them go to other places, such as are described in the
5th chapter of Proverbs. _Men will not deny this_. Who caused these men
to go to these places? Shall I answer? Shall I tell the truth? If I do,
I must say it is the virtuous wives, daughters, sisters and sweethearts,
who have been participating in the dance. _Every man knows that this is
true_. Let every honest physician send in a report of all his male
patients, giving the disease of each and the cause, and then let us have
a correct report from the dead of the same kind, and I am confident that
no husband, father or brother would ever permit his wife, daughter or
sister to be seen at a ball or dance. HUSBANDS, FATHERS, BROTHERS, your
wives, daughters and sisters do not know these things, _but you do know
them_, and now that your eyes are open, will you, can you, as a husband,
father or brother, ever permit the females under your care to even take
the chance of being RECRUITING OFFICERS for these sinks of perdition,
THESE ANTE-CHAMBERS OF HELL. These places, dripping with the blood of
hundreds and thousands of young and middle-aged men, who, but for their
enchantment, might have been good and true men, and have filled
honorable graves. These places have broken the hearts of thousands of
wives, mothers and: sisters, when they have seen their loved ones bound
in the fetters and chains of eternal death. These funnels, through which
thousands and millions of souls of both men and women have been poured
into an endless hell.
I have tried to furnish fair samples of the fruit of dancing, if I have
failed, it is an error of the head and not of the heart. It may be said
by some that I have occupied forbidden ground in writing a book to be
read by the public generally. In reply I can only say that I have simply
_followed the varmint to his hiding place_. I have not used any stronger
or more indecent language than was used by Jesus Christ, and God forbid
that I should ever be guilty of the sacrilege of saying or even thinking
that Jesus Christ was _vulgar_ or wanting in _refinement_; that ever I
should say of and concerning Him: "_I am holier than Thou_." If the
things I have herein mentioned have flowed from the ball room, if I have
stated FACTS, and _I know that I have_, you should not get mad at me,
but get mad at the _facts_. If a man lends a helping hand in removing a
_dead dog_ from the yard, it is not the man that is indecent, _it is the
dead dog_. The man shows his decency and kindness by condescending to
give aid in removing the stench from the premises, and no one but a
contemptible _snipe dude_ would stand off and turn up his nose and call
the man indecent and vulgar. If I am wrong, I rejoice to know that I am
in the best company on earth, for the whole religious world, with a
_few_ exceptions, regards dancing as an enemy to good morals, and as
_destructive to all spirituality_, because it is productive of so much
evil and NO GOOD. Who upon all the earth has the opportunity of knowing
the true inwardness of dancing like the Catholic priests and bishops?
Who ever held and used such a _probing instrument_ as the CONFESSIONAL?
Who on this earth can come as near knowing all the acts and deeds, yea,
and the very _thoughts_, that do pass through the minds and hearts of
men, women, boys and girls, as the Catholic priests and bishops can know
of and concerning those under their charge? Arch-Bishop J. Henry William
Elder, Co-Adjutor to the Arch-Bishop of Cincinnati, has issued a
circular letter to the clergy in his Diocese, from which I take this
very significant clipping:
"THERE MUST BE NO ROUND DANCING AT ANY TIME, AND NO DANCING OF ANY KIND
AFTER DARK."
What meaneth then this blating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing
of the oxen which I hear? Why does Arch-Bishop Elder inhibit the round
dance even in _day-light_? Mr. and Mrs. ECHO and their girls and boys
will please answer _why_? And why has he inhibited _all kinds_ of
dancing after dark? Will some member of the same family please rise and
explain?
"Oh wad some power the giftie gie us,
To see oursels as ithers see us."
While this circular letter has an existence upon earth, let all
_so-called_ Protestants and their friends, who say "_There is no harm in
dancing_," and who participate in dancing of _any kind at any time or
place_, or who simply attend such places, or who remain at a place after
it has been turned into a dance, (for the aiders and abettors of crime
are just as guilty as their principals), hang their heads for very
shame, as poor old dog Tray hangeth his head when caught in company with
sheep-killing dogs, and especially when some wool is found in his teeth.
Paul was present when Stephen, the first Christian martyr, was put to
death; he only held the clothes of those who cast the stones, but he was
just as guilty of murder as though he had cast the fatal missile, _by
his presence, and making no objection he was consenting to the crime_.
