CHAPTER VIII. Be Temperate

BE TEMPERATE

One of the great curses, if not the greatest in our land, is intemperance. It is productive of murder, lawlessness and crime; the chief agency in the corruption of the ballot, legislation and administration of the law; the voracious consumer of purity, reputation and health, and the chief architect in establishing mad-houses, orphan asylums, prisons and county farms. It demands and controls annually more than a billion dollars by which bread, meat, clothing, shoes and sugar could be purchased for the poor, and all schools and Christian missions supported. In silver dollars this money could be laid side by side on the equator till it formed a band around the earth, while the liquor it purchased would fill a canal twenty feet wide, twenty feet deep and forty-six miles long. The grain alone used by distilleries in the manufacture of the destructive drink is fifty million bushels, enough to furnish three hundred one-pound loaves of bread to each family in the United States. No wonder that “ninety-nine of every hundred men,” as John B. Gough said, “are ruined morally, intellectually and religiously by the use of drink,” and that fifty of every hundred insane persons, seventy-five of every hundred prisoners, and ninety-six of every hundred tramps are made thus by this evil. Far better that every boy “touch not, taste not.” Longfellow said:

“It will make thy heart sore To its very core! Its perfume is the breath Of the angel of death. And the light that within it lies Is the flash of his evil eyes. Beware! Oh, beware! For sickness, sorrow and care Are all there.”

A GREAT STATESMAN’S DOWNFALL.

In one of the older colleges in Massachusetts years ago, there was a boy of great promise, bearing an honored name, and concentrating in his own intellect the mental power of generations of ancestors. He was a prodigy in learning. He seized a language almost by intuition. His person was faultless; his hair like the raven’s wing, his eye like the eagle’s. On the day of his graduation he married a charming young lady. His profession, the law, led him to the highest office of advocacy in the State. He was Attorney General at an age when most students are admitted to the bar. Suddenly, when as yet no one knew the cause, he resigned his high appointment, giving no reasons. He was a secret drunkard. Too high was his sense of honor, and the importance of his station, to intrust himself longer with the destinies of society. As years rolled by he sunk like a mighty ship in mid-ocean, not without many a lurch, many a sign of righting once more to plow the proud seas that were destined to entomb him forever. His lovely wife left him, and, returning to her parents, died of a broken heart. With bowed head at the grave, he wept bitterly on the head of a dear boy she had left behind. Friends of his, men of talent and piety, prayed over him, and at times he would get the better of the demon that ruled him, and again put forth his gigantic powers. The greatest effort he exerted during this period was in an important case before the Supreme Court of the United States. Marshall, the patriarch of American judges, gazed with wonder on the barrister, as burst after burst of eloquence and oratory followed. George Briggs, member of Congress from Massachusetts, seeing his splendid portrait hanging in a conspicuous place at Washington, inquired who it was, and was told “that is the portrait of Talcott, the brilliant genius, the most talented man in the United States.” In his last spasm of temperance he wrote a beautiful tract: “The Trial and Condemnation of Alcohol.” After a fatiguing argument before a court in the city of New York, he was over-persuaded by a friend to take a glass of beer. It was his last sober moment till he was in the agonies of death. Down, down he went and never rose to assume manliness again. As the fabled phœnix is said to rise from the ashes of its parent, one of the most noble and eloquent advocates of temperance proved to be the son of this ruined genius.

A GREAT DELUSION.

It is a great delusion for boys to think it manly to drink. Manliness implies strength and courage. A drunkard lacks both. He might be brutal, but he is a coward. Manliness also implies reason, and when we consider that liquor robs one of this, a boy shows his manliness by letting it alone and helping others do the same. Liquor is a poison. Incorporated in it is a deadly drug known as alcohol. Drop a little on the eye and it destroys the sight. Sprinkle a few drops on the leaf of a plant and it will kill it. Immerse a tadpole in it and it ceases to live. Drink it and its action produces weakness, and its reaction nervousness. In a word, alcohol is the devil’s best drug and the boy’s worst enemy. Said General Harrison, “I was one of a class of seventeen young men who graduated at college. The other sixteen now fill drunkards’ graves. I owe all my health, my happiness and prosperity to a resolution I made when starting in life, that I would avoid strong drink. That vow I have never broken.”

WHAT TEMPERANCE DID FOR A MAN.

In 1812 the town of Farmington, New Hampshire, saw a poor boy. When old enough he was bound out to a farmer. Afterward he learned a trade. He worked well and studied evenings. A friend took an interest in him and encouraged him to attend and speak at a political meeting. “How can I be anything when my father is a drinking man?” he was wont to say. He solemnly signed the pledge of total abstinence and began speech-making. Soon the young men said: “Let us send him to the Legislature.” At every step he did his best. Finally Massachusetts sent a petition by him to Congress. John Quincy Adams invited him to dinner. While at dinner, Mr. Adams filled his glass, and turning to the young man, said: “Will you drink a glass of wine with me?” He hated to refuse, there was the ex-President of the United States, and a company of great men. All eyes were upon him, and so he hesitated and grew red in the face, but finally stammered: “Excuse me, sir, I never drink wine.” The next day the whole account came out in the Washington papers. It was copied all over Massachusetts, and the people said: “Here is a man who stands by his principles. He can be trusted. Let us promote him.” He was made Congressman and Senator. Finally he became Vice-President of the country. That farmer-boy was Henry Wilson.

