Polynesian. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu], Hawaii) 1844-1864, 1851-12-13
Mr.. WYLI.IES NOTICE IN ACKNOW-
OF E.. w. C's REMARKS ON
TEMPERANCE

L
/ consider myself indebted to and instructed by
| such correspondents as Mr.. Castle and E. W. c.
who advocate the temperance cause in temperate
manner. AS for those nameless gentlemen, il
gentlemen they be, whose best logic is an "Oh"-
whose best reasonings are "fhunder6oits and ..sar
casms" and whose charity covereth not, but impu-
feth multitude of sins, have only to regret that
In their zeal to inure me- they only disparage the
really good cause which they profess to advocate
Were an enemy to the Hawaiian Total Absti.
nence Union, which l am not conscious of being,
could not wish for more effectual mode of expo-
ding it, than an increase of its members of that
class. Unfortunately, it is not confined to Honol1
lu. 1t exists in the United States, and has not ad
ded credit to the cause there. In printed paper
now before me, | find the following picture of the
American High Functionaries and Legislature
given to Judge Hopper of the Maryland State Tenn
perance Society, in 1887.
81 state the fact then, to the nation that some OF
the higher executive officers at Washington, are
and have been notorious Observation-Disclosures in
my sense of the term, habitually affected by ardent
spirits-once week-impaired in constitution by
the use of strong drink and further state, that
have often heard the reason assigned, and believe
it was valid one, for the house of Representa-
tives of the Congress of the U. States not sitting
In the evening after dinner when the public business
required it, that many of the members were so much
In the habit of intoxication that they not only
unfit themselves for public duty, after certain
hour in the day, but likely to prevent Others
discharging their duty, by interrupting the order
of proceedings. During the later part of the ses-
sions of Congress when the two houses were com
PEELED to sit late, members too drunk for the decen
cies of tavern bar-room, were not uncommon
sights in the senate chambers and in the hall of the
house of Representatives of Republic, whose
fathers handed down to it the hallowed and immu-
table truth that free government the blessings
of liberty can be preserved to any people but by a
firm adherence to Justice, moderation; temperance
fugality and virtue. These are facts, sir, which,
in my name if you choose, you may bring to the
attention of tn, Convention IA meeting of the
Maryland State Temperance Society as worthy of
the notice of the people of the United States"
Perhaps Mr.. J. N. Hartley had that account in
view when he laid down the doctrine of the incom-
patibility of the duration of Republic with intem-
perance. / receive both the account and the doc
trine cum grano sails, for in IS42, during two
visits that paid to Washington, did not see one
man intoxicated either in the Senate or Congress,
or even the hotel where | lodged and where many
of them boarded, and in fourteen years which have
elapsed since 1887, the Republic has increased in
territory, population, and all the elements of wealth
and greatness, Just if its high Functonares and
its Legislators had all their wits about them quite
as much as the members of the Maryland State
Temperance Society, which verify believe they
all the while had.
If the Ha,caiian Total abstinence Union think
otherwise them assuredy, they viii be the best ar
my that the King call into the field to fight his
battles against all annexationsts to such drunken
government" as that of the United States contrary
to the opinion which expressed, alphabetically, In
nv communication of the LIST of November.
So also, has it been in England. Several of the
more rational and better educated speakers at the
Worlds Temperance Convention, in London, OF
1876, expressed their regret at the injury which
the cause sustained by the low tone of the Tempe
rance press and by the want OF moderation and
common civiity, in too many of the professors OF
temperance do not find that either then, since,
or at any time, they have ventured to assail the
high officers of the Queen, or the Peers or MEM
bers of Parliament, but what do find is that the
President of the Wesleyan Conference had decla-
red to that most respectable body of Christian be-
levers, that having received in 1916 one address
from the Temperance Convention, "wordedin avery
respectable manner, it was deserving of respectful
attention" adding ssthat all other Temperance ad-
dresses and memorials which he, as President, had
receNed-and they had been very numerous
were very impudent and very tyrannical and there
fore did not merit attention.
The pages of the Poynesian afford other sam
ples of the same spirit not Editorial which Is not
that of genuine temperance or of Christianity, and
therefore, the happy contrast increases the ment OF
such communications as those signed by Mr.. Castle
and E. w C. The latter has the courtesy to express
strong wish that should join their Society. Some
of the reasons why / cannot, as christian. he VIII
find my paper headed Teetoielism and CArssassn
Boptisua, others may disappear when know
what good the Society has done, and who are ns
members. It viii give me much pleasue "a see
them giving meat to the hungry, drink to the
thirsty. hose-room to the stranger clothes to the
naked. and to follow them in their visits to the
s;ck. the prisoner, the widow and the orphan
should be sorry to think that their morality is con-
fined to one virtue, and that in a degree neither
practised nor any where incnlcafed by christ,
whom reverently look up to as the 'au'hor ana
fnisher of my faith" r =
After knowing who the associates Of z. W. Z.
are. shall have more to say on the subject of my
:;;sx - .haza and of other fnnics of his communl-