Ashamed by Hawk-Eye

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Aug 7, 1879

Ashamed.

By Hawk-Eye

It is said that the once great chess player, Paul Morphy, is in an insane asylum. He utterly repudiates chess, and denies having ever known anything about it. He imagines himself a great lawyer, surrounded by clients, and is busy at all times settling an immense estate left him by his father. The legal part of that information may explain the "insanity dodge." But the chess repudiation casts a cloud upon it. It is evident that he is ashamed of making himself a professional at an amusement. Even a lawyer (much as the newspapers abuse him) is a better man than a professional gamer. Mr. Morphy has our congratulations on having come to his senses, and our condolence for having lost them. If he had attended to his profession, in the days of his youth, before the evil days came, or the years drew nigh when he said, "I have no pleasure in them," he might now be a useful member of society. To neglect a useful and honorable profession for the sake of an evanescent notoriety in a calling that is utterly useless, except as a recreation, does not show sanity.

For some years past Mr. Morphy has been afflicted with mental derangement of a mild form, which has been merely an annoyance to his friends, as they have been compelled to keep constant watch of him to prevent his making himself utterly ridiculous. It is plain to those who know him, that his brain has been turned by the intense strain which his wonderful success as a chess-player, and the great fame it brought to him, occasioned.

This insanity is a serious thing to him—poor fellow; but it is valuable as teaching a lesson to others who are wild about amusements when they ought to be earnest about business. If it required any brain to play base ball, or croquet, or archery, it might be a warning to those professionals and their admirers. It ought to make billiardists and poker-players somewhat nervous—for that kind of gaming requires some little intelligence. But in its seriousness to him who was once the king but now the victim, it preaches a most eloquent sermon against considering pleasure first and business afterward. —Hawk-Eye.