Recreation, as we have said, is something very different from amusement. It is the _re-creating_ or renewing the overtasked mental or bodily powers, by some relaxing and restoring exercise. It is pleasurable, as all right things ever are; but here is the all-important distinction--pleasure is not its _end_. The accompanying enjoyment is only a laxative and recreative _means_ to something higher and more ultimate, and more _real_ in human existence; and it is only on this ground that it becomes either rational or innocent. Amusement never can be either. But those who need recreation in this sense will never seek it in the theatre. The reason presents itself at once. Experience concurs with the _a priori_ view, derived from the very nature of the thing, in declaring that it can never be found there. The emotions called out in the play-house are exciting--they are exhausting--they are dissipating. In each of these aspects they are at war with the legitimate idea of the recreative. They stimulate but do not invigorate. All mere pleasure-seeking has in it an element of death. It has its ground in a morbid feeling of want which is ever rendered still more morbid by gratification. It is the same with that which lies at the foundation of the appetite for stimulating drinks, except that here it affects the whole spiritual system. In a word, the truly recreative exercises of the soul, in which pleasure is a means and not an end, are ever attended by a sense of freedom, and this is the best characteristic by which they are to be distinguished from others that assume the appearance and the name. Whatever is healthful, either to body or soul, is never enslaving. The counterfeit passion for enjoyment, on the other hand, is ever binding the spirit to a deeper and still deeper bondage. From the one, the mind returns with a healthier and heartier relish to the more arduous and serious duties of life; the other at every repetition renders such duties more and more the objects of an ever growing distaste and aversion. The slightest observation of the habitual frequenters of the theatre will determine to which class of mental exercises the influence of its representations are to be assigned.