When elected to this office, he gave his friends a dinner. The table was set without one wine-glass upon it. “Where are the glasses?” asked several of the guests, merrily. “Gentlemen,” said Mr. Wilson, “you know my friendship and my obligation to you. Great as they are, they are not great enough to make me forget the rock whence I was hewn and the pit whence I was dug. Some of you know how the curse of intemperance overshadowed my youth. That I might escape I fled from my early surroundings. For what I am, I am indebted to God, to my temperance vow and to my adherence to it. Call for what you want to eat, and if this hotel can provide it, it shall be forthcoming; but wine and liquors can not come to this table with my consent, because I will not spread in the path of another the snare from which I escaped.” At this, three rousing cheers rent the room for the man who had the courage to stand by his noble convictions.

BE A TOTAL ABSTAINER.

It pays to be a total abstainer. “Abstinence,” said Bishop Spalding, “is but negative, a standing aloof from what hinders or hurts.” The tendency of drink is to deaden the moral sensibilities. It weakens the nerves, impairs the brain, feeds disease and at last “bites like a serpent and stings like an adder.” On the other hand, “temperance is a bridle of gold, and he who uses it rightly is more like a god than a man.” Nothing is so conducive to one’s happiness and success in life. Burdette said, “Honor never has the delirium tremens; glory does not wear a red nose; fame blows a horn, but never takes one.”

There is a story told of Hannibal, the great Carthaginian, who fought so long and so successfully against the Romans, that when he was still a boy of nine years, his father Hamilcar asked him if he would like to go to the wars with him. The child was delighted at the thought. “Then,” said his father, “you must swear that you will, as long as you live, hate the Romans and fight against them.” Young Hannibal took the oath, and all through life was the bitter enemy of Rome. He took sides with his father and his country against the proud foes. The boy who wishes to succeed in life must incorporate “no liquor” in his resolutions, and under all circumstances refuse it, choosing rather to be an advocate of ennobling temperance.

It pays to be a total abstainer, because it is right. It is not so much a question of dollars saved or happiness promoted as a question of right. Said Amos Lawrence, “Young men, base all your actions upon a sense of right, and in so doing, never reckon the cost.” In the army, drinking and treating were common occurrences. One noble captain had the heroism to decline the oft-proffered treat. An observer asked, “Do you always reject intoxicating liquor?” “Yes.” “Do you not take it to correct this Yazoo water?” “Never.” “You must have belonged to the cold water army in your youth.” “Yes, but I learned something better than that; my mother taught me that what is right is right, and coming to Mississippi makes no difference. It would not be right for me to accept an invitation to drink at home, it is no more right here; therefore I don’t drink.” Some time after an officer met a lady who wanted to see one who had met her boy, naming his office and regiment. He told her of the noble examples of piety which were found in the army and related the case of the captain. She exclaimed, “That’s beautiful! That’s beautiful! His mother must be proud of him.” “Yes, she is, and you are that mother.” Amid grateful tears she exclaimed, “Is that my boy? Is that my Will? It’s just like him; I knew he would do so. He was a good boy. He told me he always would be and I knew he would.” Beautiful trust. Excellent commendation. Would that it could be said of every boy.

It pays to be a total abstainer for the sake of those who suffer through intemperance. The good and wise Governor Buckingham, of Connecticut, gave as his reason for being a total abstainer, “If I indulge, I am not safe. There is no degradation so low that a man will not sink to it, and no crime so hellish that he will not commit it, when he is drunk. But if it could be proved conclusively to my own mind that I could drink and never be injured, yet I could not be certain but others, seeing me drink, might be influenced to drink also, and, being unable to stop, pass on in the path of the drunkard.” Were many more as considerate there would be less drinking husbands, and less despised and taunted children because of drunken fathers.

TWO SAD CASES.

Who would ever think of a two-dollar bill relating a sad story and giving a pathetic warning? Yet such a bill was brought to the office of a Temperance Union recently. Written in red ink a poor man told what liquor had done for him, and what it would do for others. Here is what it said, “Wife, children and $40,000 all gone. I alone am responsible. All have gone down my throat. When I was twenty-one I had a fortune. I am now thirty-five years old. I have killed my beautiful wife, who died of a broken heart; have murdered my children with neglect. When this bill is gone I do not know how I am to get my next meal. I shall die a drunken pauper. ’Tis my last money and my history. If this bill comes into the hands of any man who drinks, let him take warning from my ruin.”

When Colonel Alexander Hogeland was sitting in his room at Louisville some years ago, a lame boy knocked at the door. Said he, “My father is to be hung to-morrow. The Governor will not pardon him. He killed my mother when he was drunk. He was a good father, and we were always happy only when he drank. Won’t you go and talk and pray with him, and then come to our house when his body is brought to us?” The Colonel did as requested, and found that the demon drink was the sole cause of that family’s ruin. The father was hung, and when the body was taken to the home, he was there. Six worse than orphans were curled up on a bundle of straw and rags, crying with a grief that would make the stoutest heart quail. The crippled boy but fourteen years of age was the sole support of the little family. The father’s body was brought in by two officers. The plain board coffin was rested upon two old chairs, and the officers hurried out of the room and away from the terrible scene. “Come,” said the crippled boy, “come and kiss papa’s face before it gets cold;” and all six children kissed the face of that father, and, smoothing the brow, sobbed in broken accents, “Whiskey did it. Papa was good, but whiskey did it.”

My boy, be temperate. Do your best to stop another such scene. Sign the pledge. Talk against, work against, and when able, vote against the liquor interests. “Woe to the man or boy who becomes a slave to liquor,” said General Phil. Sheridan. “I had rather see my son die to-day than to see him carried to his mother drunk. One of my brave soldier-boys on the field said to me just before a battle, ‘Tell mother, if I am killed, I have kept my promise to her. Not one drink have I ever tasted.’ The boy was killed. I carried the message with my own lips to the mother. She said, ‘General, that is more glory for my boy than if he had taken a city.’”