186+  tT
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                THE        #*&+1

        D  E  S I H E
                 FOR

INTOXICATING  LIQUORS

           A  DISEASE:

 Its  Causes, Its Effects, and Its  Cure,

      WITH THE DANGER OF A RELAPSE.
Together with Illustrative Sketches—The Good Sales-
      man—The Would-be Politician, &c.
                  A
          BY GEORGE'MOORE.




"At the last, it biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder."
            Prov. xxiii : 32.
Baltimore......Printed by Sherwood & Co.

             1864.
/ 

V\IM  A
 rV*22<J
ACKNOWLEDGMENT.
  To the Rev. J. N. McJilton, D. D.,  Rector of Mt. Zion
Church, the Author acknowledges his indebtedness for val-
uable assistance in the preparation of this work.   Without
his assistance, he Avould not have been able to accomplish
his purpose in the service he desires to render the cause of
Temperance,  and especially to the Maryland Inebriate Asy-
lum, of which the  Doctor is Vice-President.   When the
subject was  mentioned  to him,  he at once declared  his
willingness to assist, by all possible means, the great cause,
in the success of which every true philanthropist must feel
an i nterest.  My earnest prayer is, that God may bless  the
object I have determined to pursue in doing good.

                                GEORGE MOORE.
  Baltimore, Dec. 18, 1864.
  Entered, according  to the act of Congress, in the year
1864, by George Moore, in the Clerk's Office of the District
Court of the United States for the District of Maryland.
fe-l  ^ 
DEDICATION.
  To the cause of an Inebriate Asylum for
the cure of drunkenness, and to all persons
who are exposed to the temptation of drink-
ing  intoxicating  liquors,  especially  the
young,  on whose  behalf the  kindliest in-
terest is entertained, this volume is respect-
fully
           DEDICATED.
  In the general, as well as in the  especial
application  of  his labor,  the  author  is
animated by  the hope that,  through  the
blessing of God, it may be the means of
restraining  some of  his  felloAv-men from
the abuse of themselves by yielding to  the
desire  he has endeavored to  delineate, or
from the further abuse of their persons and
families after  they  have  so  yielded.   In
consideration of the  causes of the  disease,
which  in the  moral form are insufficient,
and its  causes, which are  sadly afflictive, 
4
the hope is entertained that the propositions
here presented in relation to its cure may
be effective in the accomplishment of their
intended purpose.
  It is the ardent desire of the author, that
an asylum should be established for the re-
formation of confirmed  inebriates.   Con-
finement and treatment  in such an asylum
is the only method  by which drunkenness
may be properly treated as a disease, and
its cure effected.  To accomplish an object
so desirable, it is the  design of the author
to contribute  his means  and labor to the
utmost of his ability, and lie indulges the
hope that he may be sustained and  sup-
ported in this design  by all who desire  its
success. 
      INTRODUCTION.


  In presenting this little book to its read-
er, it may be proper to say a few words by
way of explanation.  In writing it the au-
thor has had four  things in view,  all of
which are  subservient to one  object,  and
that is to benefit, as far as its influence may
extend, a class of my fellow-citizens, who,
like myself, have been  too free in an  in-
dulgence Avhich is  at all times dangerous,
and not unfrequently attended  with  disas-
trous results.   No man  can indulge  in the
habitual use of intoxicating liquors without
the hazard of becoming a victim to  his folly
in the loss of character, of property  and
life.  It were  criminal in the voice  of  ex-
perience to be silent while the  evil is pro-
gressing, and  the souls and bodies of men
are involved in the  ruin it produces.
  The first thing I  have in view is to show
that drunkenness is a disease.   The second,
      1* 
6
 to exhibit its causes.  The third, its effects.
 The fourth, its cure.  In illustrating these
 points, I shall take occasion to advocate the
 establishment of an institution for the cure
 of the disease, which is  fatal  in its effects
 of sending tens  and hundreds of thousands
 yearly to a premature and dishonored grave.
 There is scarcely a family in  this country
 but  has experienced  the  sad effects  of
 drunkenness in some of its departments.
 Many of them have been  rendered unhappy
 in the mortification it produces in  witness-
 ing  the degradation  to  Avhich  it has  re-
 duced multitudes of young men, the start-
 ing point of Avhose career was as promising
 as could have been desired.
  Since the breaking  out of the rebellion,
thousands of our youthful fellow-citizens,
 who were leading a peaceful and quiet and
 temperate life at home,  have  united with
friends and associates in the  army in the
practice of drinking, in  which they have
continued until  they were ruined.  They
have left the plough in the field, the store,
the trade,  the  profession, the  pursuit  of
every kind of business, and when far away 
1
from home, and beyond the control of their
parents and friends, they have contracted
the habit  of using intoxicating drinks, in
which they have broken down their consti-
tutions, and rendered  themselves  but  the
wrecks of what they once were.
  Stationed with their regiments in  large
cities and in towns, they have frequented the
Lager  Beer Saloons and  Kestaurants until
the habit has become fixed upon them, and
they have  believed it was necessary to make
several visits a day, and at each  visit to
take one drink  or  more,  expending nearly
as much money as it would require to sup-
port them, and sinking  themselves lower
and lower in the  disgrace of drunkenness.
Although 'frequently told that they were
nourishing the  viper that Avould sting them
at the last, they have steadily refused to be-
lieve it, and as steadily pursued the path
of destruction.   The wound, more fatal than
many of the battle-field, has reached them
in the  drinking hall, and from its effects
they may never hope to recover.
  Many a young man that would have been
a brave soldier, if he had continued tern- 
8
perate, has been converted into a coward,
and so far from being of service on the field,
he has damaged the cause he should have
sustained, and rendered himself an object
of reproach among his  comrades,  and a
burden to himself.
  Young soldier, answer the inquiry  for
yourself, and to yourself:  Will you be will-
ing to waste your money for the liquor that
can do you no service,  and  may rob your
country  of your services by enfeebling and
destroying you ?  This result is inevitable,
if you persist in the use of your cups until
the control  is  complete over  you, then
you will assuredly be undone.  Keason with
yourself  but a single moment.  Ask your-
self what benefit all the  liquor  you have
drank has done  you?  Ascertain whether
you have been rendered better or worse by
your habit.  If you have been worsted in
the trial, the caution has been administered
through  your experience, and if you heed
it not, and pass on  and are punished,  the
blame that you can cast  upon none  but
yourself, will surely fall most heavily upon
you.  Your place  is in  the ranks  of  the 
9
army of your country's defenders.   If you
stand there, a young soldier, without the
mark of disgrace upon you, firm, faithful,
undaunted, in this situation of honor you
may be noticed, and your patriotic devo-
tion to the cause of the Union, may  elevate
you to an enviable distinction—a  distinc-
tion you may never  secure while you are
the patron of the Lager  Beer Saloon and
boon companion of  the  men that linger
long over their cups, and stupefy their sen-
sibilities in constantly repeated inebriating
draughts.
  Young man,  if you are in the a?my, and
far  away from home  and friends, and your
associates ask you to enter with  them into
the drinking house  for the indulgence  of
the dram, before  you consent ask yourself
if you Avould do  it  if you were at home.
Ask if your father or your mother would
be pleased at your acceptance of the invi-
tation, or if they would not warn  you  to
flee  from the engagement as you  Avould
from the serpent.  It may require  longer
for  the beer to do its work of destruction
than the bullet, or the shell, but the result 
10
is  just as inevitable, if the  intemperate
course is continued.
  If you have left the plough  in the field,
and hurried away to war at the call of your
country, remember that  you  might  have
done service to your family and yourself,
if you had proceeded with your agricultu-
ral labors.   Do not reduce the chances of
your service  in the army by drunkenness.
  If you have gone from the store in which
you were engaged in  a mercantile pursuit,
remember that you might have maintained
your reputation and  been respectable  and
respected at home.   Preserve  your charac-
ter in your  military relations, and he sure
that you are as much a man when you re-
turn to your home as you were when  you
left it.
  Was it the trade you followed and that
enabled you to support yourself with credit,
and to  render assistance  to others of your
family and friends who needed it ? Kemem-
ber that the same  success might have at-
tended your labors had you  not become a
soldier.  Resist every temptation that may
be thrown in your way, and ever be the 
11
 manly character  you were when home and
 friends were near, and when friendly asso-
 ciations  had not corrupted you,  and per-
 haps could not have done it.
   Did you leave a profession that was more
 or less lucrative  in its  return of profit for
 your labor, and in  which your counsel was
 sought and you were frequently called upon
 For advice ?  Eemember that the same hon-
 orable and profitable pursuit might  have
 been continued if you had  chosen  that it
 should be so.   Repel the tempter when he
 approaches you, whether in the company of
 young associates or  in the desire  you may
 entertain for the dram.  Determine  that
 you  will preserve   your manhood in its
 strength, and that  with  the temptation in
 your view, you will  be the  man that will
 resist it.
  Soldier from  the  plough,  the store, the
 trade, the profession, this little book is de-
signed for  you.   Read it; ponder over it.
Let its truths affect  you.  Let them cause
you  to vow  eternal  warfare against  the
tyrant, drunkenness.
  If  you were well prepared  and successful 
12
in the pursuit  of your business at home, I
may refer  you to the case  of the " Good
Salesman," in this book, which Avill ansAver
as a warning  to  the  efficient young man
who may be  engaged  in  any business.
With this case I was perfectly familiar, and
you knoAv as well as I do that what happened
to him may happen to you.   The safe side
is the side on which there  is  no liquor.
Keep on that side and you are safe.
  Are you an aspirant for political honors
and  profits?   Examine  the case of the
" Would-be Politician,"  which you will
find in the folloAving  pages.   His fate will
assuredly be yours if you persist in the use
of the intoxicating cup.
  Do you  profess the  religion of  Jesus
Christ ?  If so you are looked up to as an
example.  There  are  hints that may be
profitable to you among the pages that you
are  here desired to peruse.  Remember
your position.   It is  one of eminent dis-
tinction in proportion  as you render it  so
by  your  character  and  labors.  Do not
meddle with the dram or you may realize
how fearful may be the fall of the  drunkard. 
THE  DISEASE.
  The Desire for Intoxicating Liquors is a Disease.,
   There is abundant evidence to  prove that
the desire for intoxicating liquors is a dis-
ease.  A disease is a moral or mental  dis-
order.   So says the  definition  given  in
Worcester's  large Dictionary.  A  moral
disorder is a violation of the rules by which
society is governed, and that should govern
mankind in society.  That drunkenness  is
a moral  disorder—that it is a violation  of
the  rules of society, every sensible person
very Avell knows.  Who is it that  disturbs
the  peace of society more frequently, or in
a greater degree, than the drunkard ?  This
question may be ansAvered by every man and
woman who has had any experience in the
social relations.
  And this moral  disorder  has  its effects
upon the mental and physical organization
of man.  What  is the condition of the men-
       1 
14
 tal powers of the man in a state of  intoxi-
 cation ?  Are they in their sane condition ?
 Did any one ever see a man under the in-
 toxicating influence  of  liquor  that could
 properly use his mental poAvers ?  In a state
 of excitement  those  poAvers may be used
 while consciousness  remains, but not in  a
 state of intoxication.  The intoxicated man,
 is beside himself.  His mind is not under
 his control, because it is exhilarated beyond
 its ability, and loses its  balance.  It is in
 a state of beAvilderment which is unnatural,
 and Avhich cannot be  controlled by reason.
 Who does  not  knoAv that the drunkard is
 t\\e most unreasonable of all men ?  Wit-
 ness his language and his actions.  He  ut-
 ters  foolishness in  every word  he speaks.
 He has no idea of the force of language, and
 mutters his unconnected sentences in such
 confusion as convinces every one Avith Avbom
 he attempts to  con\rerse that his senses  are
benumbed, and that he is not responsible for
 the abuses that he  heaps  upon  his  best
 friends.
  The effects of intoxicating  liquors  are
 witnessed as well in the movements  of the 
15
physical man as in the use of the man's
mental powers.   Why does that man stag-
ger ?  Why  is it that  he cannot  support
himself, and falls to the ground?   It is be-
cause the liquor he has drank  has  affected
his  physical system.  He is excited;  his
blood is in a condition of fever ; his nervous
system is affected ; his whole frame is dis-
ordered ; his power of locomotion is either
prostrated  or weakened.  It  is  in this  con-
dition that the drunken man is put to bed
as though he were a sick man.  And a sick
man he is.   He is  too  sick  to stand, and
must of necessity be placed in  a prostrate
condition.   Nor is the  drunken man  able
to work himself, either in  his mental  or
physical powers, until he becomes sober.
He is therefore laid aside a sufficient period
to wear off the effects  of the  liquor.   He
is good for  nothing until the effects of the
liquor have disappeared.
   And is it said that the drunkard cannol;
control his  desire for liquor?  So,  inceed,
is it truly said.   He cannot  control his de-
sire for liquor, because it is a  disease.  And
how is  the disease produced?   It  is pro- 
16
duced, like other diseases, by predisposing
causes, and by contact Avith contagious pro-
perties.
  One of the predisposing causes of this dis-
ease is fondness for a stimulated condition.
In this condition men fancy that they enjoy
themselves.   The drunken man sometimes
exhibits  himself in such a  manner as to
cause  every one  that  witnesses his actions
to believe that he is the happiest man in the
world.  Many times  the man under the
influence of  liquor imagines he is the rich-
est, or the most famous, or  the most im-
portant man of all the neighborhood.  How
then  does he  act?   Most foolishly.  The
bystanders that look  upon  the Avildness of
his actions and listen to the foolishness of
his speech, set him down as an insane  man.
And such he is, for the liquor has deprived
him  of  his  judgment  and his  physical
strength, and he shoAvs himself to be a tem-
porary lunatic.
   And there is contagion in this disease.  It
is produced by contact with those  who are
afflicted  Avith it.  Who associates Avith a
drunkard and does not become a drunkard 
                    11

