Fayette County herald. [volume] (Washington [Washington Court House], Fayette County, O. [Ohio]) 1860-1???, 1871-04-13
''fhe Temperance Question and
the Press,o

le IN ocrDners Monthly for Apr
4 is an article by DR.. Holland. iii
E. editor, on "The Temperance One,
l. tion and the Press" from WHICH "
quote:
!. The time for new departure
e come. 1t is punctuated by th
n shifting and uncertain movement
e of those who have "had their owl
8 way" for many years and who fin,
t themselves as far from the goal a
s which they aimed as they wer,
D when they started. The press
+ independently. must take this ques
ton in hand, and educate the peo
pie to temperance. The truth i.
! that there IS not a country on the
face Of the earth where stimulants
} are needed so little, and where they
! are capable of producing so much
mischief, as in our own. OnI
sparkling, sunny at mosphere, and
: the myriad incentives to hope and
enterprise in our circumstances, are
stimulants of Gods own appoint,
ment, for the American people.
This pouring down of Intoxicating
liquors is ten thousand times worse
than waste-it is essential sacrilege.
This straining of the nerves, this
heating of the blood, this stimula.
ton or stupefaction OF the mind,
this imposition of cruel burdens
upon the digestive organs, is a foul
wrong upon Nature. Tens Of
thousands of valuable lives are
sacrificed every year to this Mo
loch ofstrong drink. The crime,
the beg gary, the disgrace, the sor
row, the disappointment, the disas
ter, the sickness, the death that
have flowed in one uninterrupted
stream from the bottle and the bar
rel, throughout the length of the
land, are enough to make all think
ing and manly men curse their
cource and swear eternal enmity
to it. The American people need
to have it proved to them that un- |
der no circumstances are the vari-
Gus forms of intoxicating drink
good for them. They are not vet
convinced of this, although they
know of course. that the abuse of
drink brings all the evils that can
be imagined. Every juvenile mag |
azine, every review. owes it to the
country to teach this fact persis
tently. There has been something
in the way in which the temperance
reform has been pursued which has
brought upon it the stigma of fanat.
icism. That stigma ought to be
obliterated--so thoroughly obliter-
ated, that the man who weakly
yields to a degrading appetite, or
wantonly courts such an appetite,
and the danger and disgrace it
brings, shall feel that be bears
stigma which marks his degrada.
ton among generation of clean
and healthy mer. In short, tenn
perance must be made not only re-
spectacle, but fashionable. The
wine bidder and the beer drinker,
as we'll as those of stronger stom-
achs and coarser tastes, must he
made to feel that they are socially
disgraced by their habits: In the
family, in the school, everywhere,
by all ordinary means of approach
to young and plastic minds, the
virtue Of temperance should be in.
culcated. 1t is fashionable fer the
young to drink wine to-day. 1t
must not be to morrow; and in or
der that it may not be, the accep-
ted leaders of public opinion must
tell the people the truth, and en-
force upon the people the obliga-
tions of duty. That world of high
life which sends down its powerful
influence upon all the life beneath {
it never was instituted by profess
ional temperance reformers, or BY !
temperance organizations, and is '
not likely to be. The clergymen ]
it listens to, the papers, and magq- L
zines, and books it reads, and the j
social authorities it respects, must /
inculcate temperance, until it shall b
be shame to place a wine bottle a
before friend.
0 Heaven for one generation r
of clean and unpolluted men = e
men whose veins are not fed with c
ire-men fit to be the companions c
If pure women men worthy to be g
he fathers of children men who t.
10 not stumble upon the rock of Fl
a. mid age, or 60 blindly il
5roping and staggering down into s
drunkards s grave, but who can ii
it and look upon the faces oftheir W
with eyes undimmed, S
nd heart uneankered. Such a C
eneration as this is possible in y
America and to produce such q Il
eneration as this, the persistent, f
onscientious work of the public i
ress is entirely competent, as an 4
lstrumentality. The press can do P
hat 1t o0jd; and if it will faith d
lily do its duty, Maine laws will b,
1me to be things unthcught OF, u
nd temperance reformers and tom is
erance organizations viii become q
Stiuct.