RECREATION

Hokitika Guardian, 27 September 1929, Page 7

RECREATION

We arc sometimes told in these days that people do not take any real interest in the big things of life, that the amusements which are most popular are those which require the minimum of responsive effort. And this is not only true of the big tilings, but it is no less true of the beautiful. In iact, that the great trinity which should have the devotion of all, the good, the beautiful, and the true, are being greatly neglected. Perhaps, however, in the summer months, our minds turn more naturally to recreation and holidays. There is a quaint story told of a little girl who one; evening altered her prayer to “Bless thy little pig to-night.” Oi being told to say “lamb” she replied "ino 1 am tired of being a lamb, I want to be something else.”

When the winter months turn to summer, most people can sympathise with the little girl. They want to be something else, they want to be recreated, created anew; and they naturally turn to outdoor recreations and the extra joys summer-time lias given them. After all green grass is the natural home of human kind. But at the same time we should remember that it is recreation, and not the main, or at all events not the only object in life. Life has a two-fold object, a sound mind in a sound body. A very nice idea seems to underlie the ancient saying “the evening and the morning were the first day.” The evening should be regarded, not so. much as a time for recovery from the day’s work, but as a time for getting fit for the next day’s work. So the recreations of summer should not bo regarded so much as a recovery from I 1 work of the winter as a preparation of the body to sustain the work of tl coming winter. Now there may he differences of opinion as to what are the big things of life. There should, as we have said,' he no doubt as to the cultivation of the great three, goodness, beauty, and truth. And for these the cultivation of knowledge is required; Lord Haldane has given an ideal which we should set before ourselves. He says the complete individual “is a man who lias a wide outlook, who has the capacity of understanding his fellow men and of seeing all sides of a question, who is neither biased nor narrow, and neither a pedant on the one nor a j; prig on the other.”

It is a high ideal, but not • and, as we use our opportunities 'for recreation aright in order to clear away the cobwebs, preparing the body to be a sound home for a sound mind, so the chances are increased that the ideal may he attained.