himself?   Should there be  small-pox or
yellow fever in a house, would not persons
be  afraid to enter it?   And what  Avould
produce this fear?   It is the danger  that
the disease may be contracted.  Both those
diseases are knoAvn to be contagious.   Per-
sons are therefore afraid of contact with
them.   The case of the drunkard is similar.
He comes  in contact with  those who are
accustomed to dram drinking, or Avith the
liquor, and is induced to use  the beverage.
But is it argued that there is a difference be-
tAveeh the  effects of the small-pox or the
yelloAv fever and dram drinking, in the fact
that in the one case it is  produced without
action  and in the other with action ? It
must  be remembered that it is the  desire
that is  the disease,  and this is  produced
without action, although the act is required
to produce  the drunkenness.  The desire is
the disease,  and it  is  contracted by  con-
tact Avith contagious causes, and  not by ac-
tion.  The action follows in  the develop-
ment of consequences in  the  same manner
that consequences are  produced by  conta-
gious diseases.
      1* 
18
  Reader, if you are afraid of going into a
house where there is small-pox or yellow
fever, be afraid of going into the  bar-room
Avhere  liquor   is  sold  and drank.  The
sight of the liquor,  and the  persons drink-
ing  it,  may produce  the  desire,  and you
knoAv how easy it is for the desire to be fol-
lowed by the act, Avhich will prostrate you
upon the groundas a drunkard.  You think
your life is in danger by your contact  Avith
the  contagious  disease.  The  desire for
liquor, which is succeeded by drunkenness,
is produced by the contagion of habit—the
habit of drinking.   Be  consistent,  then,
and  shun the  one  as Avell as  tbe other.
Avoid the associations of drunkenness and
liquor,  and you  will escape  the disease
which you will be  almost sure  to  contract
by too near an  approach to the contagion.
And Avhen the  desire is indulged, what is
the consequence ?  Do you see that bloated
face?  What produced  it?  Liquor.  Do
you observe howthat man trembles?  What
causes his tremulousness ?   He is excited by
the liquor he has drank. Look hoAv that man
staggers !  What causes it? He is drunk, 
19
Hear how foolishly that man talks.  What
is the  cause  of it?   Drunkenness.  And
what is to be the end of such pursuit ?  The
end is destruction.  Nothing less.  The de-
sire indulged and increased  by indulgence
is the disease inflamed and aggravated, and
it will carry the patient through the several
stages of his  excitement and  depression ;
his fever and its abatement, until the ruin
appears. And the result is inevitable.  The
disease  will continue,  and progress,  and
work destruction as long as it is allowed to
work its way in the system.
   The  rich man  drinks because be  can
afford it.   He. has the  means, which  he can
appropriate to the purpose'without being
oppressed by his circumstances.  But it is
not  so Avith the poor man.  Why does he
drink Avhen it requires all he can make  in
his daily labors to support himself and  his
family, if be has one ?  The poor man drinks
for the same reason tbat causes the rich one
to do it.  He  is  impelled by his  desire.
The  desire  is  his disease, and its results
must be rendered apparent.   The  desire
must be indulged, if it takes  the last cent 
20
that honestyprocures. If the manishungry,
and has the means of satisfying his hunger,
if compelled  by his desire, he will expend
it for the  dram, though there  be  future
trouble and even destruction in his view.
  But there is  a moral difference betAveen
the diseases of  small-pox  and yelloAv fever
and the desire  for liquor.   The man may
be attacked by the  small-pox or the yellow
fever, notAvitbstanding his refusal to enter
the house Avhere those diseases are raging.
This is not the case with  the desire  for
liquor.   In the indulgence of this  desire
the man  has  to act.  He  enters  the place
where the contagion is ; he comes in con-
tact Avith it;  he takes hold of  it; he places
it in his  system.  While in the one case he
keeps aAvay from the exciting cause  of  the
disease, in  the  other he takes hold of that
cause, and  places it in  immediate  contact
with the parts of his system that are affected
by it.  The poison is brought in immediate
contact with  the vital parts that are  im-
pressed and subdued and  prostrated by it,
and this by the voluntary act of the man
himself. 
21
  But it  may be said that the desire  for
liquor is  not  drunkenness.  This is  true.
But the desire for liquor,  Avhen indulged,
produces  drunkenness.   The  desire  for
liquor indulged  may be  declared  to  be
drunkenness, because the result is inevita-
ble.  The man that  enters the restaurant,
and drinks three mornings in succession,
and cannot resist the desire  for liquor  on
the fourth morning, is pretty well  gone
with the disease.  The desire is surely fixed
in the system, and once settled it will  Avork
its way of destruction.
  Reader, if you have never been afflicted
with the desire for the dram, and wish to
know how it  will  affect you,  I can give
you an idea of it, if  you  have ever been  ac-
customed to the use of tobacco, and made
the effort to give it up.   You  know how
hard  you had to struggle against that  in-
ward feeling that Avas like some living thing
gnaAving at your stomach, and inflaming
with its effects the Avhole of the lining mem-
brane  of  the  throat and mouth.  If you
succeeded,  you  had  to  endure the trial.
So is it  Avith  the desire  for liquor ;  if  in- 
22
dulged, it becomes  your master, and Avhen
you would cease from its indulgence it rises
up for the  mastery, and you  are  a man
indeed if you Avrestle  successfully against
your  adversary.  The  only difference be-
tween the use of tobacco and that of liquor
is in the force of the desire for the  liquor,
which is much  stronger  than that for
tobacco.
  In its inflammation the desire for liquor is
insupportable,  and the  rum-seller   Avould
have the  fever rise to this point.  For the
purpose of causing  you to reach it he uses
every possible appliance.  Do  you remem-
ber the card-table, the bagetelle-table, the
domino-board, the faro bank ?   Let me ask
you,  Avhat do you suppose these demoraliz-
ing agencies were intended for?  Why,  it
Avas to arrest your attention.  It Avas to keep
you employed at exciting games in the sight
of the liquor, so that you might be tempted
to drink as often as possible.  You perhaps
knoAv something about  the excitement pro-
duced by the game, and the frequency of
the working of the  desire.  It Avas the dis-
ease that was calling for its stimulus, and 
23
 that in most cases called too loudly to be
 resisted.
  Reader,  if you are a young man,  and
 have talents, I would warn you of the ruin
 of  your intellectual  powers, and of your
 final overthroAv.   You  may  improve your
 talents and occupy places of respectability
 and honor  in  society.  There  are halls of
 intelligence in Avhich you may pass your
 time  in self-improvement,  or in impart-
 ing your intelligence to others.  In those
 halls are the pursuits of honor and useful-
 ness.   You may  raise yourself to a proud
 eminence if you will only labor sufficiently
 for  the purpose.  And in the  labor thus ex-
 pended there is character—character that
 you may possess, and that will give  you a
 name and place among the community that
 may be indeed  enviable.
  If you have  contracted the  disease,  be
 warned to seek  its cure.   The first step will
 be to keep out the predisposing and exciting
 and aggravating causes.   Keep out  of  the
 way of the  liquor.  " Look not on the wine
 when it is red."   Shun the presence of the
viper, and it will neither bite nor poison you. 
24
It were much better not to contract the dis-
ease, than after you  have contracted it to
seek its  cure.  An ounce of preventive is
worth a pound  of cure.   Use the  preven-
tive.  Abstain from the use of liquor, keep
out of its way, and the desire for it  Avill not
harm you. 
THE CAUSES OF DRUNKENNESS.
The Desire for Intoxicating Liquors is the Cause of
               Drunkenness,
  In attempting to point out some of the
principal causes of this deplorable evil, I can
speak not from theory only,butfrom personal
experience and observation. For fifteen years
I have often  had to work in taverns and
bar-rooms, and of course had to mingle in
all kinds of society, from the highest to the
lowest.  I have made good use of these op-
portunities for  seeing  the Avorkings of in-
temperance, and have besides often inquired
of men who  indulged too freely how they
began to fall into this  destructive habit.
  Though there is no good excuse for drink-
ing liquor, no justifiable cause—for no man
can be so  senseless  as not to know that  it
brings in  its train  ruin  to  both body and
soul—yet  the reasons  with which  so many
      2 
2&
men deceive  themselves  into  this  deadly
habit are numerous.  With the view of do-
ing service to my fellow-men, I propose to
examine some of them.
  The desire for excitement, for relaxation,
for social pleasure and amusement, which
is natural to  man, and when  properly di-
rected is perfectly innocent, induces many
persons to resort to the use  of stimulating
liquors.   Some, for instance, drink because
at the moment they have nothing else to do,
and " must have excitement."  They afford
an illustration of the common proverb: " The
idle man's head is the devil'"s work-shop !"
What a  great pity it is  that they cannot
find a less expensive means of excitement.
The cost is sometimes  fearfully oppressive
not only in money, but  in  health  and in
real happiness.  A man can make nothing
by idleness, Avhile he may Avaste his time
and his  money, if he  has it, in its  indul-
gence.  Then it is that in his desire for ex-
citement he may poison himself in the use
of intoxicating liquors.  For the brief enjoy-
ment of what at  best is but a  momentary
gratification, he brings upon himself per- 
27
manent disadvantage.   And when engaged
in the fatal orgies, in Avhich the soul is sold,
what poAver is there that can compute the loss
he must sustain?  For the sensual enjoyment
of the single occasion  he is willing to risk
months of pain and wretchedness.  Let the
effects  of a single night's debauch bear
witness to the  discomfort  he  brings upon
himself.   Behold his condition on the morn-
ing  after his revel.  His eyes are SAvollen,
his nerves are unstrung, and he trembles as
if he had the ague.   The  gnawing thirst
for more liquor  causes a  burning  sensa-
tion  in his stomach, which  is almost insup-
portable.  His head is aching, and seeming
as if it  would burst.  Its  throbbing and
jerking excite the most painful sensations.
The  man is dissatisfied and unhappy Avhere
he is, and he can be at rest no Avhere else.
If with alT this there be the dim recollection
of some act that is ridiculous, it brings the
blush of shame upon  his cheek.  And Avhat
if the  remembrance,  dim as it  may be, is
of an act that  is criminal ?  Then comes
the bitter reflection on account of the deed,
or the fearful anxiety that the dread of be- 
28
ing exposed occasions.  Surely, Avhile the
man is in this condition he is enduring the
curse  of his  oavii producing.   He is bearing
the afflictive penalty of his OAvn deed.  While
the man lives and indulges  himself in the
use of the intoxicating bowl, he must render
himself a Avretched victim of his oavu de-
praved taste and appetite.
  Suppose  Ave  contrast the  enjoyment of
the moment of dissipated pleasure with the
wretchedness  that follows,  and Avith  the
pure satisfaction enjoyed in innocent amuse-
ments, Avhich cost nothing, and instead of de-
moralizing,  tend to elevate and refine.  The
pleasant walk or ride into the country, the
healthful and manly engagement in sports
in the open  air, the quiet evening spent in
good society, in musical or literary associa-
tions, or  in  attendance upon entertaining
and instructive lectures,  and many other
pursuits that might be named, leave no ex-
cuse for resorting  to the low and debasing
stimulus of rum.  These are real recrea-
tions, and leave a man with his eyes bright,
his head clear, his nerves strong, his spirits
buoyant, with no stings of remorse to tor- 
29
ture him, and Avith the respect and friend-
ship of all true men.
  Reader,  if you  are  a  young man,  and
have fallen into the habit of drinking and
carousing  for amusement,  because " you
have nothing else to do," as I have  often
heard it said, let  me  implore you to try
these cheaper and purer employments, and
my word for  it, you will not only escape a
perdition of torture, but you Avill experience
a heaven in your breast that is Avorth all the
sacrifice  you can make of the intoxicating
draught to obtain.
  And I Avarn a ou that if you Avill resort to
these dens of vice,  Avhere both soul and body
are destroyed, it will make earth a  place of
perfecthorrortoyou. By indulging in drunk-
enness you madly quench the light of reason,
and in your moments of insanity, produced
by the liquor, you will probably do something
that you will have to regret for life ; some-
thing that Avill haunt you to your dying
day, and fill you with  sorrow and shame.
  Closely  allied to the  indulgence of the
dram for the idle love of it, is another fruit-
ful cause of  drunkenness.   It is the habit,
      2* 
30
so lamentably prevalent among young men,
and even boys, of frequenting beer-houses.
There is a wide-spread, but very false no-
tion, that beer is a very innocent and healthy
drink, and many persons who would shud-
der at the thought of ever being drunkards,
do not  hesitate  to drink  thenisehres,  and
invite others to drink "a, social,  healthy
glass of beer."   Take your stand near what
is called a respectable Lager Beer Saloon,
and Avatch  its  customers,  as they pass in
and  out.  Some are business men of the
neighborhood, who, when they make a sale,
habitually invite their customers to take a
glass of beer Avith them ; others are young
men, who are  just entering the road that
will  lead them to ruin ; others appear in
rags and wretchedness.  They have almost
reached the last stage  of the drunkard's
career.  It may be that while you are watch-
ing you will  see the respectable  church-
going gentleman, who, if you ask Avhy he
visits such places, will  probably tell  you
his doctor advised him to drink lager beer,
or something   stronger, for  bis  health.
Never Avas there a  greater  or more fatal 
31
professional mistake than  this.   It is the
sheerest humbug palmed off upon the  com-.
munity.   I have the declaration from as
eminent  a physician as there is in  this
country, that lager beer is as rank a poison
to the system as bad whiskey or worse  rum.
At least nine out of ten of  the doctors Avho
tell their patients to drink these stimulants
are either Germans,  Avho  are fond of the
dram themselves,  or  ignorant pretenders,
who have never studied, and of course know
little or nothing about the  subject.
   In  striking  contrast Avith' this church-
going man, who drinks lager beer, &c, for
his health, see that noisy crowd of youths,
ranging in age from twelve years to *nan-
hood !   What  are they doing ?   Listen !
They are  cursing and  swearing.    Look
through  the window  and bear Avitness.
They are playing cards, bagatelle, or  some
other game.  Listen to their coarse jokes
and filthy language !  Look again !  They
are swilling  beer  and whiskey and other
intoxicating liquors.  They are  faithfully
learning  their  trade  as  "drunkard's ap-
prentices."  Alas !  some of these boys are 
32
sons of pious parents, Avho are living in the
practice of the moral virtues, Avhile their
sons are at these dens of vice, preparing for
the race of the vicious and the intemperate.
They are revelling, it may be, on the Sab-
bath, Avhile their parents  are  at  church.
praying for the prodigals.   It is a'pity that
such parents do not give their children bet-
ter instruction, and  endeavor to  restrain
them from the pursuit of the drunkard's
path. I have known even preacher's sons to
be at these Avretched places, while their fath-
ers were in the pulpit preaching the Gospel.
Now, while I must of  course blame these
boys for so doing, I must blame  still more
severely those who should have taught them
better, and  prevented  their fall into  the
vices of drunkenness and profanity.  Again,
I must blame the men Avho make our laAvs,
and those  who elect the law-makers.  The
law-makers should put a stop to the evil
by shutting up the man-traps.  Most of
these places  are  kept  by foreigners, who
come here to make money, they care not in
what Avay. What is it to'  the rum-seller
whose son becomes  a  drunkard,  or how 
33
much society is demoralized, so that he can
fill his purse?  LaAvs of the most stringent
character should be enacted in order to pre-
vent the sale of beer or any other liquor to
minors.   I have  never knoAvn it fail, that
he Avho contracts the habit of drinking beer
will soon Avant something stronger.   These
beer-shops are the gates of perdition to thou-
sands of boys and men.  It is a significant
fact, that beer saloons, restaurants and bar-
rooms are almost always in close neighbor-
hood with gambling houses.  And  many a
man has formed the terrible habit of gam-
bling by making the acquaintance oY gam-
blers in the drinking saloon.  They havebeen
enticed to play Avhile the brain Avas heated
with liquor, and the seductive game being
proposed and accepted, the trap is laid  by
alloAving the  novitiate  to win aAvhile, then
the scale is turned, and he  begins to lose.
At the first session he  loses just enough  to
entice him back in the hope of making  up
for his  misfortune by future success.  For-
lorn hope, wretched delusion !  Such is the
machinery by which these gambling houses
are  Avorked, that you might as well expect 
34
to find a needle in a hay-stack, or to recover
a stolen dollar, Avithout  a mark  upon  it,
after it has been thrown into a pile with a
thousand others.   Men know  the dreadful
effects  of gambling.   They have  seen the
awful wrecks of fortune, intellect, character,
happiness, and even life, it has occasioned  ;
and yet impelled by some singular and fool-
ish fascination, they rush  with their eyes
open through  its  seductions and  doAvn to
ruin.   Why do they seek, night after night,
the wild excitement Avhich  results in fever-
ish anxiety, and that without  dreaming of
the dread issue of staking their all on a turn
in a pack of cards or a box of dice ?  In my
opinion such persons are insane, and  ought
to be confined in a lunatic or inebriate asy-
lum, Avhere they  may be prevented  from
doing such mischief to themselves and fam-
ilies and friends.
  Reader, if you are one of that unfortunate
class of men, you  have formed tAvo of the
worst habits that can possibly be formed
by any  human being.  Drunkenness  and
gambling are the lowest and most degraded
features of human vice.   They act and  re- 
35
act upon each other, and unless you break
aAvay from their influence, which, like the
folds of the Anaconda, press but to destroy,
they will surely and certainly drag you into
temporal ruin, which Avill be folloAved  by
eternal  perdition!  Stop where  you are.
Touch not another drop.  Play not another
game.  Give up the money you have lost.
Let it go.  You can never win it back, and
the longer you play for it the more you will
be disappointed, and  the more  unfortunate
and the poorer you will be.  The drunkard's
and gambler's track is that of ruin.   If you
pursue  it your ruin  is inevitable, both of
body and soul.  If you continue its pursuit
you may go on from one degree of degrada-
tion and Avretchedness to another, until your
refuge may be found in the grave  of the
suicide.   You may strike the blow at life
with your own hand, that may hurry your
guilty spirit into your Maker's presence.
  Speaking  of the beer-house, suggests to
my  mind another very prolific  cause of
drunkenness—I mean the patronage  of the
keepers of such houses.  I can fearlessly
appeal to any and to  every man  who has 
36
 worked in the beer-house, and in the service
 of the keeper, if he has ever realized  the
 profit he expected.   I appeal to such in the
 confidence of obtaining the reply that more
 has been lost than earned.   A run of that
 kind of custom  is ruin to a man in any kind
 of business.  In your  dealing  you  must
 drink Avith your employor or cease to do his
 work.  The first drink leads to other drinks,
 and the drinking goes on until drunkenness
 ensues.   I knoAv of men Avho had accu-
 mulated considerable means in the pursuit
 of their business, and Avho at the age  of
 forty or fifty years concluded to invest their
 money in business.   They did so, and for a
 time they succeeded well.   But they  Avere
 unfortunate enough to secure the custom of
 several beer-houses.  The keepers  of those
 houses managed  to remain  always a little
 in their debt, so that they might make fre-
 quent calls for  their money, and at  each
 call they were  invited to drink.   This  is
 one of the regular " tricks  of the trade,"
 which are played on all persons with Avhom
the beer-sellers  deal.  By keeping a little
in the debt of those with whom they deal, 
37
 it naturally brings them more frequently to
 the house.   Every time they appear there,
 as a matter of course they must drink, and
 then they must remain awhile to talk and
 to treat  their friends as thef come in.  In
 this Avay men form new associations  with
 tavern loungers and drunken, lazy loafers,
 AAdio hang around such places.  And  so it
 goes on.  At each tavern that owes the per-
 son employed, he must remain and take two
 or three drinks, until  by the time he has
 gone the round of the dram-shops  he  is
 very fortunate if he is not pretty well in for
 it,  as  they  say.  Such man is  unfit for
 business the rest of the day.
  This  process  may go  on,  working its
 effects imperceptibly for years,  until the
 awful disease is fairly established in the
 system of the unfortunate  dealer with the
 dram-shops.   Then  its fatal consequences
 must MIoav in the ruin of business, the de-
 struction of health and character, the misery
 of families, and all  the dire ills that cluster
 around  the  person and the home of the
 wretched drunkard.  Such was the course,
and such the result of the wiles of the dram-
      3 
38
sellers  upon  the  men to Avhom  I  have
alluded.  It is the rum-sellers  business- to
work this sort of ruin, and he will do it
more faithfully than ever servant served his
master.  He «will, he  does practice  every
stratagem he can invent to make a customer
of the man to  Avhom he gives his  custom.
And the dealer must become what is called
a "good customer."  I could tell  of more
than one man avIio was wrecked in this way,
and Avhen the dram-seller got his  money,
and made him a drunkard, and cheated him
out of most of his hard earnings, he abso-
lutely kicked him out of the drinking-room.
I knoAv from personal observation what the
keeper of the beer-house will do with his
customers.  I have transacted a large amount
of business with them, and that to my sorrow.
I will say it boldly, and without  the fear
of contradiction, that the majority of the
men Avho keep such houses are of the very
lowest grade of society.  If they do not so
begin, they become so.  All their  concern
is  to make money, no matter by  what
means.  If they  find out that a man has
money,  they resolve at once to get as much 
39
 as  they can of it.   They proceed immedi-
 ately with the  work.  They exert all their
 ingenuity  to get  whatever means may be
 in  the possession of every new  customer.
 And they will  succeed Avith every one who
 crosses their threshhold, unless he makes a
 firm resolve never to put  one drop of their
 poison to his lips.  Reader, if you are com-
 pelled to do business with taverns and beer-
 shops, make up your mind not to drink one
 drop.   Drink not the first drop.  If you
 commence you put  yourself in  the hands
 of the  harpies, and poverty and ruin and
 wretchedness are the sure results.
  There are persons who form the habit of
 drinking under the influence of false no-
 tions,  which are very current in the com-
 munity, and by Avhich they delude them-
 selves  to their OAvn undoing.  Some of these
 delusions I will here endeavor to expose.
  1. Some, for  instance, think they cannot
 do business unless their  nerves are braced
 and  their minds brightened by stimulants.
 This is a foolish as  Avell as fatal mistake.
 Liquor may—it does—impart a  temporary
excitement to the nerves and brain ;  but 
40
 there is no real pleasure in the excitement,
 because the man is beside himself.   He is
 intoxicated, and beyond the reach of rational
 enjoyment.   And the excess is sure to be
 folloAved by a reaction, and to end  in be-
 numbing the physical faculties, stupefying
 the mental powers, prostrating reason, un-
 settling  the judgment, and rendering the
 subject unfit for any kind of intercourse with
 mankind.  Is it reasonable to suppose that
 a  man  can pursue  his  business  properly
 when his brain is muddled, Avhen he is un-
 naturally excited, and not perfect master of
 himself?  Ten to one, instead of attending
 to his affairs at his OAvn store or shop, that
 he will spend the  most of his  time  at the
 restaurant and in the bar-room, Avasting his
 hours in  foolish talk,  or in the far more de-
 structive  employment of drinking  rum.
 Then it is likely he will make stupid, silly
bargains, and  expose himself to  the chi-
canery of every sharper Avho is the Avitness
of his condition.   Let me appeal  to facts.
Who ever knew a business man Avho Avas
always stimulated or  half drunk,  that did
not  eventually fail,  unless he reformed ? 
41
/
Some may stand it longer than others, but
time will surely do  its Avork of destruction
on the  tippling tradesman.   If a man in
any kind of business, large or small, con-
tracts the habit of drinking, his failure may
be written down as a certainty.  I have seen
it in hundreds of cases.   Let it be set doAvn
as a never-failing rule, for it  is such, that
ruin is  the  ultimate  destiny of the dram-
drinking tradesman.  Unless he dies in dis-
grace,  he will live to see his  prospects  ut-
terly blasted,  his children street beggars,
turned  away from  home and  scattered in
utter Avant and wretchedness.  His wife Avill
be rendered a broken-hearted  woman, and
perhaps p«rish in  the  condition of utter
destitution  to  Avhich drunkenness  has re-
duced her.   And all this for Avhat ?  Simply
because the man has acted on the  absurd
notion  that he cannot be a man and attend
to his  business without liquor,  Avhen  the
truth is exactly the reverse.
   2. But some say they take  it to drown
trouble.  Alas ! that such a notion  should
ever possess a man, Avhen it is known  that
drunkenness plunges him, body and soul,
       3* 
42
 in ten thousand times worse  trouble than
 that from which he supposes he is flying.
 All drunkenness can do is to help a man to
 shut his eyes for a few hours to his troubles,
. and to dream of sorroAvs only to aAvake to
 greater misery.  I have  knoAvn, and you,
 my reader, have known liquor to give thou-
 sands trouble.   But Avhose broken heart has
 it ever healed ?  Whose anguish of soul has
 it ever soothed ?  Has it ever  restored the
 Avealth that it has squandered, the houses
 and farms and merchandise that have  been
 literally  destroyed  and desolated  by  its
 wretched progress?  Has it ever supplied
 the wants  of the Avidow and  the  orphan,
 Avho have  been stripped  of all4by its  ac-
 cursed agencies ? Has it ever restored to
 life  the  hundreds of thousands martyred
 and  murdered  by the madness it has pro-
 duced?  No, never.  Then let me beseech
 you, reader, do not make use of intoxicating
 liquor to drown trouble.  It is one of the
 chief causes of all the trouble  that fills the
 world Avith groans and tears.
   3. Again, multitudes resort to the dram,
 because they say they are sick, and  must 
43
take it  as a medicine.  Ah, sad delusion !
Take it as a medicine !  Surely it is a medi-
cine that kills far more than it cures.  It
kills its millions for every one it cures.  It
is the opinion of many eminent physicians
that there is no  east in  which spirituous or
malt liquor might benefit the patient that
would not be better served by something
else.  There are medicines that  may suit
every case  Avithont the  danger ahvays
attending the use of this fascinating poison.
Many a man  has commenced the practice
of drinking by the advice  of his  physicians,
Avho, for his oavii sake,  and for the sake of
his family, Avould have  done better had  he
remained sick or even died.   In such a case,
in the effort to cure  a disease, another has
been substituted.  The  neAv disease is worse
than the  first, because  it effects  the ruin
of both  body and soul.  It has killed thou-
sands.   It has made victims of multitudes,
as Ave have the proof.  But Avhere is the one
it has  cured?  Reader,  be not deceiA-ed.
"Wine  is a mocker, strong drink is raging,"
and if your doctor advises  you to take stim-
ulants,  tell him boldly  you don't intend to 
44
be poisoned, that his prescription shall not
poison you, and that you would rather be
sick,  and die a sober man, than  to  die
under his hand  and in the  pursuit of his
advice, a drunkard.
  But in ansAver to all #ur  arguments, Ave
hear from many tAvo very different, but what
they  regard as  very potent  objections.
They  are, however, as  proved in hundreds
of thousands of instances, the most perfect
fallacies.  One  class of drinkers  say they
will drink,  because  there is no danger of
their  becoming  drunkards.  "They  can
drink as much as they please, and not  get
drunk."  Another  class are too  far gone
for that potent fallacy.  Their plea is "they
love the taste of it, and can't do Avithoutit."
Let us briefly consider these cases.  I have
known men of the first class, Avho boasted
that Jhey could drink liquor all day and not
get drunk.   Strange and astonishing as it
may seem, I have seen them stand  at  the
bar, and  drink and  drink, until their com-
panions  would be  staggering  all around
them, while they  were almost  unaffected.
The reason  is that the poison instead of 
45
going to the brain  works upon some other,
or perhaps all other parts of the system.  It
so gradually does  its work that it is not
perceived.  It destroys the stomach, injures
the action of the  heart,  and  prepares the
Avay for  sudden death in many forms.  A
man  Avith so firm  a brain is tempted to
drink more than others.  Although the dis-
ease  of drunkenness is not apparent,  the
poison is  operating in the system and un-
dermining its poAvers, and Avill be as fatally
successful in the end as if the  drunkenness
were  apparent.  It does  not at first  show
itself, but it takes a deeper hold upon the
system, and slowly and  surely the poison
does its fatal work.  It does it secretly, but
not the less certainly because secretly, until
on some occasion the first neAvs you  hear,
the  man  is  dead :  "he  is gone, gone to
a  drunkard's grave."   I knoAv of many
cases of  this kind ; I know  of tAvo  cases
which happened  Avithin  the  last  three
months.  Poor deluded men !  Though such
may have never been seen to stagger, yet the
poison is  operating, and  Avill  continue its
operation.   They are noAv nothing but rum- 
46
soaked carcasses that you see walking along
the street.  They are  doomed  to sudden,
certain, fearful  death.   There are some in
this condition that Avill fall under mania
a polu, others with  sun-stroke, others with
any epidemic which may  prevail in the
community.  Like tinder, they are already
prepared to go off at the  least spark of
disease.  Therefore, young man, do not
boast that you  can drink  as much as you
please Avithout being  drunk, for let me
warn you,  your life is in greater danger
than that of your companion who is  more
easily fuddled.  And Avhat a Ioav and  mean
thing to brag of is the capability of extended
dram drinking.  I think it Avould be equally
creditable to boast that you could murder,
rob and slander, more  than your acquaint-
ances, without being discovered  or brought
to account.  Let  your  boast rather be that
you can stoj) drinking Avhenever you choose.
And choose now, and forever.
   And Avhat shall I say of that unfortunate
class  Avho so love the taste of liquor, and
have become so wedded to their cups that
they  " can't do without it." 
47
   What a deplorable state for a man to be
 in, to love a viper, a  worse than viper,
 which is his enemy—to love an accursed
 thing that  is  ruining  his constitution,
 Avrecking his reputation, and clothing his
 family  in rags.  "Can't do without  it!"
 Can't do Avithout  a  poison  that  is  de-
 stroying  both  soul and body,  that  is
 producing a  perfect hell in his bosom,
 that  disgraces  his  wife  and children  as
 well  as himself—that brings the blush of
 shame to their cheeks,  and makes  them
 Avish  they had no husband and no father.
 Poor  man, you can't do with it.  You can't
 do anything but make a beast of  yourself,
 expose yourself  to all sorts of slanders, and
 make your home a desolation.  0 that your
 eyes might be opened to see the truth in all
 its hideous reality !   Look at your charac-
 ter.  If it is knoAvn  among a man's neigh-
 bors that  he  gets drunk, or even drinks  at
 all, immediately all sorts of rumors are
 circulated about him, and they are not only
 circulated,  they are  believed.   Whether
true or false, every evil thing is credited to
you by somebody.  If you happen to stum- 
48
ble from a misstep, people will say : "Ah !
there he goes, drunk again."  If you take
cold, and your eyes are swollen or red, they
Avill say : "he Avas out drunk last  night."
Though  you may  not  taste a  drop for
months, the tongue of slander will have it
that  you are drunk all the time.   So little
sympathy is felt for the drinking  man3 that
if you are in business, and have competitors
in the  same line of  trade, they will use
your avcII known  habits  as a lever  to over-
throAv your character and business together.
Let me give an instance which occurred in
my OAvn neighborhood.
  There Avere tAvo men in the same line of
business.  One of them was a good-hearted
felloAv, whose love of drink was his  only
fault.  He was fond of it, would  spend his
money freely for it, and at times get drunk.
The other  Avas a little-souled, mean, stingy
creature, Avho loved liquor too, but be loved
money better.  He would  not drink unless
he could find somebody fool enough to pay
for it, which very seldom happened.
  Whenever the first man's name was men-
tioned,  his crafty  opponent  would  say, 
49
"that man is  always drunk, he will not
attend to your work."  If he made an esti-
mate for work a little loAver than the other,
he would sneeringly say :  " he was drunk
when he did it."  In  fact, when the man
was  perfectly sober, his adversary would
say:  "I saw him drunk this morning."
He pursued this course until  he succeeded
in ruining the business  of  his  drinking
neighbor.
  Take another case.   Go to the  home of
the wealthy man. Though everything looks
bright and beautiful,  his house grand  and
imposing,  his  furniture  magnificent,  his
gardens adorned with the rarest  floAvers,
and  filled  Avith  the  choicest fruit,  with
every elegance and luxury at his command,
so that you involuntarily exclaim,  "surely
peace and happiness reign supreme within
these  Avails," yet if this arch-enemy of man
has entered,  that splendid home is  soon
rendered a desolation.  The owner has be-
come  a drunkard.  He thinks he " can't
do Avithout it."  His  palace  soon becomes
a living tomb.   See his accomplished  and
devoted wife,  grief standing out in  bold
       4 
50
relief on her pale features.   See his  lovely
daughters  hiding their  heads  in shame,
trembling at their father's footstep,  afraid
to mingle in society, unAvilling to bear the
finger of scorn.  Is not this  misery ?  Is
it not agony insupportable?  And all for
what?  Because the wretched husband and
father has fallen  into  the snares of the
tempter, and says he "must have liquor,
he can't do  without it."  Let me say to
that  gentleman, and to  all who offer this
miserable plea : You can  do  without it.
You  must do without it, or you are lost.
Summon up your resolution.   Determine
to be a man.  Go to the  Almighty Father
that  loves you, and ask  Him  for strength
and grace to support you in your  effort to
be a sober  man.   Go to  the footstool of
mercy and beg for pardon, cast your guilty
and  polluted spirit upon the Saviour who
died  for sinners, and having given yourself
to Him, identify yourself Avith some Chris-
tian  church,  and seek aid in its sympathy
and  prayers, and then  "watch and pray
lest  you enter  into temptation," and you
will  conquer your  foe, and stand forth a
FREE MAN. 
51
   Let me now, in conclusion, upon this
 point, relate an incident which illustrates
 much that I have said as to the causes and
 effects of drinking.  I knoAv a gentleman
 Avho Avas formerly in the dry goods business.
 Never was there a man more respected.  He
 was a gentleman in every respect,  energetic
 in his business, kind and  charitable, and
 beloved by all Avho kneAv him.  He married
 as noble a Avoman as the sun ever  shone
 upon, and had hosts of friends.   In short,
 his  prospects for  a happy and prosperous
 career Avere as bright as possible.
   But there  Avere some ten or twelve gentle-
 men in his neighborhood, who visited each
 other by turns,  and Avhen they did so, the
 party visited Avould give  a  grand supper.
 Then the social cheer was indulged.   The
 sparkling  Avines Avere  brought out.   The
 best liquors  Avere  placed  upon the board.
 Songs Avere sung,  and toasts  proposed and
 drank, and laughter and hilarious joy Avere
 heard, and the hours were passed  through
 midnight and until  the morning.    But
what Avas the end  of all  this ?  Did the
scene close as it began, in light  and joy, 
52
and  beauty and  prosperity?  Never  did
such result follow  upon such a course of
life.  Darkness, and sorrow, and deformity,
and  destruction,  Avere  the dread  results
that  ever concluded such a scene.
  Let me here remark that men are often
mistaken about the  real friendship of those
who  visit them, for they frequently turn
out to  be your Avorst enemies.  They will
partake of  your hospitality, and  no sooner
leave your  house  than they will stab you
with the keen dagger of the  slanderer, or
injure  you in  your business,  or  cheat you
out of your money.  So it was Avith  our
dry goods merchant.  These expensive and
jovial and delightful suppers  were kept  up
for along time, that is, as long as  the means
lasted.   And  there Avere  seldom joyous,
happy  greetings that exceeded those of our
merchant.   They Avere  among  the  very
best.   Among  the  guests was  a liquor
merchant, whose  store Avas near his estab-
lishment.  The dry goods merchant and
the liquor dealer became very intimate, and
the dry goods  merchant  acquired the habit
of visiting his friend, the liquor dealer, very 
                    53

