Читать книгу Letters of Peregrine Pickle - George P. Upton - Страница 14

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ARE you a base-ballist? If not, take my word and retire from the world.

You are a nullity, a nothing, a 0.

The cholera of 1866 is among us, but it has assumed the base-ball type. It is malignant, zymotic and infectious. Its results are not so fatal as last year, and manifest themselves in the shape of disjointed fingers, lame legs, discolored noses, and walking sticks.

The disease is prevalent among all classes. Editors, actors, aldermen, clerks, lumbermen, commission men, butchers, book-sellers, doctors and undertakers have it, and many of them have it bad.

Even the tailors tried to make up a club, but as they found it took eighty-one men to make up a nine they gave it up.

The only class not yet represented is the clerical.

More's the pity.

They would derive many advantages from the game. You see they would learn the value of the short stop. That is an important point on warm Sundays. They would also learn to hit hard. There are lots of old sinners who need to be hit that way. This continual pelting away with little theological pop-guns at old sinners whose epidermis is as thick as an elephant's, is of no consequence whatever. The shot rattle off like hailstones from a roof. They must learn to hit hard—hit so it will hurt—hit right between the eyes—fetch their man down, and rather than take such another theological bombshell, he will reconstruct.

There isn't a minister in this city who wouldn't preach better next Sunday for a square game of base-ball. This Christianity of the soft, flaccid, womanish, alabaster, die-away muscle kind, is pretty, but it isn't worth a cent in a stand-up fight with the Devil.

The Devil is not only a hard hitter with the bat, but he is a quick fielder, and he will pick a soul right off the bat of one of these soft muscle men while S. M. is wasting his strength on the air. He has another advantage over our clergymen. Most of them are confined to one base. The Devil plays on all the bases at once, and he can take the hottest kind of a ball without winking. Our ministers ought to get so they can do the same thing.

Melancthon was one of the soft muscle kind. He was gentle, sweet, amiable, gracious, and all that, but if he had been compelled to carry the Reformation on his shoulders, he never would have left his home base. While old Luther, a man of iron muscle, a hard hitter and a hard talker, who keeled the Devil over with his inkstand, and kicked Popes and Popes' theses, bulls and fulmina to the winds, made home runs every time, and left a clean score for the Reformation.

A great many of our ministers have bones—some, rather dry bones—nerves, sinews and muscles, just as an infant has, but they want development. They need blood which goes bounding through the veins and arteries, and tingles to the finger tips. Their sinews must stiffen up, their nerves toughen and their muscles harden. This process can be obtained by base-ball. It will settle their stomachs and livers, and when these are settled, their brains will be clear. They won't have to travel to cure the bronchitis, and won't be so peevish over good sister Thompson, who needs a great deal of consolation, owing to her nervous system.

Now, I would like to see two ministerial nines in the field. Robert Collyer at the bat would be a splendid hitter, and would send the Liberal ball hot to Brother Hatfield, on the short stop, and I would stake all my money that he couldn't make it so hot that Brother H. wouldn't stop it. These two clergymen wouldn't need to practice much, because they represent my idea of muscular Christians. Whenever they hit, they hit hard, and I pity the soft-muscled parson that gets into a controversy with either of them. But then they would get all the rest of the nines into good trim and harden up the muscles of Dr. Ryder and Robert Laird Collier, Father Butler, Dr. Patton, and Revs. Everts and Patterson, and the rest. To be sure, the clerical fingers would sting, and the clerical legs would be stiff, and the clerical backs would ache for a few days, but it would take all the headaches and dizziness, and dyspepsia and liver complaints, and heartburns out of the system. Their inner men would be refreshed, and their outer men regenerated, and they would go into their pulpits with firmer step, and their sermons would be full of blood and muscle, and they would kick the old musty tomes on one side and preach right out of their consciousness and hearts, man to man, and all would get their salaries increased and a month's vacation to go to the seaside.

I tell you, my brethren, in this city of Chicago, the Devil is getting the upper hand, and you must go in on your muscle. Get your backs up. Stiffen your muscles and then hit like a sledge-hammer. If old Crœsus, in your congregation, is a whiskey-seller, don't be afraid of him. Hit him on the head so it will hurt. If Free-on-Board is a professional grain gambler, hit him on the head. If old Skinflint acts dirtily with his tenants, tell him he is a miserable old devil. Don't be afraid of him. He will like you all the better for it. If he won't get down on his knees by fair talking, take hold of his coat-collar and put him upon his knees.

August 17, 1869.