To have relieved himself of the blood of Stephen, he should not have
gone to the place where the murder was committed, if he knew, or had
good reason to know, that a crime was to be committed. If he had gone
there with the belief that it was an _innocent, harmless_ gathering, and
after getting there he saw their murderous intent, he should at least
have left immediately and thus have withdrawn all his influence and
supposed sympathy with the criminals. The holding of their clothes did
not make him guilty, but was only _cumulative_ evidence of the murderous
intent in his heart.
Reader, if you go to a ball or dance, knowing it to be such, you are a
participant in all the sins and crimes which would not have been
committed, if such ball or dance had never been. So if the gathering be
for a _sinless, harmless_ purpose, and you find, after arriving at the
place, that there is to be a dance, and you do not leave immediately,
you will be just as guilty as though you had gone with full knowledge of
what was to be. The encouragement and endorsement of your presence makes
you just as guilty as those who join in the dance. There is no
difference, except in degree, between the select parlor dance and the
masquerade ball, because the one is the stepping stone to the other. Not
one in ten thousand have done their first dancing at the masquerade
ball, just as not one in ten thousand ever took their first drink of
whiskey in a drinking saloon. But let it be remembered that hundreds of
thousands have taken their first drink of wine or whiskey at a ball or
dance.
One of the greatest sins committed by children and young people is
_disobedience to parents._ It is one of the greatest, because it is one
of the first, and because if cultivated it becomes a cesspool of
iniquity. It is a pandora box, out of which ten thousand troubles,
trials, difficulties, sins and crimes will come. I claim that the _love_
of dancing is the most fruitful source of _disobedience to parents_ to
be found beneath the sun, because it becomes a _ruling passion_. If
anything will cause a child to disobey its parents, it is to forbid them
going to a ball or dance when their heart is set upon it. _They go and
then deny it_. For all the disobedience brought about in this way, the
parents are generally far more to blame than the children because it is
the parents' fault that they have ever learned to dance. Some parents
have an idea that dancing is a necessary branch of education, that it
makes their children _graceful_, but never look far enough down the line
to see that they are opening the way to _graceful_ disobedience,
_graceful_ liars, _graceful_ thieves, _graceful_ gamblers, _graceful_
drunkards, _graceful_ prostitutes, _graceful_ whoremongers and to every
sin and crime that men and women can commit beneath the sun. They are
opening the very gates of hell to their own children.
MANY, if not all, of the following sins and crimes are committed at
_every dance, hop or ball,_ and every one present, whether participating
in the dance or not, is equally guilty with the perpetrators of all the
sins and crimes, which would not have been committed if there had been
no such gathering:
SAMPLES OF FRUIT FOUND ON THE TREE OF DANCING:
ENVY.
JEALOUSY.
PRIDE.
DECEIT.
DISOBEDIENCE TO PARENTS
BACKBITING.
STRIFE.
HATRED.
LASCIVIOUSNESS.
EMULATION.
SEDITION.
LYING.
THEFT.
DRUNKENNESS.
SABBATH BREAKING.
GAMBLING.
EMBEZZLEMENT.
SUICIDE.
VULGARITY.
FORNICATION.
ADULTERY.
OBSCENITY.
EXTRAVAGANCE.
DIVORCE.
LUNACY.
WANTONNESS.
CRUELTY.
IDOLATRY.
PERJURY.
SEDUCTION.
PROSTITUTION.
ABORTION.
INFANTICIDE.
ASSASSINATION.
MURDER.
"AND SUCH LIKE."