 often.  He made especial visits Avhen he
 wanted  a drink.  And so ' he progressed,
 drinking more and  more  every day, until
 at last he never drew a  sober breath.   He
 did not stagger,  but drank just enough to
 keep  him always under  its influence.   He
 soon  began to decline in his business.   He
 fell behind in his accounts.  He made some
 unfortunate  speculations.  He Avas drunk
 when he made them. His creditors became
 suspicious.   It was rumored that he would
 not meet  his engagements.   Claims were
 pressed.   Securities were required.  Having
 bought goods on the eve of a decline, he
 lost  about  five  thousand  dollars  by the
 operation.  The liquor  merchant and two
 others of his supper-going friends borroAved
 his notes  and  cash  to the amount of ten
 thousand  dollars, but forgot to pay the
 notes  or refund the  cash.   With these and
 other losses, his affairs fell  into a desperate
 condition.  His creditors came  in and SAvept
 aAvay  all that he had, even to his furniture.
 He had to send his Avife and children into
the country, to the home of a relative of his
wife, while he kept on drinking more than
      4* 
54
ever.   He had no employment, and drank,
as lie  said,  " to drown trouble."   What a
mistake !  The drink was  the  very thing
that caused his troubles, and still he kept
them  in continuance.  It Avas not long be-
fore his Avife  died of a broken heart.   She
was a delicate Avoman,  and had not the
nerve to endure her  disgrace and misfor-
tune,  but gradually declined in  her  grief
until  death  released  her  from  suffering,
leaving her two  little children  worse  off
than orphans.  At this very  day, this man is
hanging around low groggeries, hoping that
some one will take  pity on him and  treat
him to a glass of liquor. All his friends that
were once the companions  of his suppers,
and  praised  his  elegant  entertainments,
pass him by Avithout notice.  They hardly
acknowledge  that  they  ever kncAv  him.
None  OAvn  his acquaintanceship, not eATen
the rascally liquor merchant, and the others
who cheated  him out of the  ten  thousand
dollars, Avith Avhich loss his downfall be-
gan.  I  think it likely  that if  he Avould
venture to call  at one of their  houses and
ask either  of them for  fifty cents,  they 
55
 would  give  him  the cold shoulder, and
 probably order him out of their doors. Such
 are  the Avorld's  votaries,  reader.   They
 will court your friendship while you are in
 prosperity, but as soon  as  you begin to go
 down hill, every one Avill give you a push,
 until you land in  misery, rags, and utter
 ruin, at its  base.   Such were the  results
 of " drinking for amusement," frequenting
 a  liquor  store,  mingling  with convivial
 company, and seeking " to drown trouble"
 in liquor.  Such was the  fall of the man
 that thought he could " drink Avithout get-
 ting drunk," but too soon learned to love
 it, and to say, "I can't do Avithout it."
  May all Avho read these  lines be Avarned
 by the terrible fate of our merchant drunk-
 ard, and heed the admonition of the Avisest
 of men :  "Look not  thou upon  the wine
 when it is red, Avhen  it giveth his color  in
the cup, Avhen it moveth itself aright;  at
the last  it biteth  like a serpent, and stingeth
like an adder."  Proverbs,  xxiii: 31, 32. 
EFFECTS OF DRUNKENNESS.
The Desire for  Intoxicating Liquors Eealized in
                its Effects,
  In  accordance with the plan proposed, I
have  taken notice of  a few of the many
causes of liquor drinking, and of course of
drunkenness.   I will noAv direct your atten-
tion to some of the effects produced by the
too free use of intoxicating stimulants. The
effects thus produced may be seen in the
ruinous results occasioned  by intoxicating
liquors upon the  human system.   The'ef-
fects of drunkenness upon the family, upon
society, and upon  the community and the
country, are visible in acts which are de-
structive of character, and degrading to all
engaged in them.
  The natural effect of over drinking is
drunkenness, and you may see the drunk-
ard reeling along the streets at almost any 
57
time.  The over-draught has wrought its
work upon the brain  of the drunkard, and
almost  paralyzed his entire system.  His
sight, his hearing, his nervous system, the
circulation of his  blood, all are oppressed
by his  over-draught.  He  cannot  think;
he cannot walk without  staggering ;  he
cannot  talk  Avithout  hesitating and blun-
dering, and he  is not able  to  take care of
himself.   In  a  still  further  condition of
intoxication  you will find  the man upon
the pavement, or in  the gutter,  stretched
out  at full length.   Then what is to be
done ?  Some friend must  take him home,
or a police officer may find him and  convey
him to  the station house.   But there is a
still further  condition of drunkenness.  It
is that in which the liquor has so far over-
poAvered the brain as to render the man a
maniac.   He has  mania a potu—delirium
tremens.   He is  crazy  and cannot keep
himself  still  to save his life.  The Avorst
ague  a man can have is that of the trem-
bling occasioned by the surfeit of  liquor.
And  the delirium in connection Avith it
produces -the  most  horrible  sensations. 
58
 The  man  under the influence of delirium
 tremens is in a Avorse condition than he can
 bring upon himself by any other means this
 side the realms of old Pluto.  While he is
 shivering  in the most horrible physical
 sensations, his brain is on fire and he sees
 such  sights  as  no man in his  senses can
 ever  see.  Demons of all shapes and sizes
 appear  before him,  and he is  so terrified
 that to  escape from  his dreadful condition
 he would Avillingly destroy himself.
  It is in this condition of drunken insan-
 ity  that men are obliged to be taken to
 hospitals and treated as insane persons.
 They are indeed insane, and their insanity
 is the very worst kind.  It is  that  which
 preys upon  mind and body, and destroys
 the man just as fast as the ravages of the
 drunkenness  can be carried through the
 system.
  But the  effects of drunkenness are not
 only witnessed in these dreadful calamities.
 They are seen in the fruits that follow, in
tjie  disposition  it  produces  to  riot and to
steal, and to violate the laws of the land in
every way, even to the commission of mur- 
                    59

 der.   These results  have not only followed
 in the drunkard's path in past days and
 years.  They are following in his path uoav.
 They are causing men  to be arrested and
 cast into prison for  their crimes every day.
 The almshouse is at the end of the career
 of the most fortunate drunkard.  The less
 fortunate find their  home  in  the prison,
 first,  the jail—then the penitentiary, or
 perhaps the end of the  crime  is upon the
 gallows.  The history  of the  past of our
 country,  of our State—of every  State, of
 our city—of every city, is full  of details of
 such  results.   Drunkenness never did and
 never  can do  a man any good, but it may
 and will  inevitably  bring upon him  some
 one  or more  of the  calamities here  men-
 tioned.
  If a man is a drunkard,  and  will not
 support  himself, he must  be  supported
 somehow and  someAvhere.  If he bring on
 the necessity he must be supported at the
 public expense, and  in  the almshouse.  If
he produce the further necessity he must be
supported and  punished in the prison.  And
if he  bring on the still  further  necessity— 
60
that which reaches beyond his support, in
the forfeit of his life, he must perish upon
the gallows.
  And  how many  drunkards have thus
brought  upon themselves the very  worst
kinds of punishment?  How  many have
madly passed their way of guilt and ruin
until destruction has succeeded ?  From all
conditions of life drunkenness has brought
the man doAvn.   The richest fall Avith the
lowest  into  disgrace,  crime, and  ruin.
Money, nor character, nor family relation-
ship, nor anything  can  save the drunkard
from the degradation and wretchedness and
suffering he is bringing  upon himself.
  But thus far I have spoken of the drunk-
ard in relation to the trouble and  ruin he
brings upon himself.  This  is not all.  I
would it were all.  I would that tire drunk-
ard could only damage and destroy himself.
But this cannot be the case.  Every drunk-
ard is in  some way  connected with  his
family.   He has a father, a mother, broth-
ers, sisters, wife, children,  perhaps  other
more  distant relates.  Can he pursue his
way of drunkenness without doing  damage 
61
to one or more, or all of these  family con-
nections?  If nothing  more,  all—to  the
very farthest off of his relatives—must feel
the disgrace of his  mean  and disgusting
course of life.
  Has the drunkard  a father ?  How much
sorrow must the old  man feel in witnessing
the ruin of his son?  Has he  a  mother?
How must  her heart bleed when she sees
him in his miserable condition, staggering
and muttering, and  requiring  some one to
assist him to prevent him from  falling to
the ground.  And  when  she  places  him
in bed and  Avatches  at his side, how con-
stantly must her heart ache at the idea that
the child of  her affections is thus  disgraced
and ruined.   Has he brothers and sisters?
How  they despise him on account of his
Ioav, mean  habit, and how they wish  he
was not their brother.  They  would disown
him and cast him off, if they had not still
some affection for him as so near a relation.
  But has the  drunkard a wife  and chil-
dren ?  Has he a promising, rising family,
that he  might support  in a condition of
respectability, and bring out  for honorable
      5 
62
society and for a prominent place in busi-
ness life ?  Alas,  that the  hopes of such  a
family should be  in a miserable drunkard.
Alas, that the wife's and  children's pros-
pects in  life should  depend  upon a  low,
mean, degraded wretch, Avho  cares neither
for wife nor children, nor even for himself,
half so much  as he cares for the liquor that
is  destroying him !   And Avhat are the
prospects of the Avife, the children, and  of
himself?  Disgrace, degradation, ruin.  The
almshouse is to be the home of the unhappy
wife and the helpless  children.  Is this so ?
Go to the almshouse.  Ask that Avoman how
she came there.  She will ansAver, "through
the wrongs and outrages of a drunken hus-
band."  Has she  children?  Yes,  she has
one  in her  arms, an  infant.   There  is
another at her side. And are there others?
Yes.  She tells you of a son that is living
with a friend, and of a daughter  that  is
working  in  some  family.  She  tells  you
they were all comfortable and  happy once,
but drunkenness brought them down until
they were in debt  as  far as they could get
into  it in the  neighborhood, and that the 
                   63

landlord took  their  furniture and turned
them out of doors.   And then came sick-
ness, and then she was obliged to be taken
to the almshouse.  And Avhere is the drunk-
en  husband ?   He  is  either dead,  or in
prison, or in another part of the almshouse.
And does the unhappy woman wish to see
him ?  Alas, no.  She wishes never to see
him again.  He has  rendered himself loath-
some to her, and it Avould be relief for her
to die and leave the  world in which she has
had so much trouble, and the husband that
has  brought the trouble upon her.   But
the children !   Ah, yes, for  them she has
an affection that encourages her to suffer on
in the hope that returning health Avill en-
able her to support herself and her children
when she may take  them to a house of her
own, and once more make them  comfort-
able.  This  is all the hope  the poor dis-
tressed woman can  possess, and little as it
may be, and dark and gloomy as may be
the prospect before her, she is still cheered,
and hopes on and ever, that the day of her
deliverance may dawn upon her.
  Can any one undertake to tell how much 
64
the poor wife, thus reduced, must suffer, to
say nothing of the children and their pri-
vations among strangers,  and their pros-
pects in the future, and the abuse to which
they may be  exposed,—how severely and
hoAv bitterly must  be the endurance of the
neglected, forsaken,  abused,  heart-broken
wife ?  And the poor wretch that is raving
for liquor in another  part of the almshouse
took that woman from  a good, comfortable
home, where she was Avell taken care of and
happy.  He made pledges and promises of
care and protection, and swore he Avould be
her  support  and defender  through  life.
His  pledges and promises and oaths were
all  broken, and for the  indulgence—the
poor,  pitiful, mean  indulgence  in  the
drunkard's glass—he falsified  all his  de-
clarations, and Avrought ruin for his family
and himself.
  Is this the  result of drunkenness ?   Ask
every family in the land if in a nearer or
more remote relation they have not realized
it.  It  is the result of drunkenness, and it
was long foreseen before it took place.   The
father saAv it, the mother saw it, the broth- 
                   65

ers and the sisters saw it, the Avife saw it, the
children saw it.  But what could be done to
prevent it?  From the father doAvn to the
child all was done that could  be to prevent
it.   But  the poor mean  creature  was re-
solved upon his dram and his drunkenness,
with it all in vieAv, and with warnings suf-
ficient to have arrested him in  his course.
But all would not do.  The dram must be
indulged in, and the ruin must be accom-
plished.
  So common are the scenes and  circum-
stances here noticed, that they hardly seem
to have any effect  upon  the community.
The miserable drunkard is taken Avith his
family to the almshouse, or Avhile  the  fam-
ily is taken to the almshouse,  the drunkard
is conveyed  to the prison, and  the neigh-
borhood in which he lived is almost uncon-
cerned in relation to it.   Hardly half the
people know anything about it, and those
who do know do not care.  And  when it
happens, as it sometimes does,  that the
wretched man is condemned to death for
taking the life of his felloAv-man in  a drunk-
en fit, the people think of the murder and
      5* 
66
the trial and the condemnation, and say what
a pity it is  that the man  should  be hung ;
and all the time they think but little of the
drunken  fit, under the influence of Avhich
the man committed the crime for which he
was convicted and sentenced to the gallows.
With the murder  in view, many cry  out,
"it served him  right," Avhile they forget
that the liquor Avas the cause of his crime.
They blame the  murderer for the crime,
but think little  of  the  drunkenness that
led to  the deed.  The  murderer is  con-
demned and abused, while the drunkard is
not considered.  Is  it not wonderful that
many of the people will blame the man for
committing the murder, while they do not
think of blaming him for getting drunk ?
  Many a man has proceeded in his career
of dram-drinking until he was  ruined  that
never meant to become a sot.  Many a man
has drank himself a drunkard who has be-
lieved, or persuaded himself into the belief,
that  he could not do without  the liquor.
This  is  a monstrous  absurdity.   There
never was a man who could not do without
liquor.  A man  may curb his desire for 
67
 drink.  He may resist the temptation and
 save himself if he will.   A little reasoning
 on the subject will  bring  a man to his
 senses, and perhaps save him from a drunk-
 ard's and a murderer's grave.  It should
 be remembered, that it ahvays requires a
 cause  to produce  an effect.   No effect can
 be produced without a cause.  It cannot be
 that a man can become a drunkard without
 drinking liquor.   The liquor is the cause —
 drunkenness the effect.   Remove the cause
 and the effect cannot be produced.  There
 is no cause that produces its effect upon the
 human system that is generally more fatal
 than the use of liquor.  It leads a man im-
 perceptibly  on until his ruin is  accom-
 plished.
   It is a great pity that a moral being, hold-
 ing a ,place in creation as high as that oc-
 cupied by man, should  give  way  to  the
 temptation to drink Avhen  his noble poAvers
are prostrated and sacrificed in the result.
 Why should the  being  of immortal mind
be reduced to  a  common level with the
brute ?  This is done by liquor.  The proud
faculties which distinguish man as the lord 
68
of creation are blunted and deadened, and
he rendered unfit  to use them—all by his
indulgence in the  ruinous  habit of taking
his liquor.   Hoav is it  possible for a sensi-
ble man  to continue in the habit of using
intoxicating liquors, when he must witness
its destructive influence, and feel that he is
on the doAvnAvard  track?  There  are his
starving,  half-naked   children.  He   sees
their  condition—he knoAvs they are suffer-
ing ; but he must  have his drink, and he
will  have it, though his children perish in
his sight and by his neglect.   There is his
heart-broken, emaciated Avife.  She is  worn
down by sickness on account of his neglect.
She has done  the  best she could with her
needle, working day and night to  support
her children, and a large share of her hard
earnings  have been used in sustaining the
life of her destroyer.   And he sees  and
knows it  all, but he must  have his dram,
cost what it may in money, or cost Avhat it
may in pain and privation to his Avretched,
suffering family.
  Has the man a conscience who can thus
abuse himself to the destruction of his men- 
69
tal powers, his moral nature, his  wife, his
children  and  himself?  Truly,  his  con-
science, if he ever had one, must be " seared
as Avith a hot iron."  Can the man possess
any of the sensibilities of a  man  that  can
endure the sneers of his felloAv-men, their
slights,  their  neglect,  on account  of his
drunkenness, and yet indulge it ?  But what
are sneers and slights  and neglect  to the
creature that can look upon the sufferings of
his helpless Avife and innocent children, and
yet wilfully continue the cause that is grad-
ually producing its effect in  their downfall
and destruction ?  It is of very little avail
that a man's old acquaintances pass him by
with indifference.  They meet him on the
street and in company, and take no  notice
of him.   But what does he care?  He  feels
cut for the time, and it may be that some
mortification may be endured, but he  can-
not  resist;  he  must still indulge  in his
glass.  He cannot  resist, because he  will
not.  He must still indulge, because he will
not summon  up his resolution as a man,
and quit forever his vile practice.
  In the pinching of his necessity does the 
70
 drunkard go to his friend to borrow money.
 It  may  be  the friend that has  received
 favors from  him that he  thus asks to loan
 him  a trifle.  But what  is the  reply?
 " Drink less Avhiskey, and  you will  have
 more money. Stop spending your money for
 whiskey, and you Avill not have to borroAV."
 Such is the  reply that  he gets to his ap-
 plication for a friendly act.  But what effect
 has it upon  him ?  Does it  cause him to
 quit  his practice, and  become  sober, and
 take care of the money  he earns ?   No such
 effect is produced.  The man drinks in the
 vieAv  of the  loss of friends,  and of insults,
 and of privations of every kind.   He drinks
 though death Avere staring him in the  face.
 He knoAvs that the liquor is poison, and that
 it will surely destroy him, and yet he dares
 to continue in its use.
  And can it be supposed that although the
 man may continue to  indulge his habit,
 and seem indifferent when his friends turn
 away from him, and refuse  to  afford him
 relief, and cast  their scorn  upon him, can
it be supposed that such a man, under such
circumstances, is  really as indifferent  to it 
71
 all as he seems to be ?  It is not so.  The
 drunkard  does sometimes feel  the neglect
 of his friends; he does sometimes experi-
 ence the regret that such treatment usually
 occasions.  It is  the case  sometimes that
 there is as burning a hell in the drunkard's
 bosom as a man ever endured,  and  all the
 while he appears to be indifferent and care-
 less of what is going on around him.
   Do you desire to see the drunkard when he
 is enduring the Avorst effect of his drunken-
 ness in his system ?   Go to his house the
 morning after he has been on Avhat is  called
 "a spree."  Ask him how he feels ; he will
 answer, "horribly."  He has  no disposi-
 tion to talk, but will sullenly ansAver your
 questions,  while he stretches his limbs and
 stares around  and keeps in continual mo-
 tion, in the effort to place himself in a posi-
 tion in which he can get a little ease.   Tell
 him that as he came home last  night there
 were many of his friends that saAv him, and
that pitied him, and condemned  him, and
laughed at his awkward  gestures and the
manner in  Avhich he staggered  along the
street.  Tell him that some of his enemies 
72
 were following him, and tormenting him
 by punching him with their sticks, and en-
 deavoring to throAv him upon the pavement.
 While you are telling  the  story you may
 Avitness the agitated motions of his limbs ;
 you  may look upon  his blood-shot eyes
 staring in frightful wildness.  If he has
 strength enough he Avill pace up and down
 his room, and that in the most nervous
 manner.   Ask him if he feels unwell.  He
 will  tell you that his stomach is gnawing
 and burning, and that he is enduring the
 most dreadful pains throughout his entire
 system.  If you inquire if you shall get him
 anything to eat, or do  anything to relieve
 him, he will tell you no.  He will say that
 anything you can do  will  only make the
 matter worse.
  And Avhat is it the  man  craves in this
 condition ?   It is liquor—more liquor. He
 is  starving,  and he wants  liquor.   He  is
 thirsting, and  he wants liquor.  He  is
 writhing in  pain on account of the  liquor
that  has lost its force in his system, and he
wants liquor.  He is shivering under the
prostration  of his nervous  system,  occa- 
73
sioned by the liquor he has already drank,
and he wants liquor.  What is it that pro-
duces this terrible condition?  The liquor
has wrought  a fiery course through  his
veins.   It has inflamed his lungs, his liver,
his stomach, his brain.   He is suffering in
every organ.  His whole  frame is  on  the
rack.  His heart is fluttering  under  the
excitement.  He cannot keep still.  What
ravage is  going on in the man's system ?
What destruction  the liquor is working ?
It is using up the man's poAver of mind and
body just  as rapidly as it is possible for the
work to be accomplished.  There is no hope
for the Avretched creature but in his aban-
donment of his practice, and this he will
not  do.   He Avill force his  way onAvard,
although  he knoAvs that at the end of it
there is inevitable destruction.
  Is the philosophy of the man's condition
known?   It is readily described.   The
stomach is on fire.  It is burning in every
part.  The mucous membrane is inflamed.
It sends its message  of suffering  to the
brain.   The brain sympathizes and. com-
municates its sympathy to the nerves and
      6 
74
 heart.  The heart unites with the stomach
 and brain in the feverish inflammation, and
 if the man is not enduring the agonies of
 a tortured system he never can endure such
 agonies.  The  demand  is made  by every
 agitated organ for more liquor.  The brain,
 the nervous system, the  heart—all unite in
 the  demand.   The brain must  have the
 liquor, or it fails to communicate its energy
 to the nervous system, of course the nervous
 system is  prostrated, the heart beats  vio-
 lently—it is wrought up to palpitation in
 the failure of its supply of strength.  But
 what is  the  answer the stomach returns to
 this demand ?   It complains that it suffers
 more than any other organ, and yet that it
 is full to overflowing, and is in Avant of
 more.   The liquor within has lost its pow- „
 er, but the stomach in its inflammation re-
tains its desire,  and the suffering thus pro-
 duced must be the most intense that can be
imagined.  How can it be otherwise when
 the line  of inflammation extends through
 all the vital organs of the system ?
  Reader, did you ever witness the nausea,
the death sickness,  that is produced  by a 
75
drunkard's over-draught?  His return late
at night to his  home is from hfs drunken
spree.  He throws himself doAvn, whether
upon the bed or upon  the floor, he  knows
not, and perhaps cares not.   There he rolls
and tosses till the morning, and Avhen the
morning  comes, and he begins to  realize
his condition, he is sick enough.  Nothing
will remain  in his stomach.   It  rejects
everything but the liquor,  and that  will
hardly remain in it.  The poor unfortunate
sufferer  naturally cries for more liquor  to
brace his nerves and strengthen  his limbs,
so that he may be able  to stand.  And the
liquor he must  have, or suffer  such pains
as are hardly ever endured in any disease
that may happen to  persons  of  temperate
habits.
  It is said of liquor that it steals away a
man's sensibilities.  And so it does.   Who
would believe that a man may be too drunk
to stagger ?   Who Avould believe that a man
may be able to walk erect and straight for-
ward, and yet be so drunk as not to know
what he is about ?  Such is sometimes the
case.  Men have committed murder under 
76
just such  circumstances.   They have ap-
peared to  be  able to  control themselves.
They have seemed to hear and see  and ap-
prehend, while all was dull  and dreamy,
and there was little  sensibility in the per-
son.  The lips could move in muttering un-
meaning words.   The hand could be lifted.
The bloAv  could  be struck.   The  victim
could be slain.   All this Avhile the wretch
that passed through it, and committed the
fatal act, Avas unconscious of his condition
or his actions.
  An evidence  of the  truth of this state-
ment is on record in the history of our own
city.  A man who had been  on the most
intimate  terms of friendship with his  own
brother-in-law, on  one occasion  spent  a
whole day and most of a night on a drunk-
en frolic.  Late in the night  he returned
home, and by some means found his  Avay
into his room and to his bed.   He felt hor-
ribly as he laid and  tossed in the solitude
of his chamber.  His  brain  was fevered,
and his whole system was  on the rack.  As
the night passed on he  grew worse, and in
a fit of  madness he arose from his  bed, 
                   77

seized  an andiron from the fire-place, hur-
ried, staggering  and  SAvaggering, to his
brother-in-laAv's bed, and  in two minutes
beat out his brains.  The act Avas sufficient
to sober him, but  it did not, nor did he then
experience the dread reality  of his deed of
murder.   He was confined until the morn-
ing, Avhen he Avas arrested and conveyed to
prison.   It  Avas not until  he reached the
prison  and was about to be locked in its cell
that he came to himself.    He  asked the
officer Avhy he was arrested and brought to
prison.   When the fact was communicated
to him he fainted and fell upon the  floor.
Upon his recovery the truth flashed upon his
mind Avith  such  force as to overcome his
reason, and seizing a knife, he Avould have
plunged it into his heart if it had not been
for  the arrest of his  arm by the officer.
He  Avas soon placed upon trial for the mur-
der, and convicted.  He  Avas sentenced to
the penitentiary  for eighteen years.  Al-
though a  number of years—the years of his
confinement—passed since the  deed  was
committed, the murderer always protested
that he Avas utterly unconscious of his act.
      6* 
                    78

