will want pleasure and relaxation and knowing also that he ought to have it. But the day furnishes time enough for class work and study and recreation and sleep if the twenty-four hours are intelligently utilized, and there is plenty of healthful recreation for the body and the mind if one will look for it.
The temptation to waste time in gambling is an everpresent danger. There is a fascination in risking your judgment in a bet with another fellow or in a game of chance, which many a young man finds it hard to resist. It is so easy to argue that one must have some recreation, and, that if the time spent in playing games of chance is not intemperate or in excess of what one can afford, there should be no objection to the practice on the part of any sensible people. As to the money lost or won (for some one usually wins) it is often a negligible quantity, and in most cases not more perhaps than you might spend on a first class show or entertainment of any sort.
"What is the harm to me?" a young man asked me not long ago. "I can afford the time and the money it costs me. Why should I not play poker for money?"
I should answer that it is a dangerous habit, because it almost invariably leads to excesses. The gambler learns to take risks which he can not afford, to waste time that should be given to something else, to bet and to lose money which was not intended for this purpose, and he develops at once a reputation for unreliability. No business man, even if he himself gambles, cares to em-
