University of Virginia Library

MORALITY—HORSE RACING.

There is a kind of people who, instead of finding

are gifted by nature with a peculiar quickness in
perceiving and detecting vice and wickedness in
every variety of form and complexion. They have
an aptitude in raking and scraping together all the
bad which is generally mixed up with worldly pursuits
and amusements, and of overlooking whatever
of good may be mingled therewith. Whether
this intimate acquaintance with evil habits and
feelings—this familiarity with the obliquities of
human nature, is to be accounted for upon the principle
embodied in the shrewd proverb of “set a
thief to catch a thief,” ought to be left to people
more charitable in their constructions than themselves,
or the verdict would not be at all flattering.
The worst of the matter is, they claim this sharp
perception of the vile and vicious as a sort of merit,
and account it pure stern morality harshly to censure
what they dislike in the conduct of others.
They take a one-sided view of all things, try them
according to their own standard of propriety, and so
decide that they are altogether right or altogether
wrong: they cannot bring themselves to see that
“the web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and
ill together,” that “our virtues would be proud if
our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would
despair if they were not cherished by our virtues.”
This is rather too reasonable and philosophical a
view of the question for them, and in reason and
philosophy they profess to place but little faith.
These infallible personages have seen or heard
that there are such things as foolishness and
frivolity in ball rooms, and therefore, without taking
into account the innocent mirth and harmless gaiety
which there predominate, they set down balls as
very foolish and frivolous affairs; they have seen or
heard that there are specks of immorality and dissoluteness
to be met with in a theatre, and therefore
set down a theatre as a concentration of all
that is dissolute and immoral; they have seen or
heard that blacklegs, vagabonds, sharpers, &c. attend
race courses, and therefore set down all that
go as blackages, vagabonds, or sharpers. They are
great generalizers, and account a man who stands
and looks at one full-blooded horse running agains
another as a species of monster, incapable of discharging
the moral and social duties of society.

There has always been a particularly large quantity
of cant abroad on the subject of morality; and
the foundation of it appears to be laid in an erroneous
belief of the extreme susceptibility of human
nature to impressions of either good or evil. Men's
morals, like their constitutions, are more permanent
and durable than is frequently imagined, and neither
so easily destroyed or mended as mental or
medical hypochondriacs would have us believe. A
man beholds a discreditable action or hears a questionable
speech, and is no worse for it; or he sees a
virtuous action and listens to a lecture containing
the most excellent advice, and is no better for it.
This is the case ninety-nine times out of a hundred;
and it takes a long familiarity with either
good or evil to make a permanent impression on
one with any pretensions to stability of character.
Nothing can be more childish than to hear the advocates
or opponents of the stage, for instance, endeavor
to settle its general tendency by picking out
little speeches and sentences either for or against
morality; and the mistakes to which this habit of
looking at details and neglecting the sum total have

given rise, are very curious. Many a play, like a
man, has acquired a good character by sounding
words and lip-professions only. An author will
make a well-meaning peer or potentate declaim
upon vice or virtue in the abstract, or in cases far
removed from common life and every-day occurrences,
and gain much credit for the excellent tendency
of his drama; while Gay's “Beggar's Opera,”
which exposes in plain language the disgusting
selfishness and utter want of feeling and principle
in characters and amid scenes which take place
under our very noses, has been more than once
hissed off the stage for its immorality! So much
for consistency.

For my own part I always loved horse-racing,
and even when a child, and the qualities of horses
were totally unknown to me, exhibited an incipient
propensity for betting by making tiny wagers on
the colors of the riders. Since that I have seen
many a race, and never found my health, morals,
or temper any the worse for so doing. It is a
fine sight at all times to look upon a good horse;
but to see one of the noblest of a noble species led
on to the race-course previous to starting, his polished
skin glancing and glistening in the sun as
he moves gracefully along, is as glorious a picture
of animated nature as a poet or painter would wish

to behold. What fire and expression in his
eye! what a union of strength and beauty in his
finely moulded limbs! How light and elastic his
step—it seems as if it would scarcely crush the
young grass on which he treads. And then to see
him matched with another, or others, like himself
The anxiety you fell about the fairness of the start
—the quickened pulse and rapid circulation of the
blood during the race, and the all-absorbing interest
of the final struggle, are indescribable, and I am
sorry for those who have never experienced them.
But then, cry your moralists, this occasions betting,
and betting is gambling. Such a consequence by
no means follows; but admit it for the sake of argument.
What is this to the gambling that is carried
on on 'change, or other high places of Mammon?
Is not the cotton trade gambling? Are
not manufacturing speculations gambling? And
is not the banking system gambling, or something
worse? Yet who ever hears of the immorality of
those grave concerns? And as for betting, men
will bet on some subject or other, and a horse-race
is perhaps the very best thing they can exercise
their talents upon,
is true enough, and accordingly men bet on all
things—on the death or marriage of their friends—
on the election of their magistrates—on their own
weight, height, or circumference, or the weight,
height, or circumference of their neighbors. Then
again the consistency of some very good people
who look with horror on the betting of a dollar
whether one horse runs faster than another, yet
who I know invest large sums in lottery experiments—the
worst, because the most foolish species
of gambling. But the truth is, the world is made
up of people who, as Butler says,

A volume composed of the lives or anecdotes of
celebrated race horses would be an interesting study
to the naturalist, the physiognomist, the craniologist,
and the philosopher. A race-horse is an intelligent
being, and not a mere machine urged forward
by a man upon its back. Some of them are
as capricious and fanciful as a fine lady, and some
as obstinate and self-willed as a doctor of laws;
while others again are equally as sensible and
knowing as those who bestride them; and from
natural good sense, and long and extensive experience,

acquire a fund of practical information and
intelligence on racing subjects. In numerous qualities,
not only physical but mental, they are infinitely
superior to many a biped, whose memoirs
are frequently obtruded upon the public in two
volumes octavo; and I have somewhere read an
epitaph on one, which shows that I am not alone
in my friendly feelings towards these high-spirited
animals.