   Truly fearful are the effects of intoxicat-
ing liquors.  They render the man insensi-
ble to every condition  and  circumstance.
So much so, that in a state of utter uncon-
sciousness ne can rise from his bed, seize a
deadly  Aveapon,  rush to the side of  his
sleeping victim,  and leave him a corpse
upon his  bed.   Does the blood run  chill
and cold Avhile such a tale as this is in re-
hearsal?  It is a warning to the drunkard
to beware of his besotted practice.   It is a
warning to the  moderate—the  so-called
temperate drinker to cease  from his indul-
gence of the habit in the fear that a  like
result may happen to him.  It is a warning
to the temperate man never to  touch the
accursed boAvl.
   But all men are not affected in the  same
way  in the use  of intoxicating  liquors.
While it fires and  maddens  the brains of
some, it makes others as simple and as fool-
ish as idiots.  In fact, it does render them
idiots for the time being.   You  sometimes
see a drunken man  in his silly mood.   He
dances, laughs, sings, huzzahs.  Say what
you  please to such  a one, call him by any 
•79
name, use the most insulting expression,
and  he laughs  in your  face.  He looks
upon you Avith a stupid, idiotic  stare, and
evidently does not realize the force of your
remarks.  He imagines he is rich, and de-
sires to spend his money in treating you.
Many a one  has began his career in this
way.   But he has not  so ended it.   For a
time Avith such persons the effect of the
liquor is not painful either in the height
of its operation  or in the loss of its influ-
ence.  But  this  condition  cannot always
last.  The coat of the stomach will in time
be so affected as to become painful—then a
different set of sensations  are  produced.
The most peaceful  and  quiet  man  then
becomes the  fiercest  fiend.  The idiotic
child becomes the furious madman.  Then
he  may commit the most  horrible crimes
and run the risk of the most fearful pun-
ishment.
  I have sIioavii how surely liquor will con-
vert some persons into murderers.  It will
convert them also into thieves.  Some per-
sons strictly honest at other  times, when
under the influence of intoxicating  liquor 
80 .
will steal  everything  they can  lay  their
hands upon.  It matters not if they do not
want Avhat they steal.   The act of theft  is
performed by a propensity that is increased,
if not produced, by drunkenness.  I know
a very wealthy  man  Avho Avas  in the habit
of taking an occasional  spree to himself.
When fairly drunk,  nothing was safe that
he could steal.  It was no matter whether
the thing in the Avay were  worth much or
little, it was sure to be stolen.  His move-
ment  in stealing, was  cunningly pursued.
He kneAv very Avell Avhen persons Avere near,
and might detect him,  and he Avatched his
opportunity, and  generally succeeded Avith-
out the  prospect of detection.   Notwith-
standing the adroit  manner in which his
thefts Avere accomplished, he never seemed
to be  aAvare of the  folly,  and always re-
gretted  the act  after  it was performed.
Many times he has stolen articles of value
from neighbors and friends, which his wife
took the first opportunity of returning.
  In one instance this  inebriate thief  came
very near  being  caused to suffer the full
penalty of his folly.  He was on one of his 
81
sprees when he stole the purse of an asso-
ciate ; how he did it he was not able to tell.
The  purse, hoAvever,  was  found in  his
pocket by his Avife.   Like some other wives,
she was an excellent hand in searching her
husband's pockets.   There were tAvo hun-
dred dollars in the purse, and the Avife was
anxiously desirous of  finding  its owner,
impelled by the will to return the treasure,
and  not  Avithout the fear  that  the thing
might be exposed, and her husband ren-
dered liable to be arrested.  Sure enough,
by her own inquiries, suspicion  was start-
ed, and the officer came to the house and
arrested  the drunken  thief.  The officer,
when he ascertained  that the man Avas
wealthy,  asked  what  in the  world  could
have induced  him to steal.  Of course the
reply was, he  could not tell, for he did not
know himself.  The thief was committed
to jail and  kept there several days.  The
owner of the purse was  as much intoxicated
as the thief at the time  it was stolen, and
he  was  very much  surprised  when  he
learned that his friend had stolen it.  It
was  known  to all concerned that the purse 
82
Avas taken Avithout design, and the case was
dismissed.
  There  are  Avithout doubt many persons
who steal, not because they really need the
articles  of Avhich they feloniously deprive
their neighbor, but because of the desire to
possess themselves of the property of others
which  the  accursed liquor-cup produces.
It were a dangerous practice on this ac-
count.   He that is accustomed to the in-
dulgence had better take  the Avarning in
time, or he may go out on his spree in the
night, and  Avake up in the  morning and
find  himself  in  jail,  confined there for
stealing; for stealing what he did notwant
in a fit of  drunkenness.   And the  next
thing may be the trial  in court, then the
conviction, the sentence, and the home for
a number  of years in the  penitentiary.
There Avill be time enough for  repentance
in the State's prison.  Then you may Avish
you had never been born, or that some rock
of the mountain had fallen upon you  and
crushed you.   The life of woe and mourning
in the penitentiary is surely  not to be de-
sired.  It is  surely to be lamented  and 
83
 avoided.  Let the man that is even disposed
 to drunkenness beware  of the ruin and
 wretchedness the habit may produce.  Let
 him shun the intoxicating boAvl, and none
 of  these things  may   happen  to  him.
 " Touch not, taste not, handle not the un-
 clean thing."   So says an  adviser of the
 good book, Avhose  counsel is of the highest
 character, and  ought to be considered and
 followed by every one in the least degree in-
 clined to the inebriating  boAvl.
   Cases  are  on record  of  men  who,  in
 the indulgence  of the habit of drinking
 liquor, absolutely become so stupefied that
 they do not know how  much they drink.
 They are not satisfied a single moment that
 the liquor is not running down their throats.
 They burn with thirst after it continually.
 And the more  that is drank, the more is
 Avanted.   Insensibility to  everything but
 the  dram is produced, and it is most re-
 markable that insensibility to that cannot
 be produced.   Stupefied  and idiotic, and
 almost paralyzed and insensible to objects
* around, to persons, to home, to  everything
 else  but liquor,  the man will think  of 
84
it, and crave  it, and cry for it, and seems
to be in a condition that he must have it or
die.  I know of a man that determined to
have the most extended spree  of his life.
He bought tAvo gallons of brandy and  shut
himself up  with it in  his  chamber.   He
drank the two gallons in tAvo days, and at
the end  of the second day he was found in
the room dead.  His extended  spree cost
him  his life.   After he had  commenced
drinking, the desire continued to increase ;
he could not resist  the temptation to  con-
tinue  to gratify his  desire, and  he  was
literally destroyed by the liquor that  pro-
duced the excitement, and  caused him to
proceed  with  the gratification of his appe-
tite until his  system could endure it  no
longer,  when he fell a wretched victim to
the destroyer.
  Who  has not heard of persons who have
been found dead in their beds  after fits of
drunkenness ? The result is common among
the drinking  classes. Every day coroner's
juries are  called  and inquests  held  over
the bodies of men who have been found dead"
either in bed or somewhere on the high- 
85
way, or near some body of water.  An over-
charge of liquor has caused the  calamity.
The verdict of the jury is brought in " death
from exposure,"  "death  from intemper-
ance," " death by the  visitation of God."
In all such cases the destruction has been
occasioned by liquor.
  The drunkard may become so thoroughly
overcome as not to know where he is.   The
streets that.he has  been accustomed to all
his life, the houses with which he has been
familiar, his own home, his friends, all are
strange to him.  He drinks his fill in the
dram shop, and then tries  to find his  way
home.  The effort  fails.   He is another
man, and he  might as  well be in another
country.   If he lives up  the street, he di-
rects his course  down the street in search
of it.   He meets friends but does not know
them.  Nobody can he find that will direct
him  to his  home, and the  more  he  walks
the further he  goes from his home.  I
knew of a very ridiculous event  that hap-
pened to  a drunkard.  It is  so ridiculous
that  many people will hardly believe it
to be true, but  it  is as true as  anything
      7 
86
that ever happened.   A  man spent an
evening in a drinking house.   He became
intoxicated of course.  Who ever spent an
evening in a  drinking  house and  Avent
home sober ?   This man became thoroughly
drunk, and while  drunk  attempted to find
his way home.  He  was quite genteelly
dressed, and was regarded as a respectable
gentleman when sober, but when drunk he
was about as  good as any other  drunken
man, and no better.  In striking for the
direction of  home he took another  direc-
tion.  He walked until he was tired, and
wondered  all  the time  why  he  did not
reach home.   At last he began to believe
he was in some other town, and had wan-
dered outside  of  the city.   He  heard a
sound of something like  a voice.   And it
was a voice.   He thought it  was some of
his family  that  was speaking.  In  his
thought he was home, and undressed him-
self and went to bed.  He slept very soundly.
How  could  he help it? He  was  drunk
enough  to sleep anywhere.  In the morn-
ing he  heard a  voice calling him.  He
looked up, and there stood  a  man with a 
87
pail in his hand.   What in  the world was
he doing  there.   Was he about to throw a
pail of Avater upon  him ?   The  drunken
man raised his head to look,  and Avhere was
he?  He was in a hog pen.   He had slept
with a sow and her pigs, and the  man was
there with a pail of slop to  feed the pigs,
and it  was  remarkable that he did not
throw the slop  over the  man  that was
snugly  reposing  among  the pigs.   His
clothes  Avere in one corner of the  pen, and
he was  stretched  out at full length  on the
boards  and  by the  pigs.   He was  taken
from  the uncomfortable bed on which he
had slept.  The man assisted in  dressing
him, and  he turned  him loose to find his
way home if he  could.   That man could
never tell how he got into the pig  sty.  He
had no recollection  of -climbing  over the
side, which he must have done.  Nor could
he tell anything but that he was  perfectly
satisfied he was  at  home  and undressed
himself and  got into his own bed.
  The man of the pig sty was an acquaint-
ance of  mine,  and I  very often joked him
about his night's  adventure.   If I had not 
88
known him I should have supposed the
story  was made up to amuse the people, or
to frighten  drunkards.  But it is no made-
up story.  I kneAV the man well, and have
often heard him tell the tale of his drunk-
en  frolic,  and of  his  sleeping soundly
among the  pigs.   The sound Avhich  he
mistook  for that  of a human voice  was
either the grunt of the old sow or a squeal
of one of her pigs.  Strange  that a man
should allow  himself to  be placed in  a
condition in which he could not distinguish
the grunt of  a sow or the  squeal of a pig,
from the words spoken by  a friend or a
supposed member of the family.   Such he
often  declared to  be the fact, and seemed
to enjoy the degrading, disgraceful joke.
  There  is sufficient evidence in the fore-
going relation to  convince any one that a
man  may be so bewildered  and stupefied
by drunkenness as not  to  know what he is
doing.  I kneAV of a terrible case of the
kind  which  I relate Avith  sorrow.  It  is
that of a young man that was in  my em-
ployment.  He never was  drunk but once.
But that once Avas  enough.  Its terrible 
                  89

result will be remembered  by me  and by
others as long as Ave live.   The young man
went out one night with a number of his
acquaintances for a spree.  He had never
tried anything of the kind, and was anxious
to experience the fun of it.  They soon be-
came intoxicated, every one of them.   The
young man of whom  I speak, became  vio-
lently crazy.  "I will  kill somebody  to-
night,"  he  cried, and  away he hurried
homeward for  his revolver.  He got  pos-
session of the revolver and  returned to his
friends, swearing that he would kill some-
body that night.  He flourished his revolver,
and supposed he Avas the mightiest, bravest,
most independent man in the  world.  And
so he Avas.   Many of his friends thought he
was joking, and  that  there was no harm in
his threat.  But they were soon undeceived.
The  young  man entered upon a  quarrel
with the keeper of the  dram shop where
there Avere, and  he raised  his revolver and
shot him dead on the spot.  He had never
seen nor heard of the man he killed, before
that night, and of course he could have had
no animosity against him.  The murderer
      7* 
90
was  immediately arrested.   He  was im-
prisoned until the day of his trial, when he
was brought into coiirt and soon convicted.
He  was sentenced to  the penitentiary for
fifteen years,  and noAv while I am writing
he is there in confinement, during the day
at hard labor, and during the night in  a
solitary cell.
  What could have  induced the notion in
the mind of the  man  that he must kill
somebody ? The liquor he drank must have
inflamed his brain and produced  insanity.
He could have been impelled to such an act
by nothing less than insanity.  Surely, as
it is said, the liquor stole  away his brains.
It disordered his mind.  It  produced the
wildest, fiercest excitement.  It perverted
all his faculties and sent him forth a man-
iac, for the  commission of the  greatest of
crimes known to human laAv.   Can I  do
justice to the young man, or the  old man,
or to  any persons who may read the  narra-
tive of this unfortunate  young man, with-
out  a word  of warning?  Shun, reader,
shun the path of the intemperate as you
would that of the  viper.  You would not 
91
risk your life among the poisonous reptiles
that infest  the wild  untenanted  forest.
Risk it not among the drunken assemblies.
Risk it not in the drinking house.  You
may begin with the determination that you
will never  become a  drunkard, and you
may declare every day that  you will not
be  a drunkard, and  every day  that you
make this declaration you may be pursuing
the drunkard's path.  Deceive not yourself
with any fancy that you  are different from
others, and that there is no danger of your
fall.  You are  like others in  yielding to
the  temptation.  You  are like others in
the indulgence, in the drunkenness, in the
night's debauch, and you will be like others
in the Avrong you will commit upon yourself
and others, and in the ruin  in which you
may end your career.
  Do you knoAv a man that is a mere tippler,
Avho is going carelessly along in his career
of tippling ?  He may be prosperous in bu-
siness,  and he only takes small drinks, or
a few a day.  " There is no danger of my
becoming a  drunkard," says  he.   " My
drink is  a small one, and I  only take it 
92
four or five times  a day."   Watch him as
he passes along in life.  He stops regularly
at certain hours  at the dram shop.   Four
times, five times  a day he  leaves his busi-
ness for  the liquor  shop  and his  dram.
Now he goes six  times,  now  seven  times,
now more times than  he knows.  He does
not wish to  count them all.   Now he  is
drunk.  He is drunk again.  He is drunk
every day.  His business  is falling off.  His
family are beginning to be in Avant.  He is
a habitual  drunkard.  His family  is ne-
glected.  He is ruined.   His creditors have
taken his goods and his  furniture.  He  is
no  more seen at  his business.  Where  is
he ? What has become of him ?  He is in
the almshouse.  He is in the prison. He has
run the drunkard's career.  He  has died
in disgrace.   This briefly told  is  the race
of thousands.  Young  man, do  you not
know it  to  be  true?  Have you not wit-
nessed  the  result  in  your OAvn  short life ?
With the fate of the fallen drunkard before
you, shun the drunkard's habit.  Keep out
of the  drunkard's path.   Shun  the dram
shop and the dram, and you are safe. 
93
  And how is it the case sometimes that
the merest accident, which is in  itself not
improper, leads a man into  drunkenness
and ruin ?   I knew a man that was in busi-
ness, and making money.  He was as tem-
perate a man as lived.  He  never  drank
liquor.   He was taken sick, and  his phy-
sician ordered whiskey for his drink.  At
first he  refused to take it,  declaring he
did not  like  it.   But he  went  on with
the prescription.  He took the whiskey as
medicine three times a day, and before each
meal.  That is about the number of times
some kinds of medicine are taken.  Three
times !   But after awhile  three times would
not suffice, then it  must  be four  times,
then, and then, and then, as many times as
he pleased, and he pleased to drink it  all
the day through.   A reverse took place in
his business, said to  be occasioned  by the
troubles that the war produced, but it was
on account of the whiskey.  He was  at last
broken up.  The poison  of liquor was in
him, and he was about as badly poisoned as
he  would  have been  in  the  slow use of
arsenic or strychnine.  He was at length 
94
seen staggering through the streets.  It
took the Avhole pavement for him to  pass,
and every one had to run out of his  way.
One asked him why he threw himself away
in that manner.  He replied: " To droAvn
my trouble."  He said this  while he was
rapidly  making  more  and  more  trouble
every day, and every hour of every day.  The
friend remonstrated with  him.  " Do you
care for your family ?  Look at your heart-
broken wife, your little helpless children.
You are destroying them  as well  as your-
self.  You  are making your  happy home
desolate.  You are dragging  doAvn to ruin
a pleasant,  contented, lovely family.  In a
short time  you will be a miserable wreck,
and your home a ruin.  You say you drink
to drown trouble.  Is not every day's drink-
ing plunging you deeper into trouble ?  Are
you not  nearer  ruin noAv than you  were
some time ago ?  Can you stand  it much
longer ?"   This remonstrance was intended
for  the  man's benefit.   It was  made to
effect his reformation.  But  it  Avas all of
no consequence.  He continued his practice
until the ruin came.  He is still a splendid 
95
wreck.  He becomes crazy periodically, and
has to be taken to the hospital.  In a week
or two he is cured in the hospital, and comes
out and  mingles among  his friends.  But
he cannot remain out of the hospital more
than half his time.  It  is a pity they do
not keep him there until  he is cured of his
dreadful disease, or that  they do  not keep
him there altogether.  He  has  already
spoiled a splendid  home, and Avill soon be
in a drunkard's grave, if not prevented by
some timely intervention.
  Reader, ponder Avell  this little narrative.
Remember the caution it continues all  the
way through.  It is caution  not only given
in kindness, but enforced by  sad examples.
The examples are true  histories.  Every
one of them is an actual occurrence.  Heed
the reproof here recorded, and you may not
be broken up in business ; you may not be
picked up  out  of a pig-pen; you may not
be impelled to the commission  of murder,
and hanged.    You may not be  conveyed
periodically to the hospital.   Heed the re-
proof,  and none of these things  may hap-
pen  to you  on account of  drunkenness. 
                   96

But you may be the respectable  head of a
happy,  loving family, a  benefit to your
neighborhood, an honor to your country, a
faithful, devoted, useful  servant of your
God. 
THE  CURE.
    The Control of the Desire is the Cure of
               Drunkenness.
   As we have spoken of drunkenness as a
disease, and its  danger of relapse, and its
causes and effects, it is now proper that we
should say something of its cure.  The cure
of drunkenness is a  subject that  has been
considered and written upon by some of the
ablest men of our own and other countries.
The best minds  of the Medical Profession
have studied the progress of drunkenness,
from its beginning to  its end, and in the
closest investigations  of man's  anatomi-
cal structure.  The  effects of intoxicating
liquors  upon the  blood, and through the
blood upon  every organ of man's system,
have been traced and developed.   But with
all that has been  done in the relation, no
one has been able to  discover the  prescrip-
      8 
98
tion that will cure  it.   Like consumption
and diseases of the heart and  other  vital
organs, it must work its ravages Avithout a
cure in all the volumes and annals of the
Medical Profession.   In consequence of the
inability to discover a remedy among the
Medical works or in Medical science, it has
been denied that drunkenness is a disease.
But of this there  can be no question.  If
delirium tremens is a disease, and if insan-
ity is a disease, nay, if small-pox is a dis-
ease, drunkenness is a disease.   The fact is
noAv admitted by the most learned and dis-
tinguished men of the Medical  Profession.
  NotAvithstanding  all  the learning and
professional skill and anatomical labor that
have been employed on the subject, no spe-
cific has  yet been discovered  that  can be
recommended  as  a remedy, nor has any
method of prescribing been developed that
can do more than ameliorate and cure the
diseases that are  caused by drunkenness.
The root of the disease has not been reached,
and speculation is still indulged, to a great
extent, upon the subject.
  Under the circumstances thus presented, 
99
it must not be expected of me that I shall
do more than the wisest of men have been
able to do in  this  important relation.  I
have some remarks to make upon the sub-
ject, however,  and will  present them in as
close an examination of the subject as  has
yet been reached.
  When I say that no cure for drunkenness
has been discovered, I allude to the malady
as a disease of the physical system.   If I
consider   the  disease  in  its  moral  de-
velopment alone, I would at once name the
cure.   Drunkenness, as a moral  develop-
ment,  can be  cured  and has been cured
frequently.  And were the drunkard to ex-
ercise his  moral  powers as he might do it,
he  would soon be relieved  of his  trouble.
Considered as  a moral question, the cure of
drunkenness is  abstinence.  If the man never
drinks intoxicating liquors, he Avill never
be a drunkard ;  and if he  ceases  to drink
intoxicating liquors after he  has  become
a drunkard, the disease will certainly be
cured.   It requires  the cause  to  produce
the effect.  The cause in  this  question is
the drinking  of the liquor ; the  effect of 
100
the  cause is drunkenness.  Remove  the
cause, and the effect will cease as a matter
of course.  But it  is said this  is the old
song ; and so it is.  It is indeed the old
song, but I desire to sing it, and to have it
sung by eArery other man.  I desire to sing
it, and to have it sung  to every tune that
has yet been discovered,, and in  every way
and place in which drunkenness  may  be
reached.  Abstinence is the cure—the moral
cure, and if the  drunkard cannot  exercise
the moral force necessary to  cure  his dis-
ease,  it is because  he has  made  himself
much less a man than God ever made him,
or intended he should ever be. In the wreck
of his moral poAvers, Avhich is accomplished
by drunkenness, the man not only reduces
his character and condition  as a man, but
actually destroys himself.
  The moral  force of drunkenness, or per-
haps  better said, the moral imbecility  of
drunkenness, appears in the  fact, that the
drunkard will persist in his vicious  career
until his  family and himself are reduced  to
beggary,  and he will even then persist  in
its progress, and never cease while a spark 
101
of life is left  in  his  system.   In beggary
and want and disease, he will  call for his
dram, and  it does seem as if the last lin-
gering  pulse  craves the  excitement  pro-
duced by intoxicating liquor.
  In the consideration of the moral force of
the disease, I may say not only  that it can
be cured, but that it has been cured.  And
how has it been done ?  The question is easily
answered.   Men  have  been convicted  of
crimes and sentenced to prison.   Fortunate-
ly for them, while in the prison, there was
no liquor to be had.  The abstinence neces-
sary to cure the disease has been practiced,
and the disease cured.  But it may be said
that the disease Avas cured by compulsion,
and Avould  break  forth again when the re-
straint  was removed.  In  many cases this
is true,  but in many other cases the reverse
is true.  Many men have become temperate
in prison, and have continued so after they
were released.  In their cases the cure has
been effectual.  The cure, then, is in the re-
moval of the cause.  Why not, then, labor
in each  case for the removal of the cause ?
  But the confinement of the prison is not
      8* 
102
the only agency by Avhich drunkenness has
been cured.   After a severe spell of sick-
ness, during which abstinence has been ne-
cessary, the man has persevered in carrying
out the moral idea, and succeeded in effect-
ing a permanent cure of  his disease.  The
principle is the same in such cases as these
as it is in the abstinence through imprison-
ment.  And the result through the working
of the principle is  the same.  The cause of
the drunkenness was interfered Avith and
broken, and as a matter of course, the effect
ceased.
  In the case of a man that fell  from the
top of his house, on Avhich he had Avandered
in a fit of delirium tremens, and broke his
arm, the moral force is still more apparent.
The  sudden shock to  his system brought
him to his senses, and the suffering caused
by his broken  limb forced him to the con-
sideration of his condition, and  he never
could be prevailed  upon to drink intoxicat-
ing liquors after Avar ds.   In the practice of
abstinence he became a sober man, and con-
tinues so to this  day, although it has been
more that twenty years since the accident
happened to him. 
103
   Again, the  moral force is  still further
apparent in cases  in  which persons have
lost their friends  or relatives  by death.
The determination has been  formed, and
the  person has  been cured of the disease.
Cases of this kind are not so frequent as they
might be, if the persons interested would
properly consider their condition in view of
the  certainty of their own  death, and of
the uncertainty of the time at Avhich it will
occur.   The full force  of this consideration
is seldom experienced.  The man that is in
health  feels his poAvers of life in their ac-
tive exercise, and  in such feeling there is
nothing like death  or failure, and although
every day there is evidence afforded of life's
uncertainly, he goes on without being able
to realize the fact and  certainty of his own
dissolution.
   Reader, in the considerations above pre-
sented, do you not see that  all that is re-
quired in the reformation of  a  drunkard is
resolution.   The  resolution  formed  and
kept is the  cure of this terrible, afflictive
disease.  And what man is there that claims
his condition and character as a man, that 
104
cannot form and keep his resolution.  There
is no doubt that in most cases of ordinary
drunkenness  the  resolution thus directed
Avould  be sufficient for the accomplishment
of the purpose.  Men have tried the experi-
ment in various Avays, and succeeded.  Oth-
ers have failed.  Some have joined the tem-
perance society, and taken the pledge of ab-
stinence.   This is a noble work and ought
to  be pursued with  energy and vigor.   It
is a sad thing that the cause of temperance
should decline, and drunkenness be alloAved
to work its  Avay without interruption.  Let
the temperance societies be sustained.  Let
their members renew their determination to
carry  them on and enforce their  rules.
They have been the  means of saving  thou-
sands  from the  drunkard's  grave, and
should never cease their labors while there
is a drunkard to be saved.   The renewal of
the temperance cause would he one of the
best  events that could be produced at  the
present time.  Such a cause should  never
want reviving.  It  should  ever  he in pro-
gress, and ever on its increase in members and
labors, and in the fruits of  its good works. 
105
  But, after all, the best remedy for drunk-
enness is religion.  God never fails in the
fulfilment of his promises to mankind,  and
He has promised that He will be  with  and
protect  every one  that is obedient to Plim
in the keeping of His commandments.  I
have  heard of hundreds who have been
saved by joining the church.  I knoAv per-
sonally many persons who have  pursued
this  course, and have succeeded to the ut-
most of their expectations.  The  church is
a sure safeguard.   Only respect and obey
its  principles,  injunctions and laAvs,  and
safety  is secured.   Many men have tried
every other experiment—first  the resolu-
tion, then  the  oath  before  a magistrate,
then the temperance pledge, then pledge to
the minister, and  last of all, the church.
And here  they Avere secure.   Trusting in
God,  they  renounced the  trust in them-
selves, and looked to Him for strength  and
support in the purpose and pursuit.  While
a man looks to God and  prays for grace,
he ceases to trust in himself, and  the very
fact that he  looks to God and prays  for
grace will be sufficient to sustain him.   No 
106
man can pray to God without being si ncere,
and sincere and devoted prayers offered to
God will be heard and answered.  There is
mystery in this sort of help.   And the most
mysterious part of it is its success.  No man
ever yet trusted God and was disappointed.
No man ever yet trusted in  God for sup-
port in a reformed life,  and failed.   If fail-
ure ensued, it Avas because there Avas failure
in the trust.  The failure was in the man,
not in God.  And the fruits of this mystery
may be realized by every  drunkard.  He
may resolve and  trust in God, and in the
pursuit of his resolution and  trust, he will
surely be saved.
  Reader, there is a cure for drunkenness.
It is in yourself.   It is  in the moral force
of the man.   You may damage and destroy
this moral force,  and  you may use  it in
your present and  everlasting security.  If
you are  in the habit of using intoxicating
liquors, cease the  habit, or as sure as  your
death is in the future, so i3 your ruin, per-
haps death, in the pursuit of ruin.  Are you
a drunkard ?  Resolve on your reformation,
 oin the  church, and pray to God to give 
107
you grace and strength to fight  the battle
with your enemy, and you will find that
God is greater than  your enemy, and that
in Him you are safe. 
THE RELAPSE.
 Old Causes Renew the Desire, and Produce the
                 Eelapse,
  Every disease has its liability to relapse.
None more so than that  of drunkenness.
The seat of the disease being in the desire
for liquor, unless the  cause be removed in
the removal of the desire  there  is danger
of a renewal  of the disease,  and as  it is
with  all relapses  in  the  development of
worse and more .dangerous features  than
attended the first form of the attack.
  The causes of relapse in this disease are
numerous.  In some  cases, after the  cure
has been effected, the  subjects of the  dis-
ease act as the doctors advise in relation to
other maladies, that is, keep out of the Avay
of danger in exposure  to the causes Avhich
produced the first attack.   The first idea in
this relation is associated Avith the old  com- 
109
 panionships.  The reformed  inebriate is
 warned to keep away from the  dram-shop.
 This is a prominent feature in the exposure.
 There is as much  danger  to the reformed
 inebriate in his attendance upon the dram-
 shop as there  is in the  man Avho has  had
 the  small-pox in taking cold  by exposure
 to drafts of Avind and to hard weather.   The
 fall in the one case is as certain as that in
 the other.  The issue is almost sure to be
 produced.  The desire for the liquor which
 is frequently in sight Avill  most surely re-
 turn with the old  considerations and asso-
 ciations that its appearance must bring for-
 ward vividly in the memory.   I say to the
 reformed inebriate, keep  away from  the
 dram-shop, or the sight of the liquor  will
 re-produce the old desire, and a second fall
 will certainly follow.
   A second danger to be avoided is the as-
 sociation of the old companions of the dram-
 shop.  Many a man Avho has by hard exer-
 tions reformed his habit  and  restrained
his desire, has fallen into this snare, and a
second time become a  drunkard.  For a
time, it  may be, he has shunned  the  old
      9 
110
'walks and the old companionships, but by
 degrees the desire has been revived, the
 old habits reinduced, and the second  stage
 of the disease has been worse than the first.
 And how is it that the meeting is effected
 Avith  the old  associates ?  Sometimes the
 meeting is  occasioned by accident, on the
 street, or at a friend's house, and  the first
 thoughts of the old friends are those of their
 glee associations.  How  happy  they were
 when, on the occasions of their assembling,
 they engaged  in their social cheer.  The
 purpose  was to forget dull  care, and  to
 drown all responsibility in the use  of the
 intoxicating beverage.  And the convivial
 engagement, how delightful it was !   How
 much uproarous joy it produced !  How the
 thrills of excitement rushed through the
 system !   All  this was wrought Avhile the
 liquor was stealing away the senses,  which
 lasted but a brief period, and then came the
 stupor, and the nausea, and the lassitude,
 and the  almost  impossibility  of  motion.
 This reverse in every case was the penalty
 the system had to pay for its brief exhila-
 ration and transient  enjoyment. 
Ill
   A  third means by Avhich the  reformed
 may  be again entrapped is found in politi-
 cal assemblages.  Here the parties meet for
 so-called  patriotic purposes,  and when  a
 man  feels patriotic unfortunately he  feels
 like taking a drink.  This is occasioned by
 the reprehensible association of intoxicating
 liquor Avith political movements.  On elec-
 tion days the first thing most men think of
 is " a spree."  They start forth in the early
 morning for the dram, and many are well
 soaked before the hour for opening the polls.
 It has seemed for a  number of years past
 among a certain class, that a man is not fit
 to vote unless he  is pretty full of whiskey,
 or some other kind of liquor.
   The companions of the old political club
 are among the most dangerous associations
 of the reformed inebriate.   If he gets among
 them he is almost sure of the relapse.   The
 best Avay for every one in such condition is
 to keep aAvay from all his old  associations,
 Avhether  of the  dram-shop, of the former
 friendly greetings, or of the political gath-
ering.  There is danger in  every step taken
under such circumstances, and no man that 
112
well considers his position Avill risk the con-
sequences it exhibits.
  There Avere ball-room  associations  con-
nected with the life of the dram-drinker,
which Avere very delightful  in their enjoy-
ment, and afford pleasure in retrospection.
The fashion, the beauty, the attracti\re fea-
tures of grace and talent and social  cheer,
all have interests which affect the feelings
and engross the thoughts.  A return to the
ball-room is next thing to a return to the
dram.  The old associations among ladies,
who unfortunately instead of frowning upon
the baneful practice of dram-drinking, are
often found with  the glass  in their hands
sipping the beverage,  Avhich  their  male
associates are drinking  to drunkenness.
They reflect but  little, or not  at all, upon
the damage they  are doing  to society, and
perhaps the trouble they are laying up for
themselves.   To  resist the temptation to
taste the beverage in  such  relationship is
next to impossible for an old dram-drinker,
and the only thing he can do to save him-
self is to keep out of the way of the temp-
tation. 
                   113

