The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1871-05-04
'sthe Temperanse Quessiea and the Press.''

Dr.. Holland, editor OF 6cft6nero Monthty,
has an article In the Aptil number with the
above heading, from which we quote IS follows
The time for new departure Is come. It Ia
punctuated by the shifting and uncertain move
ments of those who have chad their own way''
for many years, and who find themselves as fat
from the goal at which they aimed as they
were when they started. The press indepen--
IDENTIFY, must take this question in hand, and
educate the people to temperance. The truth
is that there is not country on the face of the
earth tshers stimtlants DIRE neededso little, and
where they ATE capable Of producing SO mitch
mischief So in our own. Our sparkling su1hy
atmosphere and the myriad incentives to hope
and enterprise in our circumstances arg stimu-
lants of Gods own appointment for the Ameri-
can people. This pouring down OF intoNica-
ting liquors Is ten thousand times worse than
waste-it is essential sacrilege. This straining
of the nerves, heating of the blood, this stimu-
lation or stupefaction Of the mind, this impo'
sition of cruel burdens upon the digestive Or
gans, is foul wrong upon Nature. Tens of
thousands of valuable lives are sacrificed every
year to this Moloch Of strong drink. The
crime, the beggary, the disgrace, the SORROW,
the disappointment, the disaster, the sickness,
the death that have fowedin one uninterrupted
stream from the bottle and the barrel, through
out the length of the land, are enough to make
all thinking and manly men curse their source
and swear eternal enmity to it. The Ameri-
can people need to have it proved to them that
under no circumstances are the various forms
of intoxicating drink good for them. They
are not yet convinced of this, although they
know, of course, that the abuse of drink brings
all the evils that can be imagined. Every ju-
yenile periodical, every newspaper, every mag
azine, every review, owes it to the country to
teach this fact persistently. There has been
something in the way in which the temperance
reform has been pursued which has brought
upon it the stigma of fanaticisn. That stigma
ought to be obIiterated-so thoroughly obliter-
ated, that the man who weakly yields to de-
grading appetite, or watonly courts such an ap-
petite, and the danger and disgrace it brings,
shall feel that he bears stigma which marks
his degradation among generation OF clean
and healthy men. In short, temperance must
be made not only respectable, but fashionable,
The wine-bibbler and beer-drinker, as well as
those of stronger stomachs and coarser tastes
must be made to feel that that they are socially
disgraced by their habits. In the family, in
the school, everywhere, by all the ordinary
means of approach to young and plastic minds,
the virtue Of temperance should be inculcated
1t is fashionable tor the young 10 drlnK vine
to-day. 1t must not be tomorrow and in or
der it may not be, the accepted leaders of pub
lie opinion must tell the people the truth, and
enforce upon the people the obligations of du-
ty. That world of high life which sends down
it's powerful influence upon all the life beneath
it never was influenced by professional temper
ance reformers or by temperance organizations,
and is not likely to be. The clergymen 1t
listens to, the papers, and magazines, and books
it reads, and the social authorities it respects,
must inculcate temperance until it shall be q
shame to place wine-bottle before friend.
o Heaven for one generation of clean and
unpolluted men men whose veins are not fed
with fire men fit to be the companions of pure
women men worthy to be the fathers of chill
dren men who do not stumble upon the rock
of apoplexy at mid-age, or go blindly cropping
and staggering down in drunkard's grave, but
who can sit and look upon the faces of their
grandchildren with eyes undimmed, and hearts
uncankered. Such generation as this is pos
sible in America and to produce such q gen.
Grafton as this, the persistent, conscientious
work of the public press is entirely competent,
as an instrumentslity.