The Planters' banner. [volume] (Franklin, Attakapas Co., Lou.) 1849-1872, 1853-03-03


have all heard of the very unwise and
irrational mortal who felt we'll, wished
to feel better. took medicine, and died !
OF all that multitude, too, of fiorid
and Ito an inattentive observer,) healthy
looking men who for years have taken
a glass before every meal as an appe
tizer, very few. indeed. after the mid
die period of HE, enjoy really sound
health Some part or other of their
system has lost tone and become sub
iect to a chronic disease. If they con-
tinue TO exist, they are subject to SO
many infrmities that life is perpetual
endurance of evil.
Is It not strange, then, in view of all
these weighty considerations, that men
rational, sane men-should be Goa
sumers-habitual consumers of ardent
spirits? S'-ange, says tire greatest and
most truthlul # zapets that man
steal away brains p And it IS
strange, passing Strange, that he who
was made but a little Lover than the
angels. and able almost tn comprehend
the infinite who can compute the dis
tance of the uttermost planet from It's
centre of light, of heat, and of motion
who can determine the periods of its
revolutions upon its axis and IN lis orbit
with the utmost precision who can
follow the flight of comet careering
through the infinitude of space with
almost the velocity of Light, and pre-
dict the very day of its return within
the range of our vision, after an ab-
sence from it of 500 years, with the
certainty of mathematical demonstra-
ton: who, in short, CON raprehends the
laws which govern the external crea-
lion to the utmost limits. or rather
through all the ilIirnitable range of the
universe, ard who within the limits of
our own world has subjected to the mi
nutest analysis, reducing to lis ultimate
elements every substance entering in
to the composition of the earth, the air
and the waters and who, in addition to
the physical forces which he possesses
in the strength and activity of his own
muscular organization, has explored the
arcana of nature for the discovery Of
those secret springs and principles and
mighty motive powers which preside
over inorganic matter, and pressed
them all into his service, until there is
almost nothing within the range of ad-
mitted possibility which he cannot do:
employing the resistless expansive pow
er of caloric, TO move the most ponder
Gus machinery; propelling that i'm
mense structure, an ocean steamer,
world within itself, through the widest
pillows of the Atlantic, with the light
ness of sea-gull and velocity that
laughs at distance f; speeding the loco
motive hundreds OF miles along its
iron pathway, almost with the tieetness
of an arrow 10 its mark !; and, not con-
tent with studying the phenomena of
the lightning of Heaven, actually press
ing it into his immediate service in the
reduction of refractory substances to
their ultimate elements, compelling it
even to carry his mandates thousands
of miles with the literal speed of the
lightning's fash" and with certainty
that never fails and an exactness that
never deceives him. while the silent
but unerring magnet Pmarshals him the
way he would be goingo across the
trackless desert and The painless deep,
and he thus becomes in the snblimest
sense the lord and master of this lower
world-that he, too, whose glowing elo =
qnence in "thoughts that breathe and
words that burnt" can fire the soul with
the loftiest and most exquisite emotions,
whose magic numbers can watt it on
the wings of inspiration almost up 10
Heaven-that he should, of his own
free will and motion, unrestrained to
do or TO forbear, and in the full posses
sion of his noblest powers, coudescend
so low, become so abject and debased,
that the vile cur will pass him by and
scorn his fellowship, is strange indeed
How has the gold lost its lustre and
the most fine gold become dim 2"
Through the indulgence of this fatal
passion, how many askind, afectionate
and provident father has been led to
abandon his helpless child to cherries
poverty, to feel the pains of hunger,
cold and nakedness, and 10 grow up in
ignorance and vice, OF has utterly cast
him off upon the cold charities ef the
world, worse than fatherless childI
How many fond and doting husband
has been transformed into brutal and
remorseless tyrant and savage persecu-
tor of her whom al the sacred altar of