   And is it asked by the young man, must
I forego the pleasant relationships of society,
and not mingle among my female compan-
ions, Avhere most of all I might expect to
find safety and protection ?  It is even as
suggested.  The young votary of the social
cheer is to keep out of the  way of temp-
tation.   If there is temptation in the so-
ciety of ladies, AArhere  there  ought to be
safety and  protection, keep out of that so-
ciety.  There is enough of such association
that assumes a higher degree of real respect-
ability than can be  claimed by any assem-
blage in  Avhich  intoxicating liquors are
used.  The very use of  those liquors is de-
grading, and induces the association that
indulges to a loAver condition than ought to
be countenanced or tolerated by respectable
gentlemen  and ladies.
   Again,  there  is the  theatre.   What
throngs of young people hurry of an even-
ing to the theatre?   And how their sensi-
bilities are charmed by the idle whirl Avhich
the  brain  experiences  under the highly
wrought fictitious representations of life.
Did  ever a  young man  or young woman
      9* 
114
learn a lesson of respectability, or of do-
mestic duty, or of honorable  life at the
theatre ?  And what multitudes there are
Avho have  been utterly  and irretrievably
ruined by such associations ?  Talk of the
reform of the theatre !   It is now purified
and  redeemed, say its  votaries.  Purified
and  redeemed!   How?  In  Avhat?   The
old croAvds  go there.  The old associations
are kept up there.   The old cronies still go
from the box and the pit  and the gallery to
the dram-saloon.  The theatre is redeemed,
because a few foolish people of respectable life
are induced to attend it, and a few still more
foolish members of the church go there oc-
casionally.
  But is not the danger apparent when the
young group or  the old one, as it  may be,
adjourns from  the theatre  to the restau-
rant.  What is to be done in the restaurant
other than talk over the  excitement of the
drama?  Why,  the oysters are to be en-
joyed, and  the whiskey is to be used.  The
hour of indulgence in these  luxuries is not
to be omitted, notAvithstanding the threat-
ened danger of stupor and  indolence and 
115
sickness next morning. . Go not to these as-
sociations if you AVish to  persevere in the
way of reform.  The relapse is in their
issues,  and the second fall will assuredly
plunge you into  deeper  peril than  the
first.
   Again, in the taste,  nay,  in the  very
sight of liquor, there is peril in the Avay of
the reformed.   It may be supposed that a
glass of ale or  cider will do no  harm, be-
cause it may not intoxicate.  It is very true
that there is no harm  in a  glass of ale  or
cider drank by a temperate person.  But re-
member,  the  danger  is in  the renewed
pleasure the taste or the effect of the liquor
may produce.   Your desire may be slack-
ened, it may be rendered torpid, but  it is
still in  your system.  It  is still your de-
sire, and the disease is in the desire, and
Avhen indulged it is developed as  disease.
Again,  I say, keep  out of the way.   Touch
not the glass, for thousands have been lost
by the reneAval of the taste after the refor-
mation.   The  relapse has folloAved,  and
has only become the prelude  to  the forth-
coming destruction.  It was the first glass 
116
that led to the first fall.  It will lead to the
second, Avithout fail, if indulged.
  Another feature of the danger is in the
temptation to use liquor for slight diseases
that may attack the system.  The man has
the headache, whiskey is the remedy.  He
has the backache, Avhiskey is the perscrip-
tion—the   sovereign balm.  He has  the
toothache  !  There is nothing like whiskey
for  the toothache.  He has  bad feelings.
And Avhat  can  dispose of such feelings as
surely and as effectually as Avhiskey ?  He
has lost a friend or some property, Avhiskey
is  the antidote.   These are temptations
which  the  reformed should ever be afraid
of.   They are all  lies.-  Whiskey, instead
of being a  cure for any of these temporary
maladies,  only  aggravates  them.  Many a
man has the headache and the toothache and
other slight diseases, in consequence of his
habit of drinking.  The system is  disor-
dered by the use of liquor, and may read-
ily  be affected  with attacks from any of
these sources.   Whiskey cannot be a cure
for any ache.   It is the cause of all aches—
the heart ache most of all.  It  makes the 
117
hearts of whole families ache on account of
the drunkenness of one of their members.
Those who never drink or think  of drink-
ing liquor suffer because  their friends and
relatives have  throAvn themselves aAvay in
the practice of  dram drinking.
  It was but a little drink that brought on
the first attack of the disease." Less will
be required to  bring  on the relapse.  The
little drink has sent  its thousands  to the
grave and  to perdition.   It is sending its
multitudes there still.   What sort of trifle
is the  little drink to be  considered  when
that drink is poison ?  So it has been proved
in the destruction of vast  armies of the hu-
man race.   The little  drink !  Better that
any man should take the  large drink than
the little one.  Better, why ?  Simply be-
cause he Avill do his Avork  of destruction the
faster, and  hasten  the sooner to  its end.
The little drink !   Reader, drink a quart of
whiskey rather than half a gill.  The quart
will do its  work at once, while the half gill
at a  time  will but prolong  the torture.
You say, perhaps, that the little drink Avill
prolong the enjoyment.   So it may, but the 
118
penalty is at the end of it.  And the en-
joyment!   What is  it?  A moment's ex-
citement for hours of depression.  A tran-
sient exhilaration for a permanent languor.
Drink your full at once, and be done with
it, rather than tipple and prolong the torture
of the drunkard's career.  Surely, after the
first fall, after the first trial of drunkenness,
you will not be willing to  experience  the
wretchedness endured in it a second  time.
Think   of the  dark side  when  you  are
tempted.  Think of the dying of the liquor
within you, and the languor and stupor and
pain it  produces, and not of the exhilara-
tion and the  enjoyment.  The pleasure is
not worth the price  you must pay for it  ;
and remember that the second stage of the
disease  Avill be worse than the first, the re-
lapse will carry you lower than the original
attack.
  Philosophically speaking the risk of a re-
lapse is ridiculous in the vieAv of  common
sense.   Has  the man  been attacked with
severe  illness, by  taking cold?  When he
recovers, hoAV careful  is he to  avoid ex-
posure.   The physician warns  him,  the 
119
family and friends warn him,—he feels the
necessity himself of exercising the greatest
caution, lest he should take the second cold
and be thrown back into his room and upon
his bed.  All this Avarning, and the care
and  the  prudential consideration  come of
the fear of the relapse.   The man is regard-
ed as a lunatic, who will slight the warning
and  dare the danger.  This is  the judg-
ment of philosophy, in its witness and con-
demnation of the  imprudence of the man
who has suffered from a physical  malady.
And is the case of the reformed inebriate
different, philosophically considered ?  By
no means.  The reprehensibility of the ac-
tion is as  great in the  one  case  as it is in
the other.  It is the exposure that induces
the relapse, and when  the destructive ten-
dencies arise and work their Avay of prostra-
tion and suffering, where is the difference
as far as  the result is concerned ?
  But the plea is entered that it is the na-
tural tendency of the  desire once gratified,
to seek  its gratification again.  This is
true.   But it is this natural tendency that
is to be resisted.  The natural tendency is 
120
the natural cause.  In the case of the other
diseases, it is the natural tendency that is
to be avoided.  The exposure to the second
attack is in the natural tendency.   It is in
this that the  danger consists.   Nature
craves her gratification.   This  is the cause
of ruin in all instances of self-indulgence.
Resist >then  the natural  tendency.  Resist
it with  your might.   Resist in the deter-
mined purpose of being successful.  Resist
it as a means of fortifying yourself against
the assaults  of an  enemy Avhich is so in-
sidious  and  so  seducing and so certainly
destructive,  as  to  work  its way of ruin,
while you are witnessing its effects and ex-
periencing its enjoyments.
  And again, it is often supposed, that after
years of abstinence have elapsed, and  the
person is strengthened and confirmed in his
habits of soberness and  propriety, a little
indulgence may be  enjoyed without danger.
This is a fearful error.  The desire for  the
liquor may never  be  eradicated from  the
system of one who  has once indulged.   It
may lie dormant.   Like  certain  birds  and
insects during the cold season, it may he in 
121
 a condition of torpor, but it is still there.
,It is still in the system.  The passage of
 years of abstinence, may obscure it deeply,
 but Ayhile the man lives it is not dead.  It
 may be  revived, and it wi 11 be revived if
 the causes are applied.   The birds and in-
 sects that have lain torpid in Avinter, revive
 and return Avhen the warmth of the spring
 weather operates  in the re-animation of
 their forms.   So  Avith the reformed in-
 ebriate.   The desire is  in him, and will be
 there as long as he lives, and as certainly as
 the Avarmth revives the  birds and insects,
 and as fire causes the explosion of poAvder,
 so  sure  Avill the cause  of reneAval operate
 upon the latent desire of the old inebriate,
 whenever the means of such renewal  may
 be  applied.
  The man who is engaged in business, re-
 quires that every moment of his time should
 be  employed in the same.  There are  none
 of  his moments  that can be spent in the
 restaurant.   If  he  is seen in such places,
 his failure may be predicted Avith certainty.
 I have known  many  such, Avho have  neg-
 lected their business, for the pleasure  they
      10 
122
supposed they enjoyed, drinking and gam-
bling among their friends of the dram-shop.
It was  well  enough  understood  by their
neighbors, that they were on the track, and
at some no distant  day Avould wind up.
As supposed and believed, so it has happen-
ed.   The neglect of business was the cause
that produced the failure,  and it  had  to
take place.   The promise of better action
in a reformed life, has encouraged creditors
to extend time, and  allow  further  credit,
and the merchant  has made a neAv start,
and proceeded  Avith new purposes  and re-
newed  vigor, but the  old desire,  led the
way, and the willing victim  followed.  He
loitered near the old places of his ruin, then
entered, then drank, then came the relapse,
then became  drunk,  then Avas drunk more
hours than sober, then folloAved the relapse
and failure.   In the second relapse and fail-
ure there was a total Avreck.   The man was
left  without  a hope—a hopeless, hapless
ruin.  Merchant, look around you, and see
how many of your profession have gone down
in this  way.  In your  view  think  of your-
self, and be assured that if the propensity 
123
is in you, and  you indulge it, that  such
will be your fate.  Human nature is the
same in you that  it is in others, and Avhis-
key  Avill  have  the same effect  upon  it.
Drink, and you are undone. Touch not the
inebriating bowl, and you may be safe.
  And many are the professional men, both
young and  old, that have been dragged
doAvn from  the lofty eminence and  from
the place of promise.  I remember the case
of a distinguished medical practitioner Avho
was  fond of his glass.   He was a professor
in one of the medical colleges of Maryland.
He was one of the most talented men of his
profession, and he Avas highly  respected by
all the members of his profession, and much
beloved by the  students  that  attended his
lectures.   Once  he Avas  discovered  in  a
boozy condition, and his lecture was inter-
spersed with such nonsense as  could not be
understood.  A middle aged man, Avho was
a student, said  to  a number of his associ-
ates, " our old professor will soon go doAvn
the hill.   He is on the slope, and it will not
be long  before  he reaches the bottom."
As predicted so it came to pass.  One slide 
124
after another happened, and he Avas at last
unfit to lecture  and as unfit for his prac-
tice.  He  spent a small  fortune  that  he
had gathered in his  better days, and be-
came both a drunkard and a beggar.  He
was supported by charity until  he died.
And many Avas the Avish that Avas uttered
that he might  soon  get  through.  His
friends became tired of serving him.  They
appropriated reluctantly the  money neces-
sary for his support, and wished him out of
the way.  And as  desired so it happened.
He fell Avhen  he Avas  old,  and Avhen there
was hope that he would be able to maintain
his character, his respectability to the end
of life.   Such Avould have been the case had
it not been for the desire  for liquor.  The
desire  Avas  gratified.  He went do^vn  in
gratifying it.   By the assistance  of his
friends he rallied and  Avorked on again for
some time.  The old  friends  and patrons
returned to him, and Richard seemed to be
himself again. But the destroyer returned,
and the second fall Avas effected.  Another
reform was induced, and another rally took
place, only  to  become  the prelude to the 
125
third overturning.  The doAvnward race,
after the second  relapse, was rapid, and he
was soon out of the Avay of those Avho so
ardently wished it.  This case of the pro-
fessional man is  not a solitary one.  There
are plenty on the record.   Reader, if you
are a professional man, you have hours that
you devote to study.   Spend them in the
pursuit  of your  profession, and not at the
restaurant.  If you spend  your  hours in
the pursuit of your business you will doubt-
less  succeed, but if you  spend them at the
ale-house you Avill  assuredly fail  and fall,
and your friends, or the city or county will
have to support you.  If the city  or county
has to come forAvard to your support it will
be in  the almshouse.   So  beAvare of the
tempter, and shun it, and  the fate of the
fallen man may  not be yours.
  And  the  mechanic too has fallen.  Oh
how often—fallen once,tAvice, thrice—fallen
never to be recovered.  Hoav  many young
men have served  their apprenticeship in
faithful labors, and as  soon as they  Avere
free or some  time  afterward,  have  become
addicted to the use of liquor.   Not only
      10* 
126
 the wasted hours Avere  not  to  be restored,
 but the lost character Avas not  to be recov-
 ered.  More  rapidly than the  fortune and
 the  character Avere made, they Avere lost.
 It is a sad sight that sometimes appears in
 the form of the able and Avell  experienced
 mechanic, first on  the topmost  rounds of
 the ladder of success, nnd then at the  bot-
 tom.   It required a long  period of activity
 and  industry and perseverance,  to reach the
 place  near  the  summit.  But it required
 but a short time to fall from it.   And then
 comes the constant pressure  of the necessity
 of making the effort for recovery.  It may
 operate successfully, but there is  danger
 again in the  prospect of the relapse, and in
 the relapse there may be  the ruin, without
 the prospect or the hope of  being restored.
 A second and third reformation may possi-
 bly take place, but the result is extremely
 doubtful.
  Men of mechanical enterprise and talent,
 be not deceived by the false hope that you
 can act Avith  yourself as  you please.   De-
ceive not  yourself with  the idea that you
 may recover  your lost character  and busi- 
127
ness whenever you may determine to do so.
You may  contiol the winds as readily as
your OAvn  habits, once  they  are  set  and
confirmed.  Your only hope is in the absti-
nence that Avill save you from the ruin to
which your  indulgence  Avill surely  lead
you.
   Merchant, professional man,  mechanic—
listen to the voice of reason.   You  have
intelligence.   You possess reasoning facul-
ties.  You can  reason  from premises  and
judge from facts.  You can draAv conclu-
sions from  premises,  and understand  how
it is that the logic of facts is indisputable.
Argue the. case Avith yourselves.   Witness
the  result  a thousand  times repeated, of
the practice you  indulge.  The Avreck, the
ruin, the  poverty, the  Avretchedness,  the
degradation, all are in the path of drunk-
enness.   The ruins lie all along the path-
way of the  inebriate.
  Abstinence, total abstinence, is the  true
and effective remedy for the reformed drunk-
ard.   Every one  Avho is  in this condition
should ever preserve in  memory the dread
of the relapse.  It were  better to suffer in 
128
the mental anxiety that the fear of falling
produces, than to fall and realize the wretch-
edness that the almost hopeless condition
of a second, fall produces.
* 
THE  GOOD SALESMAN.
  Reader, are your prospects for the future
all  bright and  beautiful and  attractive?
Has your success  secured your happiness,
and are you now surrounded with  plenty,
and happy in the  society of your friends?
If such be your condition  you  doubtless
would like to be intrusted with  the secret
of knowing how to resist all the efforts that
may be made to dispossess you of your enjoy-
ment and reduce you to poverty,  want and
degradation.    If  you  Avould  like to  be
intrusted  Avith such secret give close atten-
tion to the  folloAving  account  of  a  very
prosperous salesman,  one Avhom  it would
have  been very hard to excel in  his  busi-
ness.   When  the  person to Avhom  I  have
reference as the good salesman commenced
his  career, he  Avas  about t\venty-five years
of age ; of very  prepossessing personal ap- 
130
pearance, and most pleasant  and attractive
in his conversation.  His style was really
eloquent and  easy, and very agreeable in
manners.  When  speaking, you could not
but be favorably impressed by his rich, full
and persuasive voice.   In fact he possessed
every qualification necessary  to win the fa-
vor of all Avith whom he met in the business
walks of life.  As a salesman, his abilities
were of  the highest order.  He possessed
the happy faculty of adapting himself to
nearly every customer ; and seldom permit-
ted one  to escape Avithout  being  persuaded
to make a purchase.  This faculty of adapt-
ing one's self in manners and conversation
to the various circumstances of disposition,
taste and means, is no trifling accomplish-
ment.   Every one who is acquainted with
mercantile pursuits, Avill  readily acknowl-
edge the truth of this declaration.   By his
tact  in  the management  of his superior
powers our salesman brought to his employ-
ers many advantages and much profit, and
he was in turn remunerated  with a salary
of fifteen hundred  dollars a year,  Avhich,
for the  times, was considered a good one. 
131
Few employees of the mercantile profession
received that sum.
  At the age of twenty-six the young man
married an accomplished young lady, whose
family were highly respectable, though not
wealthy.  The match was an excellent one,
and everything  went on  pleasantly and
prosperously for several years.  Unfortun-
ately, hoAvever, he contracted the habit  of
taking  some  of his  customers to a very
fashionable restaurant near the store.   His
visits at first Avere to obtain a snack.  Then
a glass of ale,  then something stronger.
He  was ahvays successful in learning if his
customer indulged in stimulating beverage,
which indulgence he was of course com-
pelled to gratify.  One visit a day was the
starting point in this neAV  and dangerous
practice.  It is a practice which is often
encouraged  by  merchants  who desire to
make all they can out of their  clerks and
salesmen.   That it is  reprehensible and
disgraceful is apparent in the  unfortunate
results that almost ahvays  folloAv its pur-
suit.  Although our salesman  began with
a visit a day, it was not long before he could 
132
be seen Avith  his customer  three  or four
times during the hours devoted to business.
At every visit, he not only invited his cus-
tomer to drink, but  in  gentlemanly cour-
tesy,  was obliged to drink  himself.  On
some  occasions it was  found to be very
pleasant to prolong the stay  in  the good
company and engage in the  pleasant em-
ployment of talking and smoking.  Several
drams Avere purchased and  paid for and
drank and enjoyed on each  occasion of these
business engagements.  In the  course of
his progress the subject of our history be-
came  exceedingly fond of Avhiskey, which
became his choice drink.  Being one of his
best customers, the keeper of the restaurant
always  kept on  hand  for his use a bottle
labelled "the best."  This  best Avhiskey
was about four times as strong as ordinary
whiskey.  It Avas Avhat liquor dealers call
fourth proof.  Being four times as strong
as other whiskey ; the fact is  apparent that
its effects Avere four times more poAverful
and four times more  destructive than ordi-
nary Avhiskey.  It would  therefore intoxi-
cate and kill four times as fast as the ordi- 
                    133

  nary whiskey. The chances of the salesman
  on his rapid  passage dowmvard were four
  times in number those of persons  using
  other Avhiskies.  And this is the stuff that
  is  used  by the upper classes,  so called, of
  society.   These classes must have the best,
  and of course they must risk the consequen-
  ces • of  the fourfold  disaster*  their effects
  must produce.
    Now,  reader, let us pause here for a mo-
  ment's reflection.  In the first place, what
  do you think of the  fashion of the  higher
  classes  of society, Avitnessed in the use of
  " fourth proof Avhiskey ?"   The  liquor is
  concentrated  so that its poAver  may become
  fourfold.  And men are willing to run the
  risk  of  ruining themselves on  account of
  the name of this fashionable indulgence.
  Is not such process of fashion an absurdity ?
  But again, Avhat do you think  of a talented
  young man, one possessed of extraordinary
  business poAvers, that  could thoughtlessly
  endanger his constitution and character in
  the use  of this  highly wrought  beverage?
.  It may be termed " high "  and  " best " as
  Avhiskey, but it is certainly low and worst
        11 
134
in the consequences it produces.   It is cer-
tainly among the worst and loAvest of moral
evils.  The race of the drinker of this con-
centrated poison must be measured in fig-
ures as four times as fast and  four times
shorter than that of the man Avho disgraces
himself by the  use of " bad whiskey " as
his beverage."                       *
  But to return to our story.  At the first
of his drinking  the salesman did not fancy
the  fourth proof as Avell as he  did some
other brand.  But the  extra bottle had its
attractions, and besides it was fashionable
among the better sort of people.  It being
the beverage of the  extra class of society,
caused it to secure for itself the favor of the
best judges, and to become the delight of
all who had the means of purchasing it.
In a little while, so  enamored with his new
idol did the salesman become,  that  the
drams of the restaurant were not sufficient.
He  must have  some of the best  brand at
home, and  Avhenever his friends came to see
him, the extra was set out, and many extra
drinks were called  for.   And Avhen  the
friends did not  come the drinks and  the 
135
extra drinks were all taken when the advan-
cing inebriate was  alone.  It sometimes
happened that the salesman met a customer
who refused to accompany him to the res-
taurant for the drams.  Then the frown of
displeasure appeared  on his countenance,
and he pitied in his heart the weakness of
the man who Avould not take a drink.  He
thought it was a poor kind of man that had
no taste for  " good Avhiskey."  Poor delu-
ded man !  He had  lost his sensibility and
moral force as a well-bred gentleman, and
felt disposed to hate and to curse every one
that declined his sociable  invitations  to
taste the friendly glass.
  Notwithstanding the rapidity with which
the subject of our history made his progress,
there were moments Avhen  he felt  sadly
enough.  They were  moments  of better
feeling  when his conscience was doing its
work and causing him to feel  that he was
wasting his means, undermining his health
and preparing a life of future wretchedness
not only for himself but for his interesting
family.   These  thoughts, hoAvever,  were
not allowed long to occupy his mind.   They 
136
were throAvn off as soon as possible and the
onward progress of drunkenness  pursued.
The desire for liquor soon became  a disease
as it frequently does, and then resistance
Avas not to be considered.
  When a man reaches this stage  of his
progress, unless arrested by some fortunate
event of Providence, his case becomes hope-
less.  He has pursued  his  Avay until the
disease begins to prey  upon him, and  like
other diseases it must be cured by confine-
ment and  medicine.  Whenever intoxica-
ting liquors  get the  better of  the  sys-
tem, the  liquor is  required to steady the
nerves, it is said.  So it was with our friend,
the salesman.   His nerves  Avere greatly
disordered by the effects of the liquor, and it
seemed to be necessary to brace them up by
the continual use  of it.   Whenever  the
whiskey began to lose its effects in bis sys-
tem he began to tremble, and he could not
pursue his daily avocation Avithout the  rep-
etition  of the dram  every hour. Then the
run round to the restaurant was a matter
of necessity, and its repetition a  thing of
frequent occurrence. 
                  137   .

