Connecticut western news., 1878-03-21
EVIL EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL.
What Dr. Willard Parker Has to Say. Figures Showing Whisky's Effects i'm New York City.

What Dr. Willard Parker Has to say--
 Figures showing Whisky's Effects i'm New
 York City.
 Dr. Willard Parker spoke, at meet ing of the National Temperance Society in New York, on "The Hereditary h. fluence of Alcohol" He said that the truth of the saying that |" dr1nkards be- get drunkards," was recognized as far back as the times of Plato and Aristotle. The tendency of children to inherit not only the physical traits, but also the mental and moral qualities of their par ents, had been clearly demonstrated. Physicians had discovered that diseases of the body were transmitted from father to son through many generations. The records of several families, and especially that of the 'Juke family" showed that the effects of drunkenness extended through at least seven genera tions. Alcohol was an irritant-as much so as grain of sand forced into the eye and the so-called stimulating effects were only the efforts of nature to throw off the offending substance. Alcohol disarranged the nervous system and weakened the reasoning powers. Men acted either from reason or from impulse. When reason was dethroned by alcohol, the man was left prey to impulse, and was for the time insane. When @ man, under the influence of alcohol, beat his wife and children, or killed a brother, he acted not from reason, but from inn pulse.
 The temporary loss of reason from drinking alcohol, Dr. Parker said, was not the only effect. The brain lost it's tone. and the entire system of the man became tainted. He transmitted the taint to his children. The child of & drunkard would suffer, even if he should remain temperate, many of the physical diseases which resulted from the use of alcohol, and would transmit these dis eases to his children. Sometimes this taint took the form of an incurable rest lessness. Fifty per cent. of the idiots were children or grandchildren of drunk ards. Ill this city the effects of drunk enness were to be seen on every hand. Within ten years the number of hospitals, insane asylums and infirmaries had in- creased greatly in proportion to the number of inhabitants. The lower por- tions of the city were inhabited mainly by descendants of those persons who used alcoholic beverages freely. The better class of citizens had been driven further and further up town or across the East river, and there was constant advance of the grog-shop keepers and thelr customers into the fairest portions of the island. About $40, 900, ,OOO were spent each year for intoxicating liquors ln- this city, and during the past ten years the valuation of property in the city had decreased about $1OO, 900, GOO. It became time for intelligent citizens to consider whether some efforts should be made to stop the advance of the rum traffic, or whether the city should be gwen over entirely to drunkards and their descendants.
 Dr. Parker sad that at times it seemed to him as if nothing but the power of the Almighty could save this city from the dominion of alcohol. The rum power was like an army attacking the Christian citizens and driving them from point to point. In the upper portions of the city, along Broadway and some of the avenues, it's outposts were gilded palaces, fashioned so as to win the youth ot the better class. From these fash 1onable resorts to the slums of the lower wards there was 8 great variety of sa looms, differing from each other in the number of their attractions. The city was also like an emigrant ship crowded beyond its capacity with emigrants. A little portion of it, which was somewhat cleaner than the rest, might be called the cabin, but the odors of filth could not be kept even from that portion. Statis- tics showed that a great majority of the children who died in this city were the children of drunkards. The reports of the Board of Health proved that per- sons who were temperate could live as long in this city as in any other portion of the country. Manhattan Island was as healthy strip of land as could be found anywhere in the world, and if the rum power could be overthrown, the city would be both prosperous and healthy New York people had laughed at the Maine prohibitory law, but the effect of that law had proved its worth. While New York and Boston were falling be- hind in the valuation of their landed property, Portland was able to rise from it's ashes and increase in prosperity and wealth every year. The energies of New York were spent in caring for the diseased, idiotic and thieving children of alcohol.
 At the close of his address, Dr. Parker was asked by gentleman in the audi ence If he considered the use of light wine dangerous to health. He replied that he believed indulgence in any bev- craze that contained alcohol to be dan gerous to health. He said, however. that If beer and light wines were the only beverages in use, the evils now felt so sorely would be greatly lessened
 He Was All Alone.
 A Baltimore American correspondent