Every honest man is compelled to admit that these sins and crimes are
the _natural fruit of dancing_; THAT THESE THINGS DO FLOW FROM THE
DANCE. I frankly admit that all these sins and crimes may and do come
from other sources, but I challenge the world to point to any _one_
thing that produces as many of these sins and crimes as the dance. The
drinking saloon is a prolific source of evil, but not one-half as much
as the dance, for it must be borne in mind that _men only_ attend the
saloons, and that many of them are sent there _from the ball room_, and
many, who never would have seen the inside of a drinking saloon but for
the ball or dance. _The ball is a feeder for drinking saloons, gambling
saloons, and houses of ill-fame._
I have delivered this lecture on dancing in seven States, before about
one hundred congregations, numbering from three hundred to ten thousand
people. I have called on all the men, old and young, saint and sinner,
at nearly every place, to give an expression of opinion from what they
had seen themselves, or what they had heard from those who had attended
balls, hops, and such like places, as to the correctness or
incorrectness of my charges against the dance, and out of I think not
less than fifty thousand men, I have never found but SEVEN who stood up,
thereby saying they did not believe that the sins and crimes I had
mentioned had ever flowed from the ball room, while nearly all the
balance stood up before their wives, daughters, sisters, and
sweethearts, saying that they do believe, from what they _know, and have
seen_ and have heard from those who attend balls and hops, that these
sins and crimes are the natural fruit of all kinds of dancing, where the
sexes dance together. A few, perhaps one in twenty, kept their seats,
not expressing their opinion either way. Of this class I think I may
safely say that _four-fifths_ failed to understand my proposition, or
thought it not necessary to rise; but if they had stood up, they would
have been with the affirmative. While I am not an apologist for saloon
keepers and gamblers, I want to record the fact right here that I have
had more or less of them in my congregations, at nearly every place
where I talked on this subject, and I have never known one, no, not one,
to keep his seat when an expression of opinion was called for, and not
one was found among the _immortal seven_.
There are many men worse at heart than gamblers and saloon keepers. If
they and their families were treated by the Christian people with more
kindness, and less like they were outcasts, hundreds and thousands of
them would become Christians. I do not claim that all who attend dancing
parties, balls, and hops are ruined, but I do claim that _all who attend
such places take part in the eternal disgrace and ruin of others._ There
is not a man or woman among the living, or the dead, who has made a
practice of attending such places, but that has the blood of one or more
_lost souls_ upon their garments, _and there it must remain throughout
the ceaseless ages of_ ETERNITY, _unless it be washed away_ BY THE BLOOD
OF JESUS CHRIST.
My sainted mother and my wife have attended and participated in the
dance, but, like hundreds and thousands of girls and women of to-day,
they never had the most distant idea that the dancing party or ball was
a cesspool of iniquity, for, had they known the things brought to light
in this little book, they never would have made one step in that
direction. I believe that God has forgiven them, because, like Paul,
they did it ignorantly. "I obtained mercy, because I did it
_ignorantly_."--I. Tim. 1-13. Reader, if you ever go to one of these
places after your eyes have been opened, as they must be now, you cannot
plead _ignorance_, but you will sin _wilfully_ and _knowingly._ See Heb.
10: 26, 27.
Those who are turned into the paths of shame, of vice, and of crime, are
described in the Bible in the following terrible language, and where
could a better description be found? "Woe unto them! for they have gone
in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for
reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core. These are _spots_ in
your feasts of charity when they feast with you, _feasting themselves
without fear._ Clouds they are without water, _carried about of winds_,
trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by
the roots. _Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own_ SHAME;
_wandering_ STARS to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness
forever."--Jude, 11, 12, 13.
Mothers, wives, daughters, sisters, if there is a doubt left in your
minds as to the charges made against dancing, will you do yourselves,
and those under your influence, the justice to ask your husbands,
fathers and brothers to read this little book, and give you their
_honest opinions_?
* * * * *
VERDICT.
This is to certify that I have carefully read this little book, and give
it as my honest conviction--from what I have seen and what I have heard
from those who have attended dancing parties, balls and hops--that the
charges and specifications are true, and believing them to be true, I
here promise to use all my influence against _all kinds_ of dancing,
while I live on earth.
(Here Sign Name.).............................
Try and get four others to sign with you.
* * * * *
If this little book should be of benefit to any one, I would like to
know it. As it is my intention to get out a second edition, I desire to
collect all _the facts_ I can in support of the charges and
specifications against dancing. Ministers of the Gospel, physicians, and
fathers and mothers, can render me great assistance if they will.
_Names of correspondents will not be published without special
permission_.
There is No Harm in Dancing.
Single Copy, Paper Cover, 25 cts.
Single Copy, Cloth Cover, 30 cts.
Liberal discount to Pastors and Dealers.
* * * * *
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Address:
W. E. PENN,
PALESTINE, TEXAS.