  And now how Avere the evenings of the
salesman spent?  At home  with his  wife
and children as was once the case ?  Alas,
no !   Every evening had its demands for
the draught, and the  restaurant was the
place Avhere it was usually obtained.  Oc-
casionally,  however, a  party of boon com-
panions would call at the house for the  pur-
pose of trying the good whiskey, and Avhile
the wife was in her room Aveeping in the
bitterness of a broken heart, and the inno-
cent,  unconscious children were sleeping,
the hail felloAvs Averein the parlor drinking
and carousing, and making the once peace-
ful and happy home of industry and frugal-
ity, hideous Avith the fumes of liquor and
cigar smoke.  In vain did the wife impor-
tune and implore a renunciation of the habit
which she saw was becoming inveterate in
its hold upon her husband.   In spite of her
remonstrances of affection  and her tears,
the dread experiment was to be tried, and
the well educated,  capable,  talented  and
influential member of society Avas to hasten
forward ii his career until  the desolation
and the ruin should appear.
      11* 
.    138
   At this stage of the inebriate's progress
 it did not  require the customer to induce
 the visit to the dram-shop.  In fact he had
 sometimes to leave his customer in the store
 and hurry around for his liquor.  One in-
 vitation for the purchaser was enough dur-
 ing  one visit,  and frequently  before the
 time  arrived for the customer to take the
 drink the  salesman  had taken it  several
 times.
   I have often  noticed what a number of
 friends a man has when he passes  the bot-
 tle around freely.  Men will go to see their
 friends and associates Avhen the dram is ex-
 pected, Avhen nothing else can induce them
 to do  it.  And  how anxious they  are  on
 behalf of the friend that has  the Avhiskey ?
 He must be thought of and toasted when
 he is not present, and he must be visited as
 often  as decency will  admit.   And  how
 kindly and affectionately do  these visitors
inquire after the health of the family—the
wife and the  children for Avhom they have
no more concern than if they did not exist  ;
and if the  bottle is not  soon forthcoming
after they are seated in the parlor, they be- 
139
 gin to get impatient and to look around as
 if something was missing.   What do drink-
 ing men care for wives and children ?  The
 sham of the inquiry in relation to them is
 generally an  insult and  would be so re-
 garded if the dram did not settle all ques-
 tions of all  kinds, and preserve friendships
 and associations that could not exist with-
 out it.
  Reader, if you are a dram  drinker and
 make such  calls as I have  described, you
 know it is the whiskey you want, and that
 if you  have to Avait a  feAv. minutes longer
 for it than  your desire admits of, you get,
 impatient.  When you first entered  your
 friend's parlor you asked after his wife and
 children,  and you seemed to be very earnest
 in your inquiry in relation to them.  Now
 be  candid Avith yourself  and  answer the
 inquiry to your own conscience.   If after
 you had waited longer than you  expected
 for  the  dram and it did riot appear, if one
 of your friend's children  had entered the
 room, would you not have felt like kicking
 it out ?   You know this to be the  case, and
you know that you were  half mad Avith 
140
your friend himself for keeping you so long
waiting for the whiskey.   And do you not
remember asking him for it when he was
tardy in bringing it forth, or rather Avhen
in your burning desire for the liquor you
thought he was tardy in producing it?
  What a sham is all  such friendship as
this, and hoAv the manly character  would
spurn it !   No man  that is  a man,  and
none but the  thing  the  whiskey has left
could play the part either of the  visitor or
visited under such  circumstances.
  Our  salesman  had noAv become what is
called a hard  drinker,  and  drank  more
than his constitution Avould bear.  He be-
gan to fail in his business qualities, and his
employers complained that he made mis-
takes,  and  could  not  succeed in selling
goods as formerly.  Nor was it unfrequently
the case that when the  customer came in
the salesman was out in search of his dram.
This sort of action did not suit the employ-
ers.  They were  very sorry that their friend
who had formerly rendered them such val-
uable service and had made them so much
money should  have thrown himself away, 
141
 as  they said, but their  business  must be
 attended to and they were not disposed to
 pay fifteen hundred dollars a year  salary to
 a man  that spent so much of his time in
 the restaurant.  It was not  pleasant  for
 them to  be obliged several times a day to
 send for him to return from the dram-shop
 and attend to their business.  And  after all,
 very frequently when he returned  to the
 store he was so drunk that he could not sell
 goods  and  only made a fool of himself in
 the presence of the customer  who  would
 leave the store in disgust, and that never
 to return to it.  His bland and amiable dis-
 position Avas entirely destroyed by his in-
 dulgence and  he became impetuous and
 fretful,  and frequently insulting.  On one
 occasion that  Avas discovered,  he  called a
 customer a fool because he required a com-
 parison to be made between two different
 qualities  of the same kind of  goods.  He
 said his word was sufficient and if  this did
 not answer  the goods could be put upon
the shelves.   At the moment it happened
that one of his  employers Avas passing,  or
rather he was  moving about at  a little dis- 
142
tanceand watching what was going on.  He
stepped forward, pushed the salesman aside,
apologized to the customer for  his condi-
tion, and succeeded in making a sale which
the drunkenness of his agent would have
prevented.
  As  may be supposed, such conduct was
insupportable.  The employers of our fallen
salesman held a brief interview, when it was
determined that he should be discharged.
One of them approached the salesman as he
stood in a  half stupor by the counter and
told him his services were no  longer re-
quired.
  "Do you  mean to  discharge me?" he
inquired in a boozy manner.
  "We do, certainly," was the  reply.
  " What do you discharge me for?
  " For drunkenness."
  "Drunkenness.  I'm not drunk."
  "Not drunk,  what then?"
  "Only a little in for it."
  "Well, my friend, you  are too much in
for it to do us justice, and have been so for
such a length of time that our business has
suffered greatly in your hands, and we must 
143
 decline your further services, at least until
 you cease your use of intoxicating liquors
 and re-possess yourself of your poAvers as a
 sober man."
   "Well, that's fine.  I  made  you  all
 the money you've got, and now  you dis-
 charge me.  Well, I'm not dead  yet, and
 I'll be revenged.  Yes, I'll be smashed if
 you shan't hang for it."
   " You are  not in a condition  now to talk
 about  your  affairs.    You had better  go
 home and become sober, and reflect  upon
 your conduct.  Here  is the amount due
 you for  your  services.  You  had  better
 take it and go home  and give it  to your
 wife."
   Saying this the employer  placed the
 amount due the salesman in his hands and
 left him.  He stood  a few moments in a
 mood of stupid thought, and left the store,
 but instead of returning to his home he went
 to the restaurant, where he drank  until he
 was beastly drunk, and Avas laid out at full
length on a settee in a side passage. While
he laid there  exposed  to the vieAv of every
one  that  passed,  he  was  robbed of his 
144
money and of his watch, and of everything
of value in his possession.  He laid several
hours in his drunken sleep, when he awoke,
and in a bewildered state asked Avhere he
was and how he came there.  The keeper
of the  restaurant told  him  that he  was
drunk and in his  way, and  that he  had
placed him in the passage to relieve him-
self  of the trouble he occasioned him.
" And Avhat did you do it for?" he asked.
  '"To get you  out of  the way," Avas the
reply.
  " Out of the way—out of the way,  he 1
Me in the  way.  Where's the money I spent
here?  Where's the custom I brought you?
Me  in the Avay, he !  ha ! ha !  Well,  I'll
get out of  the way."
  Here  the  restaurant keeper  left  the
wretched man, and he stood a Avhile prop-
ped  against the Avail,   and   soliloquized.
"Turned  out—dismissed.  In  the way.
Must get  out of the way.  In the  way in
the  store  where I  made the  money !   In
the Avay in the grog shop where I spent
the money ! In the  way, and must get  out.
Here man, give me another glass of whis- 
145
 key—the best,  mind,  fourth  proof—the
 best.  I'm going it!   Dismissed.   Kicked
 out !  Give me the best.  I've had the best
 first, and I'll have the best last.  Here,
 give me the whiskey !"
   All this and much more was boisterously
 uttered in the passage,  to the amusement
 of  a feAv persons who Avere passing in and
 out, and to the annoyance of the proprietor
 of the house, but no one gave the poor crea-
 ture  any attention.  His  vehement calls
 for more whiskey were at length answered
 by  the  bar-keeper,   Avho  came  to  him
 Avith  the glass, Avhich he Avas  obliged to
 assist in holding  to  his mouth Avhile he
 drank.   When the glass was finished, he
 commenced  an  examination, fumbling in
 his pockets for his  pocket-book  to pay for
 the dram, but pocket-book and money Avere
 gone.  Not a cent was left.  He could not
 therefore pay for the liquor, when  the bar-
 keeper in a rage pushed him into the street.
 He  fell  upon  the  pavement in  a  state of
perfect intoxication.  He laid on the pave-
ment until the proprietor  of the house in
a rage,  sent  for a  police officer, Avho  had
      12 
146
him conveyed in a furniture wagon to  his
home.
  The reader may judge of the scene that
happened at the home of the drunken man.
Wife and children were  thrown into a con-
dition of surprise and consternation  which
caused  them to rush  from one  place to an-
other, and to scream in the wildest manner.
It was some time before  the wife  could be-
come  composed  enough to attend  him.
With the assistance  of the police  officer he
was put. to bed,  where he remained until
he became  perfectly sober, when  he again
called for  liquor, and threatened to take
the lives of any persons that dared to resist
him.  Liquor  he wanted,  and  liquor he
said  he would have.   It was found impos-
sible for him to be  managed by  a woman,
and it  Avas necessary to  keep the children
out of his way to prevent him from killing
them.  His Avife sent for one  and another
of his old drinking friends to  assist her in
his management, but not one of  them Avas
willing to do it.   One or two  called, sup-
posing  a supply of whiskey Avould be af-
forded, but when they were told Avhat was
the matter, they left in a hurry. 
147
  It required but two  years from the time
be began for  our salesman to  finish  his
career in the store of his employers.  How
brief and hoAv rapid Avas his course ?  Such
is the result of the drunkard's employment.
There is no  resisting the course or prevent-
ing the  result  while the practice of drink-
ing is continued.   There were  bright pros-
pects in the future  of our salesman's his-
tory, but they  were all obscured, beclouded
and  darkened by his accursed habit.   What
a waste  of desolation was now  before him ?
Utter desolation was in the vista of the fu-
ture. Amid the uncertainties  of life's pas-
sage but one thing was certain.  That was
his  entire  ruin.   There he was,  a poor,
miserable, forsaken drunkard, with a young.
and  interesting family claiming attentions
and  services that his habit had disqualified
him for rendering.  There Avere no means
of support for  himself and his dependent
charge but by his own labor,  and that  he
was  incompetent to render.  What was to
be done  ?  That was a question  more readily
asked than  answered.   The accomplished
salesman was not a  salesman noAv, not  be- 
148
 cause there were no goods to sell, nor because
 his services were  not wanted, but simply
 because in his Avrecked condition he was no
 salesman.   He Avas good for nothing; there-
 fore he Avas cast out.
   By locking him up in his room, and ven-
 turing in Avith caution, and retreating when
 he threatened violence, his  Avife managed
 to prevent him from getting away from her
 until he Avas completely sober.   When his
 reason returned, he remembered in part the
 scenes through Avhich he had passed  since
 his discharge from the service  of his em-
 ployers.  Realizing his condition, without
 employment, without a cent of money, with
 a wife and children in want of bread, he
 became for the time a maniac.   He raved
 and cried, and if there had been a weapon
 in his Avay he would have destroyed  him-
 self.  Several hours passed before he could
 be composed.  At  length he became calm,
 and thought he might obtain a pittance to
 relieve the  hunger of  his starving children
 from  his friend, the keeper of  the  restau-
 rant.   Thither he  went as fast  as his stiff
joints and sore frame  admitted  of motion. 
149
He told his friend, the rum-seller, what had
happened, and in lamenting his sad condi-
tion, asked for a trifle to serve him in the
emergency of the moment.
   " You owe me a balance often dollars,"
said the man, whose whiskey had  ruined
the salesman.
   "I know it," replied the wretched man,
" and I Avill pay you as soon as I can.  But
I am noAv in need of a  very trifle, to buy
bread for my children."
   " Pay me the ten dollars," said the rum-
seller,  " and I will lend you a trifle."
   " It  is impossible.  I'm without a cent."
   " Then leave my premises."
   " But I spent a large amount  of  money
with  you in the last two years,  and you
might give me a dime or so."
   " A  dime or so !   Didn't I give you value
for all  the  money  you spent in my estab-
lishment ?"
   " Yes, I got the value in whiskey, but
it has been of no value to me, if it  has been
to you.  I'm  ruined,  and  your  Avhiskey
helped to do it,  and now I only want a
dime."
      12* 
150
   " Do you insult me ?  Leave the prem-
 ises, or 1 will have you removed."
   A police officer being sent for, our fallen
 salesman deemed it best to leave his friend,
 who Avas desirous of assisting the bar-keeper
 in dealing out the drams  to waiting  cus-
 tomers.
   " That was  cool," said the proprietor of
 the restaurant to a bystander.   " That fel-
 low  used my house and my refreshments,
 drinking the best  liquors I had, and now
 that he has ruined himself, he  comes here
 for help.  He  tells me of his starving chil-
 dren, as if they Avere any account to me.  I
 gave him full value for all the money he
 ever paid me,  and noAv Avhile he  oavcs me
 ten  dollars  for liquors  he has drank, he
 comes to me for assistance.  He shall pay
 the ten dollars, if I have to sell his bed from
 under him.  No man  shall receive and use
 my property, and not  pay me for it."
  The rum-seller continued talking in this
 way  Avhile a number of customers called for
 drink,obtaineditandwentaway; butnotone
of them seemed to concern themselves about
his conversation, and none gave  a moment's 
151
consideration to the case of the poor wretch
he had helped to ruin, and then turned upon
the street.  At  length he seized a labelled
bottle, and drew it from the shelf. "Here,"
said he, " is the very bottle of extra whis-
key, Avith its gold label, AAuth Avhich  that
fellow began to drink at my house.   And
he drank  out of that  bottle to the last.  It
is the extra bottle.   Worthy of a prince.
I kept that bottle filled Avith  the best whis-
key, fourth proof, for him  and his friends.
And now  he has the  impudence to ask me
for a dime.  I Avish I had collared him, and
led him to the  door, and pitched him out
upon the pavement.  But I'll fix him yet."
  While  the  restaurant keeper  Avas  en-
lightening and amusing  his customers  Avith
the rehearsal of the salesman's history, the
poor man himself Avas wandering along the
street, he kne\v  not and seemed to care but
little Avhere. He Avas sober and capable of
reflection.   He thought  of that  very extra
bottle, out of Avhich he had drank his ruin,
and vowed for revenge upon the bottle, and
the man that OAvned it.
  Wonderful it is that the rum-seller could 
152
abuse the salesman, and threaten him with
damage, while  not  a thought of his own
agency in his ruin occurred to him, and the
salesman could  meditate  upon the bottle
and the rum-seller and  the ruin to  Avhich
he was reduced, and not entertain the first
idea of his OAvn agency  in Avorking the evil
that had come upon him.  This is Avitness,
plain  and palpable, of the selfishness  of
mankind.  Each desires all he  can secure,
no matter hoAv or at what cost, and the self-
appropriation is  made of whatever can be
secured, without a moment's concern  for
any one else, and disregarding the meas-
ures and means by which it may be secured.
  It was that extra bottle that run the
salesman into the loss  of all he had.   It
desolated his home, blunted and benumbed
his OAvn  mental poAvers,  brought disease
upon his body, and  left  him a poor, pitiful
wreck of Avhat was once an intelligent, ac-
tive, accomplished  man.  How certain  is
the fall of the dram-drinker ?  He begins on
the best.   He ends on anything he can get.
He begins a  man of power and  means and
abilities.   He ends a wreck—a ruin. 
153
  The restaurant keeper was as good as his
word in the threat he issued, that he would
force the  payment of the ten dollars  the
ruined salesman  owed him.  He obtained
a warrant, and  had it  executed  in  the
seizure and sale  of about three times  the
quantity  of furniture  than  the original
price of which  would have paid the debt.
The loss of this furniture reduced the family
a degree  loAver  in the  scale of suffering.
The want of it  was experienced much more
by the Avife than by any one  else,  but  she
bore the trial Avith apparent composure.
  Hoav kind, how considerate was the keeper
of the restaurant while the character of the
salesman  was good, and his money and
credit lasted.  He kept the extra bottle for
him.   Whether or not it  always had  the
extra liquor in it, is a question Avhich  he
would hardly like to answer. Hoav often the
bottle was emptied, is not to be told,  nor
how much profit Avas  realized in  its use.
The selfishness of rum-selling is proverbial.
What can any man expect Avho falls as the
salesman did, but the same kind of treat-
ment ?  It is part  of the business of  the 
154
rum-seller to turn aAvay from his bar and his
door the poor wretches he has ruined.  All
he wants is the money, and Avhen he  gets
that he  can readily enough turn  the  cold
shoulder on his victim.  Never  was man
petted, favored and praised by  a rum-seller
more  than was our  salesman.   He  was
treated in the kindest and gentlest manner,
because he was a good customer. He visited
the bar frequently, and he brought friends
with him, and he drank the most costly and
profitable liquors.  His custom  Avas courted,
and anything that could be done to accom-
modate and please him was most readily
performed.   All this while there was money
to be made in the pursuit.  But  when the
money was gone, and the man  was poor,
there Avas  no further  use for him.  The
sooner the house was rid of him the better.
  Reader, do you frequent the  dram-shop ?
Beware !  The salesman's fate will surely
be  yours if you continue the practice  of
drinking the best whiskey, or  any kind of
whiskey long enough.  And it Avill not re-
quire a very long period to  accomplish  it.
The salesman run his course in tAvo years. 
155
You may run longer, but the end is inevita-
ble.   Whiskey never elevated  a man.  It
never caused his rise in society and his hon-
orable distinction.  But it has caused the
downfall of multitudes.  The overthrow is
certain of any man that Avalks  in the foot-
steps of the salesman. Never try the exper-
iment  of drinking  good Avhiskey.  Never
try the experiment of drinking any  kind of
whiskey.  The extra bottle is extra  poison.
It will accomplish  its  Avork of ruin, and
reduce you  to  the  pitiable  condition of a
beggar for a glass of liquor,  which Avill not
be given, for the rum-seller is the meanest
man on earth.  He will not favor you with
two cents' worth of his whiskey Avithout the
money.  Nor will he trust you  for it unless
he is certain you will pay the amount.
  While the auctioneer  Avas selling his fur-
niture the salesman thought he would drown
his care by taking a glass or two of whiskey.
He Aventto a Ioav groggery and called for his
drink, which Avas immediately delivered to
him by  the bar-keeper, as  he was  well
dressed and  gentlemanly in his appearance
and  was supposed to be able to pay.  He 
156
drank off the liquor without thinking be
had no money to pay for it, and when the
fafct Avas made knoAvn the bar-keeper ordered
a colored man, that Avas in attendance on
the house, to put him out.   It is the lowest
kind of a drunkard generally that calls for
liquor for which he is unable to pay.  And
the bar-keepers respect  such no more than
if they were brutes.  The order was obeyed,
and the well  dressed and  yet  gentlemanly
looking salesman was thrust into the street
by the colored man.  As he Avandered along
he Avas impelled  by his burning desire to
taste another glass, which  he obtained in
the same  way, and with  nearly the  same
result.  He  drank a very  large quantity
each time he practiced the deception on the
bar-keeper, and it was  not long before the
liquor began to affect him.  In fact he was
soon drunk.  He continued to  wander in
his drunken condition until night came on,
when he  was found by a police  officer and
taken to the station house.  Had there not
been an  officer there  who knew him he
would have been obliged to have remained
in the station house all night.  But the 
157
officer who knew him took him  home and
delivered  him to his sorroAvful  Avife, who
received him kindly, and at once proceeded
to make him  as  comfortable  as possible.
When the effects of the liquor wore off  he
felt a3 though he could  have  hanged him-
self if the opportunity  had been afforded
him.
  The next morning the subject of our story
was  sober when  he awoke, but he felt as
though he Avas punished in every nerve and
muscle on account of his transgression.   He
arose and Avent into his parlor and sat aAvhile
Avith the  windoAvs  closed, admitting light
that Avas  scarcely  tAvilight.   He  sat and
thought, as well as be could, over his con-
dition.  In a few minutes his Avife entered,
and in tones of tenderest affection asked him
if he Avould not quit his habit of drinking.
and return to his former condition, a sober,
respectable, useful  man.   He made every
promise she asked him, and said he would
struggle against  his propensity and once
more appear worthy of her affection and of
the respect of his children. In order to for-
tify  himself against his  temptation  she
      13 
158
desired him to remain at home for the day,
to Avhich he  consented.  But he broke his
pledge.  He left home, and meeting a friend
on the street, one Avho had not heard of his
recent misfortune, he borrowed fifty cents,
as he said, to  provide some medicine for a
sick Avife, he having accidentally left home
Avithout any  change in his  pocket.  In a
short  time  after he received the irioney he
was so drunk that he fell and hurt himself
severely.  He had wandered near the  out-
skirts of the city and Avas found by a tender-
hearted man, who  assisted  him  into  his
house and allowed him  to lie upon a lounge
in one of the rooms of his house.   There he
remained  until he became sober, Avhen he
thanked the man kindly for  the service he
had  rendered him, and  left for his home.
As he went along the street he asked him-
self what he should do  and Avhere he should
go.   "I  will go home," said  be, "and
fight this  enemy that is destroying me.
With my  wife's  assistance I will conquer."
His determination Avas  fixed, and he started
for home.  Passing a restaurant he stopped
and  looked through the door, which was 
159
partially open, and saAv  the decanters  and
tumblers on the shelves and counter.  "  One
more drink," said he to himself, " and then
I'm a sober man."   So saying he entered,
and in a moment the liquor Avas in him.  He
sat doAvn on the bench in a side room of the
restaurant and concluded  he Avould wait a
feAv minutes and take another drink. He did
so, and that drink Avas folloAved by another
and another, until he began to feel that he
was entering upon another fit of drunken-
ness. He  had just enough  reason left to
desire to reach  home  before he became so
stupidly drunk as to be unable to walk.  He
arrived in time to enter Avithout assistance,
but he passed  another night  of Avretched-
ness, and resolved again  next  morning, in
the presence of bis Avife, that he Avould resist
the pressure of the temptation and  go in
search of a situation.   The first object, hoAv-
ever, which it Avas necessary for him to pur-
sue Avas an amount of money sufficient to pro-
vide bread for  his Avife and children.  He
made a number of pledges to his Avife of
keeping out of the way of liquor, and started
for the house of one of the old companions 
160
of his evening associations over gocd whis-
key and the cigar.  He Avent to his friend's
house', Avhich"he entered in the confidence of
having his immediate necessities  supplied,
and of securing the relief he desired in the
required provision for his  family.   His
friend  was  at home, and received him in a
very cordial and affectionate manner. After
the exchange of the usual civilities, he in-
formed his friend of his misfortunes in being
discharged by  his employers, and reduced
to the  necessity of applying to his friends
for assistance.   " I have noAv come here,"
said he, " to beg the loan of a small amount
of money, say five dollars, to serve me until
I shall be  able to return it, which  I hope
will be in a feAv days."  The friend heard the
story  Avith evidences  of  impatience,  and
when it was concluded he said he Avould have
to be excused from the loan, as he had no
money, and as  his business  was  pressing
for his attention he had no further time to
spend  Avith him.  He then moved toAvards
the door, folloAved of course, by bis visitor,
whom  he boAved from  his presence at  the
street door and left. 
161
  "Well," said the  salesman to himself,
 " this is fine work.  To be treated thus by
 my old friend, who enjoyed himself so much
 over  my  whiskey and  cigars.  But I've
 learned a lesson.   They are summer friends
 that  sport with  one  Avhile the Aveather is
 warm and the sky is clear, but Avhen the
 Avinter comes and  the storms begin to blow
 they disappear."
  While pursuing his way, engaged in this
 run of thought, and feeling all the time the
 pressure of his desire for a drink,  he met
 another of his old companions, vdiom he
 accosted.   This friend had heard of his fall,
 and  affected  to be in  too  great a hurry to
 listen  to  his  appeal  for  help.   Shaking
 hands Avith him he abruptly left and has-
 tened out of his sight.   " Again repulsed,"
 said the disappointed  man to himself, and
 again the thoughts came  up,  Avhat  shall I
 (hi?   Where  shall I go?  The inquiries
 Avere answered by a mechanical dive into a
cellar—an oyster saloon,  where they sold
 bad  whiskey.   Here he drank himself
beastly  drunk,  and by some means he again
found his Avay home, Avhere he Avas as kindly
      13* 
162
received as he had ever been.   When sober
be excused himself to his Avife by telling
her that he had Avalked all over the city in
search of employment but could get none,
and that having failed in a number of efforts
to borrow some money for her use, he be-
came  discouraged and took a drink which
made  him drunk.
  The string of lies told the stricken Avife
was believed, and the usual counsel and
encouragement afforded him in the effort at
reformation.  " Go," said the  unfortunate
woman,' " go to the only one that can afford
you strength to  resist  this great tempta-
tion.  Go to  God in prayer, and He  will
hear you and save you."
  That was the right sort of advice, and it
came from the right  source, but it Avas not
heeded by the wretched man.   He felt its
force,  but the feeling Avas only momentary.
It Avas  not attended by  any  purpose  of
amendment.  He heard as thousands  hear,
merely by the  ear.  The heart  Avas not
fully impressed nor the purpose thoroughly
changed.  His reply was, " Yes, dear ; I
will do the best I can." 
163
  After a couple of hours spent in  pacing
the floor  and talking occasionally to his
wife, the salesman thought it Avas necessary
for  him to make  another effort to obtain
a situation.  The  wife was fearful of the
experiment,  and  said  she  had   much
rather he should  spend  the day at home,
and  become  stronger  in body  and mind
before he ventured along  the streets, where
there Avere  so many  restaurants.    This
advice Avas not accepted.  Then she pro-
posed to go along Avith him.  This also Avas
rejected as very unbecoming.   The idea of
a wife following a  husband in his search of
a situation among business men Avas spurned
as ridiculous.
  " Not half so ridiculous," said the Avife,
" as for the husband to visit the restaurants
instead of the stores, and instead of getting
a situation to  drink too  much  liquor and
hardly be able to find his way home."
  This Avas a very hard reproof, but it was
very kindly  spoken, and did not give the
offence it Avould have done under other cir-
cumstances.  It Avas finally agreed that he
should go alone in search of the situation. 
164
He accordingly started.   As soon as he had
left the house the Avife slipped on her shawl
and bonnet and folloAved him at a distance.
There  Avere restaurants in abundance for
him to pass, and although without money,
he could find  out the Avay  of getting the
liquor.  Before one of these dens of ruin he
stopped as if  arrested  by some  power of
magic Avhich was irresistible.   His Avife saw
him in the distance and quickened her pace
so as to reach him, if possible, before he
accomplished his purpose.  She Avas success-
ful. The glass was on the counter and he Avas
about to take the decanter and  pour out the
liquor  Avhen she approached,  and taking
him by the arm turned him completely
around before he was aware of it.  " Come,"
said she, " come, let us go home, this is not
the place for you."  As  she  spoke  she led
him  toAvards the door,  and succeeded in
prevailing upon him to return to his home.
  Again the remonstrance  Avas  repeated,
and again the  promise  Avas  given, and all
was for the  time apparently  satisfactory.
The  wife, however, could not ahvays be at
his side, and when she, after securing prom- 
165
 ise after promise, left  him to attend to her
 household duties  and  her children,  he
 slipped out of the house and hurried off for
 the purpose of securing a situation.  He did
 not pass the  first dram shop.  He halted a
 moment before it, looked up and down the
 street, and then darted in as if he expected
 to be arrested  in his passage.   The  tum-
 bler and the liquor Avere placed on the coun-
 ter by the bar-keeper, who looked in chagrin
 and amazement at the quantity of the liquor
 that was poured into the tumbler.  It Avas
 nearly filled, and enough for tAvo or three
 drinks.  Before he could remonstrate, how-
 ever, the liquor was in the  stomach of the
 salesman.  It is needless to  say that he was
 soon drunk.  There Avere four restaurants
 in his way, and  he  entered three of them
 and got liquor, each time a sufficient quan-
 tity to produce intoxication.  While drunk
 he  hurried off to the store of his former
 employers, Avhere he had performed so much
 service, and maintained, for atime, the high-
 est reputation of his profession.   He looked
around Avith some interest upon  the scenes
of his labors for several years, and became 
166
 a maniac in the madness that seized  him.
 He committed one outrage after  another
 until the proprietors of the store determined
 to resist his abuse.   Although a thin and
 delicate man he Avas more than a match for
 tAvo of the  clerks, that Avere directed to re-
 move him from the house.   It was not until
 two  police officers  Avere procured that he
 Avas seized and confined.  His violence Avas
 of such  a  nature  that  it  Avas considered
 proper to send him to the  station house,
 where  he remained during the night.  One
 of the clerks of the  establishment Avas des-
 patched  to  his  home for  the purpose of
 informing his wife what had happened, and
 of consulting with her in relation to his
 future  confinement.   It was decided  that
 one of the firm should appear against him
 and direct his commitment to prison.   This
 was  done, and  while in the jail, the  firm
that had employed him contributed largely
 to the support of his family. •
  He Avas in jail but a feAv  days  when he
was taken  quite ill, and it Avas agreed by
all  concerned in  his  confinement that he
should be conveyed to his home for proper 
167
medical attendance.  For four months he
was  afflicted and kept his bed.  During a
part of the time there appeared to be no hope
of his  recovery.   His system, however,
through proper medical treatment, got the
better of the disease, and he was gradually
and sloAvly restored to health.
  During the period of his convalescence
he was visited by  his former  employers,
Avho  were  still anxious  in  regard to his
welfare, and  appeared to be willing to do
every thing  in  their poAver to save him
from* ruin  and his family  from suffering.
While he Avas confined to his bed  by sick-
ness his Avife was driven to the expedient of
supporting herself by the use of her needle.
She  labored  day and night on the hard
work of the tailor shops, and thereby ac-
quired means almost sufficient for the sup-
port of the family.  The  deficiency Avas
made up by the firm in Avhose employment
the salesman bad served.
  One day, Avhen  the patient was able to
bear it, his wife suggested that a clergyman
should  be  sent  for, and  that an  effort
should be made  to direct his mind  towards 
168
the subject of religion.  One of his former
employers  happened  to be  at the bed-side
when the proposal Avas made, and  gave it
his hearty sanction.  Accordingly the cler-
gyman Avas introduced.   In a  second or
third visit a decided effect Avas  produced
upon the mind and feelings of the s:ck man.
Portions of the Scriptures Avere read to him
on  each  visit,  and he was  affectionately
counselled to.direct his thoughts toAvards
the pursuit of a  religious  life.   The effort
Avas  successful.   He became  deeply inter-
ested on account of his condition,  and on
behalf of his family.   The thought of hav-
ing  been the agency through  Avhich his
wife and children Avere reduced to want,
and  his Avife  Avas obliged  to resort to the
hard labor of making heavy pantaloons and
coats, in order  to provide support for the
family, was very oppressive  upon him.  It
brought  him to repentance, and he made
most determined pledges of  amendment, if
Providence should spare him.
  By the application  of medical  skill  and
assiduous attention on the part of his Avife
and her friends,  he was restored to health, 
169
when the gentlemen of the firm in whose
service he had wrought so faithfully and
wrecked himself so shamefully, proposed
to  re-employ him.  The engagement was
effected, and as  soon as  he was  able  to
leave the house he returned to their em-
ployment.
  Fortified  now  by his  religious  pledges
and profession, he felt as though, by the
assistance of God, he could sustain himself.
The divine assistance never fails those who
are willing  to help themselves.  The as-
surance of its co-operation is on  the record.
It  is contained in  the  Scriptures.  That
record has never yet been faulted.   Failure
has never been successfully charged upon
it.  God's Avord is ever true. The evidence
of its truth  is Avitnessed in every instance
in which  the subject of its influence per-
forms faithfully and constantly the part of
the duty necessary on his part.  The read-
ing of God's Word, prayer, and the per-
formance  of religious duties,  are  means
that must ever be successful in the salvation
of the man.   If there be failure  it must be
with him.  The agencies of the spiritual
       14 
170
reformation  are ever at hand,  and  they
may must be effective  wherever the mind
and heart of the subject are in constant and
faithful co-operation with them.
  For some  time after  the  recovery of the
salesman, and while it Avas unknoAvn that
he had  reformed,  and even aftenvards, he
was shunned cautiously and  determinedly
by his  old associates.   The boon compan-
ions that had partaken  largely of his hos-
pitality, and drank freely  of his  liquors,
avoided him on  the street and wherever
they met him.  They were fearful that calls
might be made upon them for  assistance
in the support of a suffering family.  It
was  indeed  the case that several of them
Avere called  upon for trifles in the earlier
stages of his progress  in ruin, and before
the Avife Avas obliged to take in work  for
support, but in all  cases  they most  posi-
tively refused to  contribute  to  the aid of
the family of their  fallen friend.  Some of
them were  very  well  able  to  spare  the
small amount  desired,  but they  had  not
the heart to do it, although the appeal was
made by a delicate and suffering  wife and 
171
on behalf of innocent and starving chil-
dren.
  It is almost needless for a fallen inebri-
ate to look for aid to his companions in the
mean and miserable associations of drinking
and drunkenness.  It is in fact one of the
most disgraceful features of the drunkard's
life, that appears in the utter selfishness of
the parties that were  engaged Avith him  in
his doAvnward career.  While  he has the
money to  contribute  to the enrichment  of
the rum-seller, and to purchase the liquor
for  his associates  to drink, he  is  welcome
to the bar, and the  praises of his drinking
companions are shouted in his behalf.  But
when the  money is  gone, and the man pen-
niless, he is turned  from  the counter on
which the liquor  is  placed, perhaps kicked
off  the  premises, or sent  to  the station
house, and despised and shunned, and his
acquaintance disoAvned by the creatures that
Avere constantly on his  trail  while there
Avas the price of a glass of Avhiskey in his
pocket.
  A truly heartless  gang are the grog com-
panions  of every  unfortunate  drunkard. 
172
While they can  possess themselves of the
liquor,  and sport  in each other's society,
they care not Avhere the means come  from
by which  their  bacchanalian accounts are
settled.  The Avife's groans  and tears, and
the children's cries are nothing  to them.
They can drink  and  shout and swear over
their cups while they knoAv that the family
of the man at whose  expense they are rev-
elling, is enduring the greatest privation
and suffering.   Reader, are  you the boon
companion  of the drunken crowd?  If you
are, consider for a moment your condition
of meanness  and  degradation.  There is
not an  associate  of the  dread  gang  that
secures  your companionship  and services,
that would contribute the price of three
drams to keep you out of the almshouse ;
and the proprietor of the restaurant who is
amassing all the means  in the possession
of your gang, will be  the first  to propose
that the almshouse shall be your residence.
Let the dram-seller make the record of the
wrecks his establishment produces, and the
tale would  ba  too shocking  to be endured
by any but himself. 
                   173

