The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1852-06-16

of the Commonwealth In wasting
$3.50 100000 every year, the laboring
population Of Britain put it beyond the
power of any government to avert, from
multitudes of them. the miscries of want
Were but 1.-THE of that sum wrenched
from the hands of toilworn labor, and
buried in the Thames or the ocean, we
should all regard it rs an act of stupen.
dous folly and guilt Yet it were infn-
itely better that such a SUN should be
cast into the depths of the sea, than that
it should be expended in way which
must debauch the morals and destroy
the health, and lay waste the personal
and domestic happiness of thousands.
If the question be narrowed down to
one of mere material aceaHh, no policy
can be more suicidal than that which
upholds usages, the inevitable effect of
which is to paralyze the productive pow
ors of people and to derange the prop
er and natural distribution of property
Remember, then, he who sustains the
usages, sustains the most prolific source
of improvdence and want. He makes
at the same time, an inroad upon his own
personal income, which is but loan from
God. entrusted to him for his own and
others good.
But these drinking usages are not
only expensive, they are unreasonable
What is their practical effect 1t is
that others, shall decide for u.s. ques-
tion which ought, most clearly, to be re-
ferred only to our own taste and sense
of duty. We are to drink whether it be
agreeable to us or not whether we
think it right or not whether we think
it safe or not. Moreover-and this is
sufficiently humiliating-we are to drink
precisely Whcn and precisely ,cherc, 9th
ers prescribe 1t has been said that, in
some parts of our country, one must eli
thor drink with man who invites him.
or fight 1t is not long since, in every
part of it, one must either drink, when
invited or incur the frowns and jeers of
those who claimed to be arbters Of pro
prcty. Aud even now, he or she who
will not drink at all, or Will drink
only when their own reason and all in
clination bid. must not be surprised if
they provoke. invective, or ridicule
Aud is bondage like this to be upheld?
Does ii become free born Americans, who
boast so much of liberty, to bow down
their necks to a scryitude so unrclenting.
and yet so absurd
A German nobleman once paid Wis
it to Great Britain, when the practice of
toasting and drinking healths was at its
height-Whcrcver he went, during a
six months tour, he found himself oblig-
ed to drink, though never so loath. He
must drink with every one who would
be civil to him, and with every one, too,
who wished q convenient pretext for tax
ing another glass. He must drink a
bumper in honor of the King and Queen
in honor of the church and state-in
S honor of the army and navy. How of
: ten did he find himself retiring. with
= throbbing temples and burning check
. from these scenes of intrusive hospitali-
q ty At length his visit drew to close
= and to requite in some measure, the at
tcntions which had been lavished upon
? him, he made a grand entertainment
b Assembling those who had done him
+ honor. he gathered them round most
: sumptuous banquet, and feastcd them to
!. their utmost content The tables were
t then cleared. Servants entered with two
t enormous hams; one was placed at
G each end slices were cut and passed
e round to each guest-when the host
Il rose, and with all gravity said ''Gen
IL tlemcn. / give you the King pleas
n eat to his honor p His guests protested
y They had dined-they were Jews-the,
! we're already surcharged through his to-
IF generous cheer But he was inAexibc
4. !" Gentleman said he, for six month
.e you have compelled me to drink at you
bidding Is it toomuch that you shoul'
Y. now cut at mine | have been submis
e siye why should YOU not follow my e>
IT ample You will please do honor t
II, your King You shall then be serve
of with another slice in honor of the Quee
it another to the prosperity Of the Roy
Y al Family, and 50 on, to the end of I'll
rs chapter
IS. But, waving the aJsurdity and cos
L. hncsS of these usages, let me ask if the
us are safe? No one who drinks can
IT. perfectly certain that he may not die
H. drunkard Numbers which defy a
T. computation, have gone this road, WI
is were once as sclfconfdent as any of I
of can be. No one, again, who drinks, ca
lie be certain that he may not, in some u
an guarded hour, fall into a dcbauch,
ar, which he shall commit some error I
re Iperpetrate some crime, that will folio
d. him with shame and sorrow all his day
m How many young man, by one such
ul- discretion, has cast a cloud over all h
,h, prospects for life You have read Shak
We speare's Othello-thc most finished al
Ow perfect, perhaps, of all his tragediC
les What is it but a solemn Temperan
Lecture Whence come all the horro
Iys that cluster around the closing scenes
nr- that awful and magnificent Drama
,ry it not from the wine with which La
at piled Cassie What is Iago himse
a but a human embodiment of the Gre
int Master Of Evil and as that Mast
lut goes abroad over the earth, seeking who
ad he may destroy, where does he find
de- more potent instrument than that treaC
ry, erous wine cupl This dark trageC
hat with its crimes and sorrows is but an {
av- itome, a faint transcript of ten thousa
lily tragedies which are all the time enacti
be on this theatre of our daily life II,
the many are there, at this moment, wi
ich from the depths of agonized and remor
our full hearts, can echo the words of 9th
ere los sobered but almost phrenzied Ii,
of tenant" o. thou invisible spirit of vii
9Th if thou hast no name to be known
on. let US call thee devil p-" That IN