The Sweetwater enterprise. (Sweetwater, Tenn.) 1869-187?, 1871-04-13
Extract from an Address

adee Society, April 8, 1871, by Rgy. J..
H., keith. Published By request of
lie SOcictyA (
Much has been said and written on the
important subject Of temperance. The
ground has been occupied by those who
have done so ample justice to the subject
that it no longer has the charm of novelty
to recommend it TO the consideration Of
the public.
Notwithstanding this, however, il is the
Indispensable duty Of every lover of God
aud mar to set his face against this grow.
ing and destructive evil, aud help to reit-
crate the voice Of warning from one end
OF this vast continent 20 the other. This
is the more necessary, as the vice ofintcm-
perance has, Of late years, assumed a more
bold and daring stand, and unblushingly
carries on its work of destruction in very
face oftle sun. 1t has been truly said,
that neither the thunders of the divine
law, nor the disupprobation Of public SEN
timent, have yet been able either to drive
or shame this vice from the land, Time
was when it was deemed so disgraceful
for a nan to be guilty of intoxication,
that those who were "drunken were
drunken in the night !" but at this
age of improvement and refinement, it is
no uncommon thing to see men lying
drunken in our streets and along our pub
lie highways, in open day. Public senti-
ment is not yet sufficiently armed with
the terrors Of disgrace aud infamy to drive
this vile practice into the darkness of
midnight.
We now invite yeur serious attention to
some of the reasons given by the intern
perate for the use OF strong drink.
The question is often asked, even in this
enlightened day, as Alcohol, in any form,
necessary to any man in full health %
The soundest philosophy and common
sense answers uncompromisingly, "No."
Many persons find 1t convenient, if they
have been, or are about to be exposed to
cold, to use alcohol in some form. This
is a mistaken idea. -
Capt. Ross history of his second voyage
to find the Northwest passage proves, I'M
m~istakably, that alcohol is not only not
necessary in the coolest ATTITUDES, but that
its agency is decidedly pernicious. He
Informs us hat when he got into the re-
giOns of perpetual ice, where it was so in
tenssly cold that the mercury IN the Their
Hlometers fell SO low that 1t was actually
frozen, the most efficient sailors, those who
suffered least from cold, were those who
drank no beverage stronger than water.
Temperance ships that have sailed through
all ATTITUDES, have given evidence to this
same truth. The experience of hundreds
of temperance physicians proves, conclu-
sively, that neither intense heat nor Sc
we're cold can be the better endured by
the aid of stimulating liquors. The tes-
timouy of Munro, on the Diseases of Sol
diers; Mosely, Oh the Diseases of Hot Gil
mates, and many other distinguished ply
%sicians, is to the same effect. BeaDpre, in
his excellent work on cold, tells of a fes-
tival at Petersburg, in Russia, in which
from fifteen to eighteen hundred persons
persisted miserably from cold, who had
committed too great au excess of spirituous
drink. And, further, that the soldsers
who got drunk on the retreat from Mos
COW, fell asleep, in spite of all efforts to
arOus them the cold and n%arcoti, effect
Of the alcohol overpowered them.
The same thing has occurred in this, and
every other country under heaven. Very
few persons, comparatively, in a state OF
sobriety, have ever persisted from cold.
Well, then, if Spirituous liquors are not
beneficial to u man in health, neither in
cold climates nor in hot, do they not exert
a good influence in sickness?
IT. is admitted that their effects may be
beneficial in some instances, when, Judi
ciously employed. 1t is denied, however,
that they are a specific for anything, and
in the great majority of cases their effects
are positively injurious.
Where whisky cures one man it kills a
thousand. DR.. Mitchell, of Philadelphia,
in his Therapeutics, says "The present
state of society demands an .abridgement,
if not the exclusion, of all alcoholic medi-
cines, and it is in the power of every ply
stefan to do something in this cause.n
One Of the most frightful effects ofalco-
hol is the disease known as delirium tre-
mems, Or the brain fever of drunkards.
Indurations of the liver, Jaundice, drop
sy, inflammation of the kidneys, hemorhage
from the lungs, mania, epilepsy, sponta-
neous combustion, all result from the del
e%terious action of alcohol on the animal
economy. sit impairs," says DR.. Mitch
ell, "the integrity Of every living fiber, and
infuses its pestiferous influence into every
atom of the organized fabric" If, then,
its action be so deleterious on the consti-
tuition of man, does not philosophy and
common sense say, let its use be at once
and forever abolished?
Not only does strong drink exert its
deleterious influence on the physical ma
ture Of man, but it reaches the very deep
est recesses Of the moral and intellectual
natures poisons not only the fountains Of
life but the springs Of intelligence, and
transforms the man into a nondescript,
to compare which with the harmless beast
would be an unmerited degradation of the
latter. l have predicated my remarks,
far, of the r%uinous effects Of alcoholic
drinks on the notion of their purity, or
freedom from adulteration !; how greatly
must thcse effects be augmented BY the
s~tupendous frauds practiced BY the man
ufactursrs Brandy, rum, GIN wines,
beer, whisky, &C., are all the subject Of
constant and notorious frauds, their adul-
teratioDs are made, . matter of scientific
by chemical analysis, such acFid
mineral and vegetable poisons as coRperas,
alum, cherry, laurel, and many other sub
have been detected
If men viii use such vile and %ruinous
stuff, why not prepare it at home, and
save time, labor and expense.
Tie following extract Ia from an official