  But I must hasten to the conclusion of
my story.  My friend, the good salesman,
found his  old employers  the same  kind
friends they had been before he was seduced
from  their  service by the drunkard's Avorst
enemy—good whiskey.  They had cause
to regret that they did not discourage and
prevent, in the use of more  energetic and
determined measures,  the earlier move-
ments of their friend over the drunkard's
path.   There Avere occasions  when  they
might have interposed, and when perhaps
a resolute  procedure on their part might
have  been of use  in arresting his progress
to the  condition  of ruin  that came  upon
him.   The omission to remonstrate and ad-
vise  and enforce  the  better process,  was
noAv regretted, and the purpose resolved
on that there should be no hesitancy in the
future in such relations should they occur.
They learned, through their experience, the
lesson that is ever taught the timid and the
hesitating, that  through  their neglect in
the  performance of an unpleasant and pain-
ful  duty—that of warning  the  subject of
their interest who is destroying himself as
      14* 
174
rapidly as  the  process  can  be effected, in
the use of intoxicating liquors.
  It affords me great  pleasure to state that
our  friend,  the  salesman, has recovered
himself, and is noAv at his work as before,
supporting  his  family  handsomely, and
rendering  satisfactory  service to his em-
ployers.  His case is  singular in  his suc-
cessful recovery.  In  nine cases out of ten
of the kind, the man goes doAvn and down,
until the hovel and the almshouse brings
him to  the halting  point; then the death
of pauperism,  Avretchedness and  disgrace,
Avinds up his miserable career.
  It is  indeed  pleasant  to look upon the
happy  wife and children of the recovered
inebriate.   E\Tery morning and night the
family  are  assembled  for prayers,  and  on
Sunday morning the children  are prepared
for the Sunday  School, and the parents fol-
low afterwards  to the  church.   It  is hoped
that this happy condition of things  may
continue, and that  there may be a  long
life of  usefulness and  happiness before our
reformed and yet excellent salesman.
  It might be  supposed  that  there would 
175
 be some remorse of conscience in the keeper
 of the restaurant Avho contributed most of
 all to the downfall and ruin of the subject of
 our story.  But such is  not the  case. He
 turns  Avith contempt from his  door Avhen-
 ever he sees the salesman passing along the
 street and by his door, Avhich he does every
 day either  toAvards the store  or his home.
 While he refused to  speak to him when he
 met  him,  and turned aAvay  Avith evident
 gestures of contempt  and scorn,  he con-
 tinued to denounce  and  curse  him on ac-
 count of a "drink" for which he said he still
 owed him.   When the knowledge of this
 charge reached the ears of the salesman he
 determined at once to call and settle for the
 liquor  which  he  had  no remembrance of
 receiving,  and could not believe he could
 have ever drank again in the restaurant of
 the man who had seized and sold his furni-
 ture for the sum of ten dollars. Accordingly,
as he was passing to the store one day,  the
 salesman called and  asked if he owed any
amount to the bar.  The keeper of the house
supposed he had  come for another glass,
the first in the renewal  of his old habit, 
176
and he became  as polite  and  as interest-
ing as the occasion suggested, and as the in-
grained  hypocrite could  render himself.
The chagrin of the disappointed man may
be  imagined when the bill  was paid  and
the salesman turned Avithout the slightest
appearance of a  desire for liquor and Avent
to his business.  Reader, let the \Ararning of
this story be heeded.   Touch not, taste not,
handle not the bottle, although it be filled
with good whiskey.
  " Who hath Avoe?  Who  hath sorrow?
Who  hath contentions?   Who hath bab-
blings ?  Who hath Avounds without cause ?
Who  hath redness  of  eyes?  They  that
tarry  long at the wine !  they that go to
seek mixed  wine.   Look not  upon  the
wine Avhen it  is  red ! when it  giveth  his
color in  the cup, when  it  moveth  itself
aright.   At  the  last it  biteth  like a ser-
pent, and stingeth like an adder." 
THE  WOULD BE POLITICIAN.
    In our country, the form of government
 being republican, every man has a right to
 vote and be voted for.   Of course every man
 has the right of enjoying his opinion, and
 of expressing  it, provided  his  opinion  be
 not treasonable.  In such a form of govern-
 ment, in the varieties of human kind, there
 are persons of all grades of political senti-
 ment, and of  all dispositions in the use of
 those sentiments.  Among such a  variety
 of sentiments and  dispositions it is not  to
 be wondered at that there should be a great
 variety of political  characters.  We have,
 therefore, the  political  preacher, the polit-
 cal doctor, the political  laAvyer, (all lawyers
 are politicians,) the political merchant, the
political  mechanic,  the political  laborer,
and last, though  not  least, the political
gentleman.  And among all these we have 
178
the political dram-drinker.  The political
preacher has  a first  rate  opportunity  of
working his  way among the people.  He
visits among his flock and hears their sen-
timents, and talks fluently in order to secure
a free expression from each, and having
collected all the knowledge he can secure,
he can tell a good tale from the pulpit and
deal out his opinions and threats and abuses
without the fear of being contradicted.  He
can mount the  hustings  when he thinks
his country is in danger, and the country
is ahvays in   danger  Avhen he wishes  to
make a  dash and distinguish himself at the
toAvn meeting.
  "I went to hear your preacher, the other
night,"  said one political mechanic  to an-
other, "and a fine piece of work he made
of his speech.   He says the country will go
to ruin if the people don't vote his ticket.
My preacher was there, and he says he'll
give him beans  when he has the chance of
speaking for  his party.  He  don't believe
in your  preacher's ticket, and I reckon he'll
tell him so."
  " Well," replied  the person to whom the 
179
remark was  addressed, "I was there and
heard  the speech  of  my  preacher, and I
think  both your preacher  and mine would
do much better to stay at  home  and study
sermons for Sunday, than to get up on the
stand at a political meeting and talk  non-
sense.   My preacher proved to me that he
knows very little about politics, and I guess
yours Avill convince you by a single speech
that if he knows  no  more about theology
than he does about politics he  had better
quit preaching."
  As I had heard  some political preachers
talking politics  and political nonsense to
the people at town meetings, I could not
help deciding that the second speaker was
right.   It is the duty of preachers to preach
the gospel, and  not to mount the political
hustings and make political party speeches.
They may find as much fault as they please
Avith the people  for their sins against God
and religion, and there is  enough for them
to do in this department, Avithout offending
one-half their congregations, by advocating
and abusing party doctrines and practices.
It is said that on a certain occasion, after a 
180
political party preacher had descended from
the stand, at a toAvn meeting, he was invi-
ted to  take  a  drink, and he  consented,
remarking as he  went that  he  Avas  quite
exhausted, and a glass of  liquor  would
refresh  him.  A fine example  is such a
preacher for the crowd Avith which lie asso-
ciates.  He is much  liked and  much  ap-
plauded by his  drinking assemblies, with
which he is frequently found in association.
If the country is to be saved, it will never
be done by political, partizan, liquor-drink-
ing preachers.
  And the political doctor !  What of him ?
Why, he can talk politics  to his patients.
He can tell them the  latest neAvs, and about
the last political  speculation that  has been
started.  He carries  the price of gold with
him,  and is always ready with his specula-
tions  as to the cause.  In  most cases,  the
political speeches the doctor  makes to  his
patients do them as much good as  his pills.
In his search for  intelligence  in  relation to
the political  market, he has his time so
much occupied  that there is but little  left
for thought on account of his practice.   His 
181
prescriptions  are hurriedly prepared, and
one-half the time he knoAvs but little about
the condition  of his patient, and less of the
medicine he  has  been  prescribing.  The
political doctor takes his drink Avithout invi-
tation, and of course, Avithout compunction
of conscience,  and if his patients suffer, the
cause is to be charged to the politics and the
liquor, between the influences of which his
brain becomes so thoroughly muddled that
he does notknoAv Avhat he is doing.  If people
can believe themselves safe in the hands of
political party doctors, they  may employ
them, the loss will surely be upon one side
or the other, oftener perhaps on the side of
the patient than upon that of the doctor.
Political pills Avill  not  ahvays cure, and
there is at least a risk of damage in their
use
  The political laAvyer is no article of scar-
city among any community that needs such
services as he can render.  It is the laAvyer's
business to make speeches.  Why  should
he not make political speeches?  And Avhy
should not a political laAvyer be elected  to
office ?  He is  competent.  He knoAvs every-
      15 
182
thing and a little more.  He can talk like
an auctioneer.  He  can drink like a  fish.
He can do anything.  He's the very man for
office-.  The country is safe in his hands,
so he says himself, drunk or sober.  Indeed,
if the  lawyer, drunk or sober, is to be be-
lieved, the country  is safe in the hands of
none else.
  The communities of  our country  have
tried the lawyers, and they have found them
wanting, in everything but the collection
of the fee.  In this they are accomplished.
They can  do the work to perfection.   In
some cases they can collect from both sides.
It is said that the lawyer is pledged to take
care of his client.  The  drunken lawver
can take good care of  his  client's money.
He can take such good care of it as to pre-
vent the necessity of the client's ever hav-
ing anything to do  with it.
  And what is to be said of the councils of
the States and  of  the  nation, which  the
laAvyers have controlled so  long?  The an-
swer to this question is found  in the condi-
tion of the country.   If the lawyers have
controlled the councils of the States and of 
183
the nation,  who else could have brought
the country to its present unfortunate con-
dition?
  Reader, my advice to you is, if you can
find a  laAvyer Avho is a sober man, and no
party politician,  employ  him, if you are
obliged to do  so.   But be  sure you  think
well whether you are obliged to  provide
such assistance for your business.  In most
cases, as far as the morality and the  honor
of your case are concerned,  you had  better
throw the papers on which it is represented
into the fire.  Your case  is half lost, and
more than half lost,  in  the  hands of a
drunken attorney.   If you smell liquor in
the office, or suspect it to be there, take
your papers home Avith you, and burn them.
  I know some excellent men that are law-
yers, but they are neither  drunkards nor
party  politicians.   They  are  not  found
among  the brawling multitudes, who are
in search of distinction and plunder.   They
frequent the  great walks  of life Avith quite
as much interest  as they do  those  of the
court-house and its vicinity, and they never
take a  case into  court  if they  can prevent 
184
 it.   They settle the most difficult cases out
 of court, and save the characters and money
 of their clients  by  so  doing.   The  laAvyer
 that labors to keep cases out of court is  a
 rare man of the profession, but he is the
 true friend of his client and of the commu-
 nity.  Such a lawyer desires the patronage
 and friendship of the public.
  And  Avhat  of the  political  merchant  ?
 Does he sell political  party sugar and cal-
 ico ?  If he does not, he talks party politics
 while he is engaged in selling  sugar and
 calico.  In thus talking he pleases about
 one-half his  customers,  while he  offends
 the other half.   Who cares about the man's
 sectional and  party feelings and interests
 while he is purchasing goods ?  Who wants
 to hear  of the success or defeat of the dem-
 ocrats or of the whigs or of the republi-
 cans, while he is examining the quality of
 sugar or the texture of calico ?
  "What's the  news in  your district?"
 said a sugar merchant to a dealer.
  " What kind of neAvs ?" asked the dealer.
  "Whose ahead, Lincoln  or McClellan ?
and how does the price of gold affect the 
185
 people ? and what do the people think of
 the Avar ? and  how  do  they like General
 Grant?  and Avhen do they think the Avar
 will end?"
   The poor dealer was  confounded  at  the
 amount of information required of him, and
 as he  did not know Avhich question to  an-
 swer first, nor hoAv to ansAver any of them,
 he simply replied:
   " I  am a dealer in groceries, and knoAv
 nothing about politics."
   The reply would have been sufficient for
 any one but an inveterate party politician,
 but it Avould not answer for the  merchant,
 and he asked question after question, as fast
 as be could pronounce the Avords, until the
 dealer believed his purpose was  to confuse
 and confound him, so that he could not ex-
 amine the  goods  he Avished to  purchase.
 Not being very Avell pleased with the  posi-
 tion in Avhich  the merchant placed  him,
 which  obliged him either to talk on a disa-
 greeable subject or acknoAvledge his igno-
 rance,  the dealer touched his hat, bade the
merchant good morning, and left.  A few
such rebukes might  assist  in curing the
       15* 
186
 party political merchant, or at least they
 might cause him to entertain some few feel-
 ings  of respect for his customers,
   "Do  you  know  why Smith  failed?"
 asked a Avag of another wag.
   "Yes,"  Avas the  reply,  "he swamped
 himself Avatching for  gold  to fall, so that
 he might make a heavy purchase."
   " You're mistaken," Avas the rejoinder.
 " Smith failed because he talked party pol-
 itics to his customers  on the 'wrong  side.
 He was generally half drunk all the time,
 and his tongue run ten an  hour, and no-
 body  believed half he  said.  No customer
 could stand such  talk as Smith's."
   If the merchant had attended faithfully
 to his business, and let rum  and politics
 alone, he might have prospered.
   And what a character is the party politi-
 cal mechanic !  He talks while at  Avork of
 the unrighteousness of all  the parties to
 Avhich he is opposed, and especially of the
 great political party in the opposition, and
 he vows that he will Avork night and day
to put down the tyrants that are oppressing
the country and producing hard  times and 
187
 low Avages.  Before the time  for leaving
 his Avork in the evening, he prepares for a
 visit to the printing-office to hear theneAvs.
 On his Avay he stops at the dram-shop for a
 drink,  and  by the time  he reaches the
 printer's he  is in a good  condition for a
 controversy with any one that may come in
 his Avay.   On the appearance of the  neAvs-
 boy he buys the neAvspaper, and in a very
 few  minutes  he has devoured  the  neAvs.
 He must talk to  somebody about the elec-
 tion, or the war,  or  the new constitution,
 or  the proceedings of Congress, or  the
 President's Message,  or  something  else.
 It does not take him long to convince every
 one Avith whom he talks how little he knows
 about the topics of the times, and hoAv much
 he desires to be considered a politician.   In
 a short time the man "of little  Avork and
 much  talk begins  to imagine  that  he is
 smart enough to fill an office of some kind—
 almost any kind,  and almost any office Avill
 suit  him.  He suggests  his  name  to the
 parties in power,  and perhaps has it placed
at the lower end of the list, and  then he is
in for it.   He works less, and drinks and 
188
talks more every day.   The more he hunts
the office, the more he can't get it, and he
is greatly surprised that his talents are so
lightly estimated.  He is disappointed once
or twice every day in not hearing  of his
appointment, Avhen no one has ever thought
of it but himself, and in his disappointment
he sometimes becomes enraged Avith every-
body, and  talks  at random about the in-
gratitude of the government that he has
done so much to serve, and  lost so  much
time in serving.
  There is but little hope for the would-be
politician  who  leaves  his  work-shop  in
search of an office and turns  into the  dram
shop by the way.  He may waste much of
his time in hunting  the  office and  never
obtain it.  And  if by an unlucky chance
he shouid be  appointed to some insignifi-
cant position, if he Avould soberly consider
his duty he would conclude  that he had
better remained at his business  and let the
office alone.  He learns by unfortunate ex-
perience that the proceeds of the office will
not support  his  family, that he  has run
himself in debt in seeking it  and is drink- 
189
 ing his way to trouble, perhaps to destruc-
 tion.
   And what caused the mechanic to leave
 his business at which he may have wrought
 for years in contentment, to enter the arena
 of contest Avith noisy, disappointed, discon-
 tented, and factious politicians? The ques-
 tion  is  answered  in  saying that he Avas
 either crazy, or fond of drinking  intoxica-
 ting liquors, or discontented in the pursuit
 of a trade that he had  learned in his youth
 and may have  folloAved for many  years.
 Scarcely ever  did  a man  turn from  his
 trade in this way  to  become a politician,
 without regretting that he was ever tempted
 to the trial.  Sad experience convinces him
 that he had better remained at his work and
 labored in contentment for the support of
 his family and himself.
   But there is the  day laborer  that  talks
 politics and belongs to  a party,  and desires
 office.   His  business is too laborious.   It
 has become oppressive.  It affords  too little
 pay.  He cannot pay for  his whiskey and
support  his family.   He must have  an
office. Hours of every day are lost  hanging 
190
about the restaurant and the city hall, and
in talking  on  the  corners  of the streets
with other men of  the  same stamp.  The
times are complained  of as  oppressively
hard and business as exceedingly unprofit-
able.  No wonder.  The times  are hard,
and his business unprofitable because he is
too indolent or too ambitious  of  securing a
small political office, or  too fond of talking
politics  to  apply himself properly to  his
work and  earn a support for himself and
others depending upon him.   It requires a
little of the pinching of poverty  to bring
him  to his senses, and convince him of the
folly of his course.  If he does not become
a drunken vagabond,  and leave  his family
for starvation, or for  some other means of
support, he  is quite a lucky  man.  Poor,
foolish,  would-be  city  or  county  officer!
Cease your  folly,  and  turn  in for Avork.
Become an  industrious man, and seek to
please your  employers,  and  you will meet
with  much better  success  and be much
more respected than you ever can be either
in seeking a political  office or in becoming
a political officer. 
191
  But who is that little fussy, seedy looking,
broken down gentleman,  that is hanging
about the  neAvspaper  office, and hearing
and telling the  neAvs, and assisting  every
one to read his  neAvspaper, and explaining
everything that people don't know?   He is
the gentleman politician, or  the gentleman
Avould-be politician.  He  can give  no ac-
count of himself.  He does  not  know how
he gets  his living, or how old his  hat or
coat is.   His hat allows the hair to stick
a little  Avay  out, and the sun to slant an
occasional  ray  upon his head beneath it,
and neither he nor any one  else has seen
the nap on his  coat collar and sleeves for
years.   Alas,  that nap has  disappeared,
and it has been a long time since he com-
menced napping in it through  the night,
first at the dram shop and then any place
in  Avhicli  he can put  himself.   He talks
smartly. Why  should he not? He has been
hanging about  the newspaper office and the
restaurant,  reading other people's  neAvs-
papers,  and finding out what other people
kneAV,  until he has become  the recepta-
cle of a large amount of small news.  He 
                  192

