Lewisburg chronicle. [volume] (Lewisburg, Pa.) 1850-1859, 1854-07-21

stImulauiS tahcu III ouT CoWmou moiuhnt
and evening beverages, (Which are nc
, more necessary or useful to enable healthy
= men or women to perform their labor thar
a morning dram is for the lark or the
, eagle, for the buffaloe or the leviathan J.
to say nothing Of these, the people of this
nation annually madden their brains with
, 200: 900, 900 gallons Of Intoxicating drinks
and not only stupify and defle themselves
, but transmit irritable nerves and contami
/. mated blood to their children by the CON
sumption of more than $50, 900, 600 worth
of tobacco. Ofthis immense sum, s1uan
dered for the foul and abominable weed, il
is estimated by Dr. Cole-an able writer
on Physiology-that the members Of the
church of Jesus Christ take $4,000, ,0OO
worth for their share 1t is an indispu
table fact, that, taking the whole United
States together, much more money is ex-
pended for the single article Of Cigars than
for all the Common Schools in the Union
Cigars against Schools cigars against the
great cause of popular education and ap-
petite triumphs over intellect and morals
And where these natural poisons Of alco-
hol and tobacco are used most freely, the
church and schoolhouse are seen most
rarely. l say nothing Of opium and other
narcotics. And, after quenching still
more the expiring embers of vitality that
yet g!immer in the race, and corrupting
its corruption to more malignant type,
we call ourselves civilized, and - may
heaven pardon the audacity Christian.
Are these the practices of civilization
which honeycomb the bones, and leave
the muscles soddcn, while they irritate the
nerves, and evaporate electricity from the
brain? Is that Christianity, which Obeys
the ceremonial law rather than the eternal?
which asks the blessing of heaven upon its
food, and then gorges itself like wolf !?
which offers the morning prayer, but all
the day long passes unheeding BY the hun
CRY, the naked, the sick, and by the prls-
soner's door, The time will come when
men will speak of Christian and un- Chris
tian health, as they do now Of Christian
and un- Christian character.
For all these ancestral sins, posterity
suffers through all its organism, and in
every endowment We suffer for the Of
fences Of our progenitors; our descendants
will suffer for ours. The self justifying
ancestor will asseverate that his surfeits of
Wand, and wines, and his indulgence in
narcotics, do him no harm, but, three
generations af:erward, delirium and gout
will shrek out their denial in his great
grandchildren.
Gods heart is full Of new mechanical
and new physical blessings fer the race.
He only waits for the fulness of time when
Physiology and Education shall produce
the men with talent and genius worthy to
be the medium Of their transmission to
mankind. God knew the weight of the
atmosphere and the law Of grayitation /;
He saw this western continent He knew
how books could be printed, how cloth
could be woven by machinery, and how
lightning would run through iron, as we'll
in the time of Socrates, as since but, in
the order of His providence, He had to
wait for Torricelli and Newton, for Colum-
bus and Faustus, for Arkwright and Frank
lin, before He could bless mankind by the
bestowment of that knowledge. In the same
way, lie waits for Us, through a know
ledge of the laws of Physiology and Edu-
cation, and an obedience to them, to rear
the new men for the new blessings. Mans
ideas of the earth are yet 3 be as much
changed by chemistry, as his ideas of the
heavens have been by astronomy. Chem
istry will yet beautify the earth as much
as astronomy has gloriiied the heavens
For augmenting the aggregate amount
of intelligence and mental power, in any
community, the grandest instrumentali'y
ever vet devised is the institution Of Com
mon Schools. The Common School rea-
Lies all the facts, or fables, which ever
they may be, of the Divining Rod, 1t tries
its experiments over the whole surface Of
society, and wherever buried fountain of
genius is flowing in tie darkness below, it
brings it above, and pours ont its waters to
fertilizc the Garth. Among mankind, hith-
erto, hardly one person in a million hes
had an7 chance for the development! of his
higher faculties. Hence, whatever poets,
orators, philosophers, divines, inventors, or
philantrophists, may have arisen up to
bless the world, they have all arisen from
no. more than one millionth part Of the
race. The minds Of the rest, though
equally endowed with talent, genius and
benevolenee, have lain outside the scope
of availability fer good. These millions,
with the exception Of the units, have been
drudges, slares, cattle-their bodies used,
their souls unrecognized. All nowhere
else have there been suchfwaste and loss
- T., and IOss nj