The Ohio organ, of the temperance reform. (Cincinnati, [Ohio]) 1853-1854, 1853-06-03
Elihu pdfnts On Intemrerancs.

hshed in London, Great Britain, and
edited by the "Learnsd Blacksmith" ,"
EttHU BuTRtrr. 1t will amply repay
an attentive perusal. q t la''
Here are three great generic evils
-Intetnperance, War, and Slavery.
We will not say that all the shining
and suffering Of the world are includ-
ed in one or the other of these systems;
but each Of them, you will admit,
seems to number on its muster.roll
most Of the vices and miseries that
aflict society. Let us take, first, the
habit of intemperance, for this is
fraught with more sin and misery to
mankind than both the other great
evils put together. War is tempo
rary tornado, sweeping over nations
at Widerintervals than in darker ages.
Seldom more than two or three coun-
tries are smitten by its thunderbolts
Of ruin at the same time. The fiery
tempest Of malignities RACES but for a
season, and within certain bounds
Thousands and tens Of thousands Of
human lives are suddenly consumed
by s'the quick cross-hghtning" Of ha-
tired and revenge. The storm passes
over. The fierce elements of human
deprayity subside from exhaustion,
The sun, that looked with blood.shot
eye upon the smoking desolations Of
the region, looks itself again, and
beams upon the land in its old way.
The rains and dews fall like the Sa-
mantan's oil into the wounds made
by man in the breast Of nature, and
blanch out the blood.stains with weep
ing water-drops from heaven. Saye-
~, though it be "the sum Of all vii
lainies, is a system Of atrocities in
tHicted upon hardly fifteen millions Of
thehuman family. Nine-tenths Of the
human beings involved directly in this
evil, are innocent of its existence.
They are bought, beat, sold and held
as beasts Of burden by about two mil
lions Of usnrpers. who regard them as
their property Thus, il we may so
say, sheer suffering predominates in
the condition Of slavery-7sufering
-
not self-inhicted by the subjects Of the
system in gratifying their own passions
and appetites, but put upon them by
the cruelty and wiCkedness of a few
oftheir fellow-beings possessing the
power of oppression. Then it is an
evil confined to limited and distant
portions Of the globe.
But intemperance is an evil that lies
like a miasma of sin and misery upon
all l2the populations of Christendom,
more or'less dank and deadly. Stead
ily,r with but thin and infrequent
ingleanings or promise of pure sky and
sun, it pals great communities, day
and night, summer and winter, year
and century. No plummet ever sound
ed the depth, mol line ever compassed
the circumference, or trayersed the
diameter Of the sea of crime and
wretchedness fed and filed by the
torrent streams of this, huge intum-
bent sin-streams kissing with the
gurgling agonies of despair; streams
yelling out Of the hiddenidesolation
ofhuman homes in every land; streams
red with the ruin Of immortal souls;
streams choked in the gaping gorges
ofiniquity with the wrecks Of hopes,
character, reputation, once precious
as Immortality to- millions Of warm
beating hearts; streams dashing on
ward to the black abyss with the mad
dest music Of discord, in which inter
mingle and alternate the coarse ribald-
NJ Of midnight orgies; the sickIy,
whining vail Of thiId' en- pining for the
bread that is drunk in in, or hiding
from the madness which it fires to