Counsels on Health - Ellen G. White

Other athletic games, though not so brutalizing,
are scarcely less objectionable, because of the
excess to which they are carried. They stimulate
the love of pleasure and excitement, thus fostering
a distaste for useful labor, a disposition to shun
practical duties and responsibilities. They tend to
destroy a relish for life’s sober realities and its
tranquil enjoyments. Thus the door is opened to
dissipation and lawlessness, with their terrible
results.
Parties of Pleasure
As ordinarily conducted, parties of pleasure
also are a hindrance to real growth, either of mind
or of character. Frivolous associations, habits of
extravagance, of pleasure seeking, and too often of
dissipation, are formed, that shape the whole life
for evil. In place of such amusements, parents and
teachers can do much to supply diversions
wholesome and life-giving.
In this, as in all things else that concern our
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