After what I have said as to the position of the actor in China my
readers will not be surprised at my saying that the performance of a
conjuror should not be encouraged. What pleasure can there be in being
tricked? It may be a great display of dexterity to turn water into
wine, to seem to cut off a person's head, to appear to swallow swords,
to escape from locked handcuffs, and to perform the various cabinet
tricks, but cleverness does not alter the fact that after all it is
only deception cunningly contrived and performed in such a way as to
evade discovery. It appears right to many because it is called
"legerdemain" and "conjuring" but in reality it is exactly the same
thing as that by which the successful card-sharper strips his victims,
viz., such quickness of hand that the eye is deceived. Should we
encourage such artful devices? History tells many stories as to the
way in which people have been kept in superstitious bondage by
illusions and magic, and if it be now held to be right to deceive for
fun how can it be held to have been wrong to deceive for religion?
Those who made the people believe through practising deception
doubtless believed the trick to be less harmful than unbelief. I
contend, therefore, that people who go to see conjuring performances
derive no good from them, but that, on the contrary, they are apt to be
impressed with the idea that to practise deception is to show
praiseworthy skill. It is strange how many people pay money to others
to deceive them. More than ever before, people to-day actually enjoy
being cheated. If the tricks were clumsily devised and easily detected
there would be no attraction, but the cleverer and more puzzling the
trick the more eagerly people flock to see it.
Christian preachers and moralists could do well to take up this matter
and discourage people from frequenting the exhibitions of tricksters.
There are doubtless many laws in nature yet undiscovered, and a few
persons undoubtedly possess abnormal powers. This makes the
cultivation of the love of trickery the more dangerous. It prevents
the truth from being perceived. It enables charlatans to find dupes,
and causes the real magician to be applauded as a legerdemainist. This
is what the New Testament tells us happened in the case of Jesus
Christ. His miracles failed to convince because the people had for a
long time loved those who could deceive them cleverly.[1] The people
said to him, "Thou hast a devil," and others warned them after his
death saying, "That deceiver said while he was yet alive 'After three
days I will rise again.'" When people are taught not only to marvel at
the marvelous but to be indifferent to its falsehoods they lose the
power of discrimination, and are apt to take the true for the false,
the real for the unreal.
For an evening's healthy enjoyment I believe a circus is as good a
place as can be found anywhere. The air there is not close and
vitiated as in a theater; you can spend two or three hours comfortably
without inhaling noxious atmospheres. It is interesting to note that
the circus is perhaps the only form of ancient entertainment which has
retained something of its pristine simplicity. To-day, as in the old
Roman circuses, tiers of seats run round the course, which in the
larger circuses is still in the form of an ellipse, with its vertical
axis, where the horses and performers enter, cut away. But the modern
world has nothing in this connection to compare with the Circus Maximus
of Rome, which, according to Pliny, held a quarter of a million
spectators. It is singular, however, that while the old Roman circuses
were held in permanent buildings, modern circuses are mostly travelling
exhibitions in temporary erections. In some respects the entertainment
offered has degenerated with the change, for we have to-day nothing in
the circus to correspond to the thrilling chariot races in which the
old Romans delighted. I wonder that in these days of restless search
for novelties some one does not re-introduce the Roman chariot race
under the old conditions, and with a reproduction of the old
surroundings. It would be as interesting and as exciting as, and
certainly less dangerous than, polo played in automobiles, which I
understand is one of the latest fads in the West. A modern horse-race,
with its skill, daring and picturesqueness, is the only modern
entertainment comparable to the gorgeous races of the Romans.
The exhibition of skillful feats of horsemanship and acrobatic displays
by juvenile actors, rope-dancing, high vaulting and other daring
gymnastic feats seen in any of our present-day circuses are
interesting, but not new. The Romans had many clever tight-rope
walkers, and I do not think they used the long pole loaded at the ends
to enable them to maintain their equilibrium, as do some later
performers. Japanese tumblers are very popular and some of their
tricks clever, but I think the Western public would find Chinese
acrobats a pleasant diversion. With practice, it would seem as if when
taken in hand during its supple years there is nothing that cannot be
done with the human body. Sometimes it almost appears as if it were
boneless, so well are people able by practice to make use of their
limbs to accomplish feats which astonish ordinary persons whose limbs
are less pliable.
The trapeze gives opportunity for the display of very clever
exhibition, of strength and agility; at first sight the gymnast would
appear to be flying from one cross-bar to the other, and when watching
such flights I have asked myself: "If a person can do that, why cannot
he fly?" Perhaps human beings will some day be seen flying about in the
air like birds. It only requires an extension of the trapeze "stunt".
Travelling in the air by means of airships or aeroplanes is tame sport
in comparison with bird-like flights, whether with or without
artificial wings.
There are many advantages in being able to travel in the air. One is a
clear and pure atmosphere such as cannot be obtained in a railway car,
or in a cabin on board a ship; another is the opportunity afforded of
looking down on this earth, seeing it as in a panorama, with the people
looking like ants. Such an experience must broaden the mental outlook
of the privileged spectator, and enable him to guess how fragmentary
and perverted must be our restricted view of things in general. There
is, however, danger of using such opportunities for selfish and
mischievous purposes. A wicked man might throw a bomb or do some other
wicked nonsense just as some one else, who really sees things as they
are and not as they seem to be, might employ his superior knowledge to
benefit himself and injure his fellows; but the mention of the trapeze
and its bird-like performers has diverted me from my theme.
I suppose that a reference to the circus would be incomplete which
overlooked the clowns, those poor survivals of a professional class of
jesters who played what appears to have been a necessary part in
society in ruder days, when amusements were less refined and less
numerous. The Chinese have never felt the need of professional
foolers, and I cannot say that I admire the circus clown, but the
intelligence which careful training develops in the horse, the dog,
etc., interests me a good deal. An instance of this came under my own
observation during a recent visit to Shanghai of "Fillis' Circus". Mr.
Fillis had a mare which for many years had acted the part of the horse
of a highway robber. The robber, flying from his enemies, urges the
animal beyond its strength, and the scene culminated with the dying
horse being carried from the arena to the great grief of its master.
When this entertainment was given in Shanghai this horse--"Black
Bess"--fell sick. A tonic was administered in the shape of the lively
tune which the band always played as she was about to enter the arena
and play her part as the highwayman's mare. The animal made pitiable
attempts to rise, and her inability to do so apparently suggested to
the intelligent creature the dying scene she had so often played. She
lay down and relaxed, prepared to die in reality. The attendants,
ignorant of the manner in which the horse had let herself go, tried to
lift her, but in her relaxed condition her bowels split--Black Bess had
acted her part for the last time.
[1] This is a rather unorthodox view, but nonetheless interesting,
especially as it pertains to his following statements.--A. R. L., 1996.