what a squandering of money are you guilty, if you pay thirty-five dollars at a Theatre for that which you can have for five dollars at the utmost in your closets, and enjoy much better. The advantages of the closet course are not only the saving of thirty dollars in money at least-but the saving of much time-avoiding many temptations-and, if you possess a relish for such studies, the learning of more from a piece in one serious and attentive reading, than from nine stage exhibitions of the same production: And if you find you have no taste for dramatic composition, then Shakspeare will be the first and the last purchase you will make of the kind; and you will, it is to be hoped, turn your attention to more profitable as well as more pleasing studies. If you should now ask me, why not read sermons and orations in the closet, as well as plays? I answer, there is no objection, provided you do not appropriate the Sabbath, or that portion of it in which, in order to set a good example, you are bound to attend public worship, which is morally binding on all mankind. There is, however, a great difference between the Theatre and the bar, the legislative hall or the church, as to the mental improvement to be derived from any or all of them. Whatever you hear in a Theatre, is invariably attended by such circumstances, that you cannot se

riously reflect upon it; but if you listen to an orator at the bar, the legislative forum, or the pulpit, you are not disturbed by noise or clamor of any kind; and your attention diverted by all sorts of frivolous and dangerous allurements; you are, on the contrary, at full liberty to listen without interruption, and calmly weigh, as the speaker proceeds, his principles and his arguments; and moreover, if the speaker be a man of talents and candor, you receive valuable information, far above being compared with the paltry wit, or even the brightest poetical fiction, that belongs to the stage.

We must not quit this subject without at least a brief allusion to one argument which has been advanced in support of the Albany Theatre. It is said to be useful in alluring merchants, from the north and the west, to stop and trade here instead of going to New-York. This is a poor compliment indeed to the virtue and piety of the northern and western merchants; nor is it any higher compliment to the merchants of Albany, But we are reluctant to believe that it is the Albany commercial spirit to barter God for gain; to set traps to catch customers, as savages set them to catch wolves or bears; to build a temple to God on one side of a street, to catch the pious northern or western merchant; and a temple to God's antithesis on the other side, to catch

the impious one! "Perish commerce, perish credit!" so that our party keep uppermost, was the exclamation and the meaning of a political partizan; and the sentiment has been justly execrated: But still worse, and horrible indeed would be the exclamation-Perish religion, perish piety!—but keep up the Theatre for the sake of commerce! Yea, let our youth ruin their morals, and sink their souls into perdition, sooner than lose a few impious and dissipated customers; customers, by the bye, often better lost than gained; for the visiting of Theatres is prima facie evidence of a man's unfitness for business, if not of his being unworthy of credit. But where would this argument lead us? If New-York holds out allurements for sinners to come and trade with her, Albany must do the same! Whatever vice New-York encourages, to induce the weak and vicious to spend their trading capital with her, Albany must adopt the same vice from the same foul motive! If, then, New-York should be weak and wicked enough to give a premium for the establishment of a brothel in every street, to allure merchants from abroad to visit her, Albany must do the same! But suppose we carry out the principle, and say, that if the New-Yorkers should conclude to imitate the example of Cato and some other Roman and heathen worthies, and lend their wives

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for a few days or weeks, to all country dealers who should give them the preference in trade, the Albanians must follow suit, and perhaps throw their daughters into the bargain, for the sake of trade! There is no fiction or fallacy in this reasoning; for the Theatre is the nurse of every vice, and especially of the vices we have alluded to, and of some others equally ruinous to society. If then we wish to allure strangers to trade or settle among us, let us have nobler motives to urge, than that of affording them facilities to commit sin! Let us urge upon them, that Albany being near the head of navigation of a mighty river, and the main link in the great commercial chain that connects the ocean with the lakes, must ever be a place for honest industry and lawful enterprize, such as promote human prosperity and happiness, to succeed in: That her two never-failing streams, the l'atroon's creek and Norman's kill, afford water powers, which, when once brought fairly into operation, will alone maintain a population of at least from five to ten thousand more than she now possesses: That she has temples of science enough for all who love learning; temples of piety enough for all who love religion; a climate favorable to all who study health; and resources in general, either for trade, mechanic arts, or speculation of any kind, equal to those of any

city of her size in the world: That here, in short, the honest, industrious and enterprizing man of any trade or profession will always find "scope and verge enough," for the lawful and virtuous exercise of all his faculties or talents, with the best prospects of becoming wealthy and respectable; provided that he minds his business in all business hours, takes none but innocent pleasures, and serves God, as well as man, with zeal and fidelity, as every human being is bound to do.* These are the motives to urge upon emigrants to Albany; for these things, and these alone, must cause her to prosper and flourish. She must learn to know, that "the fear of the Lord," and not the vicious amusements of the Theatre, "is the beginning of wisdom," if she would lay broad, deep and lasting, the foundations of her prosperity and happiness. Tell us not, then, that the foul argument we are combatting, is the commercial spirit of Albany !— of Albany! whose foundations were laid by the hands of honest toil and daring enterprize-by

* We have recently travelled much in the North and the West; and of very many cities and villages that we have visited, we have seen none superior to Albany, either for business or rational enjoyments of any kind; nor have we seen any surrounded by more beautiful or sublime natural scenery. In fact, the man who cannot live by industry in Albany-or rather, perhaps, we should say, in the states of NewYork, New-Jersey and Pennsylvania - cannot live any where. He may go to Michigan, or Missouri, or Texas, or Mexico, if he pleases, and he will find no better place than Albany to get a living in, by honest industry; the only way in which any good man can wish to get a living, because God ordained it, and has commanded us to pursue it.