Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1857-09-24
For the Yorkville Enquirer.
THE RECRUITING SERVICE,

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All drunkenness commences in moderate drink
ing. Every drunkard WAS once moderate drink
er The old topper began with only social glass,
or the gentlemany drink. What is now pure
love of liquor was perhaps once penance yield
ed to the solicitations of friendship, or homage
obsequiously rendered to what was regarded fash
ionable life. The very person Of the drunkard
was, it is probable, despsed and avoided, whilst
the julep or brandy-toddy was in very great mod
Grafton swallowed. 0ne-only one drink was then
enough to produce the requisite excitement Of
the blood and brain. Who wished for more! none
but that neutrality-suspicious. s-bloated-red.faced
mortal, far gone in they way of drunkenness.-
Every man Of observation and experience at once
detects and sees that this latter is an inebria.s,
and that the drunkard's grave will soon claim its
own. The moderate drinker sees this as readily
as any other. But the moderate drinker congratu-
lates himself that he IS certainly safe from the
tempter's snare-he surely can never be overcome
with the love Of liquor-he is differently constitu-
ed from the rest Of msnknd-ths laws of human
nature do not operate on him las they do upon the
balance of the human family-he is strange bird
"A non-descript on the earth. So he in his wis
dom thinks,
''when the loose mountain trembles from on high,
Shall gravitation cease, If you 60 BY"
But when this poor drunkard shall have fallen
when the fixed laws Of alcoholic poison and Of his
human frame shall have run their round-when
the drunkard's worn-out body shall have been
consigned to drunkards narrow resting place,
will the generation of drunksrds have ceased? -
By no means The moderate single glass-the
the social drink Of friendship nicely prepared
and highly favored toddy has grown into peri
odical and frequent necessity-yea the common
est bald-face from the commonest chunk.bottle is
relished and greediy swallowed, notwithstanding
oil contortions of face. Every day passed without
the e1hiarating excitement, land this day is moro
particularly the, sabbath) is day Of punishment.
The stimulating beverage is now q necessary Of
life. The habit has become fixed in the constitu-
tion. Is not this man now drunkard! Is not
the gap in the generation filed up In short
while the grave again claims its own, and hell Its
voary. Did that eminent Judge or Chancellor
that distinguished lawyer-tbat successful ply.
sician-that good merchant-that promising oiti-
zen-thst father Of an interesting family and hus-
band of an amiable wife expect to have that neri
vous tremor, that idiotic stsre-that blotched
face-that drunkard's reputation and grave, when
he first began to use the social glass; and claim it
as his birth-right and as innocent enjoyment!
Who does not see that that otherwise promising
youth, no matter how he may attempt to conceal
it, has passed through nights debsuch, and is
an enlisted soldier in alcohols great army? In .
short while, the fact will glare in open day. The
drunkard's ranks are always repleuishing from
those of the moderate drinker.
JUPP0N GIsT.