Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1878-01-30
Beginning OF the End.

One of the most cheering auguries OF Ell
fective work in the temperance cause is to
be found in the growing mutual charitable
ness of its different advocates. The cham
pions in the several departments of temper
ance work are fast learning to turn their
weapons upon the common enemy instead
of upon each other, as heretofore. 1t is
lesson which the movement has long waited
for its friends to learn, that whoever would
work effectively in the temperance cause
its nature comprehensive and varied While
each special phase of it fills useful place.
each as a specially is necessarily partial and
incomplete. Whoever would successfully
construct commanding tower must build
equally on all sides. The attempt to finish
one side only will surely fail, aud the struc-
ture topple over. So we have rejoiced to
learn that Murphy, the great champion of
the work in its moral aud religious aspects,
declares unqualifedly that it is the duty of
the Christian and the citizen to maintain
wholesome laws against the liquor traffic.
while Ex-Governor Dingley, of Maine, who
stands unninchiugly for the principle of pro-
hibition, says with equal plainness No
sensible friend of temperance proposes to
make prohibitory laws take the place of
moral agencies. All that is claimed for law
is that it supplements and strengthens moral
agencies, and fortifes aud holds the ground
that they have gained. The wise father UNI
derstands that virtuous thoughts and habits
are to be instilled into his son by moral
means, but he also understands that while
he thus strengthens his sons power to resist
temptation, he would be false to his trust if
he did not insist that the law should do its
best to put out OF the way brothes, gambling
places and dram-shops, aud thus diminish
the power of the temptations to be resisted"
This newly developed catholicity of spirit
and liberality of view is accompanied, as
we might naturally expect, with the most
cheering evidence that the good seed has at
last fallen in good soil For once, in the
long, dark history of intemperance, the peo-
Pile of this country are beginning to awake
to the enormous evils which the appetite for
maddening drink and the almost unrestricted
sale have brought upon the land. From
time immemorial, four-fifths, if not nine
tenths. of the murders that have shocked
each successive generation nineteen-twen.
tieths of the personal assaults that have not
ended in MURDER and about the same pro-
norton of other crimes, have heen directly
inspired by the rum that has been dealt out
at the places of public sale, generally in utter
violation of law. Almost the entire amount
of the paupelism AMI Wretchedless, and
by far the largest part of the taxes imposed
upon the community for the support of our
criminal courts, have been char,eable to the
same prolific cause. And yet our people
have gone Oh year after year, reading the
accounts of crime, supporting the thousands
of pauperS made such lay the illegal sale of
ardent spirits. paying the taxes imposed
upon them by the same traffic, aud scarcely
giving thought to the question whether
something should not be done to remove the
curse from society.
The people are beginning to awake. The
temperance reform has received new i'm
nulse, and in many parts of the country it is
evidently divine impulse. Never before
has there been such an extensive work
carried on in the recovery of the intemper-
ste and in the deliverance OF those who
we're i'll danger Of being swept away by the
coming tide. Never before has there been
.uch an extensive manifestation of the power
# divine grace in the thorough CONVEX
ion and the temporal and eternal salvation
If those who have been actual drunkards.
But it must br understood that no perma-
lent good in this direction can be accom-
'lished excepting 10y permanent work, by a
determined, persistent war upon the enemy.
such gigantic evil, which is entrenched in
the depraved appetites of men, and still more
irmly entrenched in the covetousness of
hose who are willing and anxious to make
money even by the destruction of their fel-
low-men, is not TO be overcome without Il
mighty struggle.
Let every citizen who has any love for
aw and order, any detestation of crime, any
compassion for the victims of crime, and re-
gard for the welfare and prosperity of so
iety, give the whole weight of his influence
10 the movement. aud the work is done.