talks fluently about the President and  the
cabinet and the war,  and the next steamer.
He is sometimes Mr.  Oracle; that is, when
he can find listeners.  How  extremely  po-
lite he is !  He can  shoAv the way to  the
best  kept restaurant, especially  if a glass
can be secured for his trouble.   It  matters
not how often  he is  troubled in this way
during  the  morning  or afternoon.  He
works it  all  pleasantly and  complacently,
and Avith  a countenance covered Avith smiles,
especially Avhen the whiskey is in view.
  The prospects of the seedy gentleman  are
not very  promising.  He can get a meal in
the market house and a dram in the drink-
ing house Avhenever he can find a friend to
treat, or  secure the pennies  to pay for  his
purchase, or prevail upon the cook Avoman
to give him a bun, or an oyster, or the claw
of a  cooked  crab.  It happens sometimes
that he goes  a  Avhile hungry and begs hard
for the needed relief.   He may Avork  his
way for a time in such  pursuits,  but  the
almshouse is not far ahead of him, and he
is making his  way to it as fast as he can.
How much more a gentleman Avould such 
193
a man be if he would find some kind of re-
spectable employment and earn himself a
decent living ?  The kind of life he lives is
not only despicable, but it is troublesome.
It might be mortifying, if such a character
Avas capable of being  mortified.   If there
were  a work-house, as there ought to  be,
the gentleman lounger   with  no  visible
means of support, might  find an institution
in Avhich he might be a well-fed and well-
cared for, though a reluctant inmate.
  Speaking in a general way of the would
be politician,  we  may consider him as a
man in possession of a flourishing business,
who becomes animated with a desire of dis-
tinguishing himself among the politicians
of the day.  He hears large talk among  the
free voters of his district and talks largely
himself until he is so full of the  desire for
distinction that he cannot consent to have
his abilities circumscribed by his  single oc-
cupation.   He must flourish  among  the
talkers,  and the time that should be occu-
pied in the pursuit of his business is devoted
to that purpose.   His first advance is to the
position of a wire-puller.  There is distinc-
       16 
194
 tion in this office.  The alehouse is  the
 place where the wire pullers meet.  They
 learn the wire  pulling  and the ale and
 whiskey drinking at the same time.  They
 are good customers and must sometimes be
 accommodated with a private room.  Here
 the flourish is  conducted.  Speeches and
 the announcement of purposes and threats,
 and the exchange of pledges are freely cir-
 culated, and the ale or the Avhiskey as freely
 drank.  Schemes are projected for finding
 out how the neighbors vote, and if they vote
 on the wrong side, of intercepting the vote.
 In the neglect of his  business the man finds
 his business is sliding aAvay from him, and
 that his new profession  of  political wire
 pulling is ruining him.  In the course of
 his career the business so far declines that
 failure ensues, and then the man has time
 to devote to  his darling object.  The wire
 pulling associates become constant compan-
 ions.   The alehouse becomes  his  second
 home, and he becomes more attentive to his
second home than he ever was to his first.
He treats and is treated until his money is
all gone, and then—then what!  Then he 
                  195

is left alone in  his—not glory, but shame.
And then who cares for him?  Then where
are his brother Avire pullers ?  Then  who
quits his company ?  Then who kicks him
out of the bar room?  And worst and most
shameful and disgraceful of all, who suffers
more than  any  others  on his account?
Truty none  suffer more  than the  impov-
erished,   neglected,   degraded,  wretched
family of the foolish adventurer among the
wire pulling politicians.
  The political adventurer like every other
man that  treads the path of drunkenness,
begins his career  in moderation.   He is a
moderate drinker.  He drinks an occasional
glass.  He drinks for the benefit of it.  He
drinks for the comfort of it.  He drinks for
the excitement  of it.   He  drinks  for the
ruin that follows.  Every moderate drinker
has examples enough before him to be fully
convinced that his course if persisted in
will end in ruin.  The moderate drinking
is  increased  as  a matter of necessity. It
becomes frequent  drinking, constant drink-
ing, and then ruinous  drinking.
  Let me ask you, reader, and  answer the 
196
question candidly.  Did you ever know a
moderate drinker that  continued a  mode-
rate drinker?  Did you ever hear of such a
drinker?  I will  anticipate your answer.
You never knew such a one.  If the mode-
rate drinker continued the use of his dram
he  became the frequent drinker and the
ruined drinker.   There is no  preventing
this result but by discontinuing the drink-
ing.  The most fatal imposition that a man
ever practiced  upon himself  is that  in
which he believes he will continue Avithout
increasing the use of intoxicating liquors.
As surely as the  man increases in years he
will increase the  portion  allotted  for his
dram.   The result is inevitable.  It is  in
the view of every dram seller.  It is in the
view of every dram drinker.   It is in the
vieAv of every man.
  Flatter not yourself, my dear friend, Avith
the idea that you can do what no man ever
did before you, that is, continue a moderate
drinker.  It never was done.   It never can
be done.  The moderate drinker is a regu-
lar drinker and the regular  drinker is in
the high way to drunkenness and to his de-
struction.                            « 
197
  But I have something more to say of the
political wire puller.  He is the man of a
party,  a political party,  and he has  the
work of the political party to perform.  He
has money placed in his hands for the pur-
pose of treating  the honest  voters of his
district.  The English of this is, the money
is to be expended  in buying votes, or in
getting votes in any  jiay.  The man en-
gaged in this business,^7hen he becomes a
proficient, has to drink as often as he finds
a free American citizen to drink with him.
This is a glorious business for the fuddling
employee, who  desires no better office than
that of buying, bribing, cajoling and de-
ceiving the sometimes  honest, but more
frequently the ignorant  and vicious voter.
They are the ignorant and the vicious that
he most of all  encounters and  most of all
succeeds in  controlling.   What sort of an
account Avould  the wire pulling politician
render were such demanded of him ? Would
it not be shocking to the meanest of party
politicians?   Let us imagine how such an
account would read  :
     16* 
198
                    Tipple Hall, December 31, 1864.
Fuddle Club
    To John Smith Jones, Professional Wire Puller, Dr.
To Cash paid :
  6 drinks for 5 honest freemen and self................  $2 50
  Cigars,        do.       do.     ...............    50
  Oysters, &c,    do.       do.     ...............   2 75
  18 more drinks, do.        do.     ...............   *l 50
  1 hat, one pocket handkerchief and 1 cravat lost,    5 00
  48 more drinks for 6 honest freemen and self......  20 00
  Doctor's fees for attendance on 3 hurt men.........  15 00
  Services of 2 penitentiarAirds, and drinks for do.   1 00
  Taking 2 hurt men home................................    50
  Damage for spree in grog shop.........................   2 00
  Washing out blood from bar-room floor............    50
  Noisy wife of one honest freeman to hush up.......   2 00
  Money lost..................................................  25 00
  ConBdential expenses.......................... ..........  10 00
  Ac't generally, for liquor, oysters, doctor's bills, &c.  26 75

                                         $121 00
  Cr.
By cash received from President of Fuddle Club... 120 00

   Balancedue John Smith Jones, W. P............   Si 00

  This is quite a moderate account  for the
amount of services  rendered. The  fuddling
was  successful as  far  as  the eating  and
drinking,  &c., were concerned, but it is not
certain that six votes  Avere  gained  by the
process.  The wire puller fared best of all.
He  had  the  money  and  he did  what he 
199
 pleased  with it.   He was hired to  pull
 Avires for other people, but he pulled them
 all for himself.   He  made  a  noise  in  his
 talk and flourished patriotism  freely, but
 he knew his purpose and pursued it.
   And  who furnished the money, for this
 Avire pulling purpose?  Who furnished the
 money to make men drunk in order to se-
 cure their votes for the party?  Now comes
 the deepest shame of the whole matter.
 Who furnished  the money ?  The preacher
 gave  his share—a ATery  small  one.  The
 doctor gave his share, quite liberal.  The
 lawyer gave his share.  It made  the Indian
 on the  American penny  yell, the squeeze
 was so tight, before the penny  got out of
 his fingers.   The merchant gave his share,
 it was a fair one.   The mechanic and the
 laborer gave theirs, and the seedy  gentle-
 man looked on  and sighed.  He wanted a
 little for himself, and Avhen he was denied
 he folloAved  the wire puller at a respectable
 distance, and asked occasionally for a drink,
 which  he seldom received.  Very ungen-
 tlemanly was he frequently treated in not
being invited to take a glass among the 
200
political gentlemen Avho had the funds and
did all the drinking. Who gave the money?
Do you see that demure looking professor
of religion.  He is one of the most sancti-
fied  among  the long  faces.   He  frowns
Avhen you laugh.  He sighs Avhen you say
witty things.  He looks up,  and appears
to pray when the drunken  man staggers
before him. He gave the money. And why
did he give it?  Why, because he was re-
quested to do so by the Rev. Moses Tobias
Agrarian  Snooks,  the  minister  of  his
church, Avho preached long sermons, prayed
long prayers, gave out short hymns,  and
run away from the  church as soon as he
could get out of the pulpit.
  Reader, Avhat hope  have you  for  your
country when such games as these are played
for its freedom? What hope have you for the
church Avhen  its  ministers  and members
are desecrating the  pulpit  and the- aisles
and the pews, by such shameful, such ruin-
ous proceedings?  Don't ask me if Avhat I
say is true ?  Look around yourself a little,
and you will find that I have only begun
to tell Avhat is  true. 
201
   But what of the demure  looking profes-
sor ?   He  contributes  his  money for the
hire of a man to do what he Avould not have
.done himself.  He hires a man to help on
the ruin of his country, and pays him for
the service.  He  hires  a  man to sell his
soul to perdition, and thinks he shall es-
cape perdition himself.'  And what of that
preacher?  He is the worst of knaves.  He
knows  very  well what he  is doing.  He
knows  that  he  is  practicing deceit,  and
helping on the  work of corruption.  He
knows  that the  course he is pursuing is
that of ruin to society, to the country, and
to the church, and  he  does not believe a
word of Avhat he  preaches about perdition,
and the loss of the soul.  If you had heard
that preacher Avhen he delivered a temper-
ance speech for  ten dollars, and  sent all
the drunkards of  Christendom howling into
the dark regions,  you Avould have supposed
he Avas a true temperance man, and a strict
religionist.  You would have thought he
was a little  too hard on the sinners.  But
Avith a peep behind the curtain Avhat would
you think of him ? Perhaps there is enough
said on this subject. 
202
  But we must follow our  would-be politi-
cian through  his career.   He began a res-
pectable business man.   He  commenced
tippling when he started  out  in political
life.  He drank moderately Avith his friends
at their  political meetings.   He  was in
search of an office.   He contributed moder-
ately to the general movements of the party.
He did more for  the immediate circle in
which he operated, and through which he
hoped to be elevated to  a political position.
He deserved an office—a respectable office.
He would like such a one  as was a little in
advance of  some others, but  would take a
lower one if offered  him.  He  spent about
   much money as  the office  Avas worth,
and Avas insolvent when he Avas fortunate
enough to obtain it.   Now he was fairly in
the political ring.  He was an office-holder.
So elated was he Avith his success that he
thought not of the money he had expended,
nor of his failure,  nor of the danger he was
in of becoming a  drunkard and a beggar.
He provided an office for the  transaction of
his business as a government agent, and in
that  office there Avere always friends  who 
203
were in office, or out  of  office, or seeking
office, and not unfrequently the drink was
proposed, when all hands proceeded to the
nearest restaurant, where all  drank at the
newly-appointed  office-holder's  expense.
For a time there was pleasure in the meet-
ings of these friends, and they met as often
as possible,  never  without a drink or two.
There Avas a small select party that met most
frequently, and what was for a time remark-
able, they never met Avithout becoming too
thirsty for endurance without the drink.
Some one of the party had to  treat, and so
often did the event happen that the turn of
each came round  very  fast.   It  was not
loijg before the office-holder found his pay
too small for his expenses, and he was run-
ning in debt.  This sort of thing might
last  awhile,  but there  was  ruin .some-
where in its issue.  The running in debt
Avas one thing not to be endured any length
of time, and the running into drunkenness
was another thing which  Avould certainly
Avind up the  business thus pleasantly al-
though unprofitably pursued. As might
have been expected, the party  wound up in 
204
 trouble.  The office-holder Avas obliged to
 paAvn his office furniture and some of his per-
 sonal property, in order to keep up appear-
 ances.  When  turned out of  doors by his
 landlord, the higher officials of the govern-
 ment,  by whose appointment  he obtained
 and held his position, turned him out of his
 office.   He Avas now a  common drunkard.
 The members of his family Avere obliged to
 seek homes among their friends.  His wife
 Avith one child found a  shelter at a sister's,
 two of his children Avere taken home by one
 of his brothers, one Avas put out at business,
 and another, which  was a cripple, was sent
 to an institution established for the care of
 destitute children.  The unhappy  condi-
 tion of the wife and  older children, as  may
 be  imagined, Avas  that of wretchedness.
 The younger children  were not capable of
realizing their  situation  sufficiently to be
 as unhappy as those Avho were older.
  The  man himself managed  to  batter it
around, as drunkards sometimes do, while
all who know them wonder how it is  that
they can continue the drunken pursuit, day
after day, without being brought up at the 
                   205

 almshouse or the prison.  And although
 the creature thus debased may outrun the
 limit allotted him by the most liberal of his
 acquaintances,  he must at last bring up
 somewhere.   Our office-holder was picked
 up on the street one cold night in a state of
 helpless intoxication, and taken to the sta-
 tion house.   One of his brother office-hold-
 ers had compassion upon him,  and fur-
 nished him with a bed for the night, and in
 the morning gave him his breakfast, but
 what was to be done with him.  He was too
 much enfeebled by his drunkenness to do
 anything  for  himself.   He  had  scarcely
 strength left to reach  the nearest dram-
 shop, nor had he the first penny  towards
 the amount necessary to purchase a glass of
 the lowest-price liquor.  In  pity  for his
 person, in its extremity of necessity, it was
 deemed advisable to commit him to the
 almshouse.   Here he laid  sick for several
 weeks.  He was reduced to a frightful look-
 ing skeleton,  and when able to move about
 he reminded one of a walking  disease.  In
 a little  time he  gained  sufficient  strength
to walk over the grounds of the institution.
    17 
206
None suspected that he would ever think of
returning to his old habit, especially  after
his experience of wretchedness in its pur-
suit.  He was therefore allowed more lib-
erty than he Avould otherAvise have enjoyed.
One evening  the  man was missing.  The
attendants upon his Avard at the almshouse
supposed he had wandered into some seclu-
ded place Avhere he had died, and they com-
menced a search about the premises for his
body.  His  body Avas  accordingly  found,
not dead, but dead drunk.   He had Avan-
dered.into a distant liquor-house, where in
pity on his forlorn condition, a very liberal
bar-tender,  in the person of  a generous
hearted boy, gave  him several glasses of
whiskey.  Full to  overflowing, he left the
dram-shop and  succeeded in reaching the
spot within the almshouse enclosure Avhere
he was found.   He Avas taken  to his ward,
Avhere every necessary attention was given
him, and through which he was enabled to
pass the critical crisis that had very nearly
carried him  off.  When he came to himself.
an attendant was at his side, Avho was much
gratified at the success of his efforts to save
him from a drunkard's  death.  He was 
207
 quite rational,  and asked  the  attendant
 what had happened to him.   The informa-
 tion startled him. " What," said he, " was
 I found drunk on the ground, and brought
 back to this place ?"
   "You were," was the reply.
   " And I am yet alive, and yet a wretched
 sufferer.  I think I had rather died.  But
 it is horrible to think of dying  out on  the
 field, and drunk."  Here he was overcome
 by his feelings, and hiding  his face in his
 hands he Avept like a child.  "I  am nearly
 gone,"  said he, when he was able to speak,
 " and before I die I should like  to see  my
 wife and one or tAvo of my children."
   The attendant promised to do Avhat he
 could to have them brought out to the insti-
 tution.   He was as good as his word, and in
 the course of the day the wife and- one of
 the  children Avere  brought to  his side.
 "Wife," said he, Avhen  she approached his
 bed, " I am dying.  It is all over with me
 noAv, and I thought I would like to see you,
 and  tell you how I have suffered  and what
 agony I have felt on account of the trouble
 I have caused you and the children. The
accursed liquor, and  that more  accursed 
208
office, have ruined me.   They made a beast
of me.  They wrecked me.  They brought
me to beggary,  and you and the children
with me.   I  Avant your forgiveness, but I
can never forgive myself.  I want you to
know that I die penitent, though my death
must be horrible, horrible."
  He could utter no  more, but sunk  ex-
hausted on his pilloAV.  When he recovered
a little his wife assured him of her forgive-
ness, and desired him to compose himself,
and think no more  of the  past, and if it
Avas the will of  Providence that he  should
be taken, she hoped his departure would be
peaceful.
  " Peaceful!"  he exclaimed, repeating the
Avord Avith emphasis.   "Peaceful!  Never.
There's no peace for  me.  I'm  wretched,
wretched, and must  die a miserable crea-
ture, a  self-destroyer—a suicide.  Yes,  I
have destroyed  myself, and  what is  more,
I must  leave behind  an  affectionate Avife
and innocent children that I have Avronged
and ruined—almost murdered.   Mine is the
end of a drunkard—a drunken office-holder.
There's no forgiveness for me.  I'm ruined,
ruined, cursed, cursed forever !" 
                  209

  Thus  he raved,  until again exhausted,
when all  supposed the last struggle  Avas
over, but it Avas not so.   He again recovered,
and  again received the  assurance of his
wife's forgiveness, and  again raved in the
agony of his greatly disturbed spirit.   His
system  could  not  endure the  overtask to
which it Avas subjected, and he sank into a
profound  slumber, which  lasted  several
hours.   When he awoke he was a maniac.
Reason  was gone,  and he Avas himself no
more.   He raved in his madness against
every one  that came near him.  He im-
agined that his wife was a fiend sent to tor-
ture his doomed spirit, and he sprang at
her  Avith  a violence  much  beyond  the
strength that any one could have supposed
Avas left in his  system.  The Avife and child
were  conveyed away from  him, and he
made the  Avard ring again Avith his screams
and ravings.   He cursed every friend Avhose
name he could remember, and his memory
Avas as vivid, and more so, perhaps, than
it had been for years.   His Avife he remem-
bered by her name before marriage, and he
cursed her by that name in utterances most
    17* 
210
fearful.  Such were his ravings, that it was
found necessary to tie him doAvn to his bed,
in which condition he expended his remain-
ing strength.
   " Man," he  exclaimed,  looking  full in
the face of his attendant, when he recover-
ed himself sufficiently to  speak,  " Man, I
am lost.  The  cursed fiends have  ruined
me.  Where's the woman that brought the
last spell  upon me?  She's gone, but  I'll
find her.  She has brought the cursed spell
upon me,  but I'll be revenged !  I'll be re-
venged !  I shall die, and she  shall  die
with me !   I shall torture her spirit forever
in the torment of—of—yes, of hell !"
  It Avas impossible to picture  the Avretch-
edness of  the poor miserable creature that
had  wronged  and ruined himself so thor-
oughly,   while   wronging and   ruining
those  who were once so dear to him.  Let
it be enough to say  that he died  Avith  the
most bitter curses on his lips for himself
and for  every one he kneAV, most of all, for
the political associates that had helped him
onAvard in his career of misfortune, and the
dram-sellers, that had perfected and com-
pleted it. 
211
   The  day his wife left him was his last.
 His attendant became exhausted at night,
 in his efforts to quiet him, and the assist-
 ance of another was secured.   In Aveariness
 both were overcome, and  while in a slum-
 ber, the spirit of the wretched inebriate took
 its departure.  When they awoke he was
 dead.  Such was the end of a man who was
 possessed of quite  an ordinary  degree  of
 natural ability, had been  fairly  educated,
 and  might have been a useful member  of
 society.  But the dram was the poison of
 his life.  It brought him  to drunkenness,
 to ruin, to disgrace, to disease, to madness,
 to death.   The consequences were natural,
 as  they followed upon their causes.  He
 lived the  drunkard's life, and nothing less
 could have been  expected  than that  he
 should  have died the drunkard's death.   It
 Avas a death of horror,  more so, perhaps,
 than  is usual, but  the end  to  Avhich  he
 brought himself,  Avas  Avhat might  have
 been, and perhaps was, anticipated by the
 more considerate of his friends.
  Reader, I have said it was  impossible to
picture  the scene of horror that Avitnessed
the last struggles of the life of the drunken 
212
subject of our present history.   No man has
power  to fathom  the  extent  of sin  and
wretchedness to which the man  reduces
himself, who brings himself to such an end.
And all  for what! Why, for the pleas-
ure, the mean, the low,  the  disgraceful
pleasure of indulging in the dram.   Surely
the  drunkard's habit is  low  and mean
and degrading.  Pt cannot possess" much
pleasure,  but it is succeeded  by a degree
of  pain  that  cannot  be  expressed.    Is
there no Avarning in the terrible  end  that
drunkenness may bring?  Surely there  is.
If a man can properly consider it he  will
never dare to risk its terrible consequences.
What, die a  drunkard—a raving  maniao
from drunkenness ! Only think of it.  Be-
reft of reason.  Mad, and imagining demons
to be the only companions of hours and days
of torment.  Truly this is perdition while
the  soul is in the body, and  torturing it
with its convulsions of insanity and horror.
What then must  be  the after  perdition
Avhen the  soul has left its wretched tene-
ment, and gone naked to the deeper torture
of the fire and the worm—the fire that may
never be quenched and the worm that can 
213
 never die—the fire that must burn, and the
 worm that must  gnaw and gnaAv forever.
 Think of it, reader.  Think solemnly of the
 curse that intoxicating liquor may bring,
 and shun it as your experienced spirit would
 the Avild agony to which the lost is doomed.'
   Reader,  are you a preacher, a doctor, a
 laAvyer, a merchant, a mechanic, a laborer ?
 In either of these occupations, honestly and
 faithfully pursued, there is a living for you.
 Labor you must, in some pursuit, unless you
 are blest Avith a fortune adequate  to your
 support.  In either of the pursuits named
 there are  opportunities for advancement.
 You may pursue your way to distinction, to
 honor, to fortune.  It is common for men
 to  complain of the business to Avhich they
 have been brought up, and  to desire to
 change it for some other business.   This is
 one of the  greatest fallacies  Avith  Avhich
 mankind can  be  deceived.   It is not the
 particular  profession  that produces the
 dissatisfaction.  It is the labor of the pro-
 fession, and if you  Avere engaged  in any
 other than  your own the result would be the
same,  you would become  tired of it, and
desire to change it.  It  is the misfortune of 
214
humanity that it wearies Avith any employ-
ment that it is obliged to pursue.  Human-
ity does not relish restrictions.  It is natu-
rally  indolent, and Avould live  at ease.
This is one of its greatest faults.   You may
discover in yourself impatience in the pur-
suit of the fortune that seems to elude your
approach, and keep ever at a distance from
you.  It matters  not what may  be your
pursuit of life, this is the result.   Be con-
tented, then, in  the choice  that  you have
made of  your profession, and pursue  it
steadily, and honestly, and  faithfully,  and
contentedly, and success will surely attend
you.  A half heart  and half purpose, in
any pursuit can only be attended  with fail-
ure.  The good Book gives the right exhor-
tation, " What thy  hand findeth to  do, do
it with  thy might."  God intended that
the whole power of the man should be put
forth in his pursuit of life.  Usefulness  in
some one of the professions is duty.  Let
the duty be pursued in the proper way,  as
God has designed it, and  success  and bless-
ing must follow.
  I  think if you keep properly in view the
troubles, vexations and disappointments of 
215
 the office-holder, you  will not be disposed
 to  seek an office.  And if you can consider
 properly  the condition and end of  the
 drunken office-holder, you will never  fol-
 low in his footsteps.   In  the path of the
 would-be  politician there is trouble and
 danger.  In that of the Avire puller there
 is  meanness  and disgrace.  The employ-
 ment is beneath the thought of a respect-
 able man.   No man can be a true patriot
 while he is engaged in the occupation of a
 wire  pulling politician.  While thus em-
 ployed, a man that  has any consideration
 in  relation  to life and its  responsibilities,
 must despise himself.   He must regard his
 employment among the meanest in Avhich
 he  can  labor, and himself as the meanest
 of men  for consenting to labor in it.
  Let the preacher  continue to preach  the
 gospel,  the work he AATas appointed to per-
 form.   Let him faithfully Avarn the people
 of  all  manner  of sin, especially that of
 drunkenness, which  includes all the sins of
 a vicious life.   A man will do any act, he
 Avill commit any crime while drunk, and
 the warning voice of the pulpit should ever
and forever be raised against it.   Let the 
216
man of any profession and pursuit, consider
himself to  be a man, and let him avoid the
meanness and  tricks of  trade which every
Avhere disgrace the occupations  which men
folloAv.  Pursue the course  of high-minded,
honorable dealing. In the course of such a
life there  may be labor and many disap-
pointments, but the labor  will be pleasant
and the disappointments may be endured.
Perseverance in faithful labor,  will surely
reach its reward, and the faithful life must
possess blessings which none else can claim.
Touch not in  any case the intoxicating
glass.   Imagine not  that  you  can  trifle
Avith it, and come off unscathed.  A single
indulgence  may  be your  undoing.   Say
not to  yourself that it  is only a  glass.  It
cannot do much harm, and if it makes you
drunk it will  be soon over.  It is  only a
glass, and  it is only one drink,  but  it will
lead its  way to other drinks, and  to the
ruin that follows.
        " Only this once—the tale is told,
         He madly quaffed the poisonous tide,
        With more than Esau's madness sold
         The birth-right of his soul—and died."
  Risk not the terrible issue of a single
drink. Remember the admonition.  Avoid
the first dram,  and you are safe.