Fayette County herald. [volume] (Washington [Washington Court House], Fayette County, O. [Ohio]) 1860-1???, 1879-01-30
Extracts from Rev. Joseph Cooks
Lecture.

! ~ " GAkC GlCGb IlAaI HIS AielJAb OA
ing all the members ef his church work
is occasionally distasteful to individuals
among them. Not long ago rich gen
tleman called upon Mr.. Tying in his study
and told this valiant servant of reform
that he-wished to pay his church dues and
to have good pew, but that he did not
care TO be put down on any committee,
and that he was especially averse to hav-
ing his wife and daughters sent into the
slums to visit the poor and degraded
eyes, said Mr.. Tying, ''I see what you
want, but you have come to the wrong
| place. just around the corner is what
you are looking for. There is the Church
of the Heavenly Rest Laughter. As
the slow, fateful experiment of democra-
cy unrolls in the world, it becomes more
and more evident that the friends of free
institutions can not safely become mem
bers of the Church of Heavenly Rest on
| the topic of temperance. 1t is "a cheerful
sign of the times that nearly all large
temperance efforts in America have of
late voluntarily put themselves into full
| sympathy with aggressive Christianity.
MI. Reynolds, Mr.. Murphy, and especially
the woman movement, :are in substantial
accord with the heart of the churches.
l. So far as drunkenness is a vice it is
to be reformed, and the treatment of it
belongs to the Church.
2. So far as drunkenness is disease it
is to be cured, and the treatment of it be-
longs to the physicians.
8. But the theory that all or most of
habitual drunkenness is a disease is not
supported by the best physiological au-
thorities, however loudly it may have
been endorsed by the prOprietors of in
ebriate asylums.
The theory that drunkenness is oftener
disease than vice is going out of fash
ion among experts. DR.. Bucknill, re-
Gently a foremost visitor of lunatics in
Great Britain, and fellow of the Royal
College of Physicians, has lately made a
vehement attack on that theory. Eight
or ten years ago inebriate asylums in
the United States were held up as models
to Great Britain. Mr.. Dalrymple of Par
lament took American testimony, which
was supposed to prove that "a per cent.
of the patients treated in our inebriate
/ WSIO LIZ ouChlll14 SdUlC
| testhis county in 1875, when the wave of
poptFlar excitement concerning inebriate
asylums had subsided to large extent,
and his book is intended to discredit the
theory that habitual drunkenness is usu-
ally a disease. The attack is from the
highest authority. This volume, from a
great specialist in nervous disease, is a
vigorous proclamation of the theory that
habitua1 drunkenness in most cases is a
vice to be reformed by moral measures,
rather than disease to be cured. DIR.
Bucknill thinks that practical Christiani-
ty is the best remedy for habitual drunk
enness. "A voice, Amen and applause. ]
The Binghamton Inebriate Asylum, at
one time quite prominent figure in the
public eye, was not long ago put on trial
for year and told to its face by the Ny.
Legislature that unless it managed its af-
fairs better it would be suspended at the
end of that period of probation. Penn
sylvania found her inebriate asylum at
Media so badly managed that she abol-
ished it. At Wards Island, near New
York, there was lately abolished an in
ebriate asylum, at which a prominent
physician from the City Hospital, accord
ing to DIR. Bucknill's testimony, once
found five patients able to offer him a
choice of spirits in their own rooms. The
asylum was on an island, but the boat
men from New York understood signals
from the windows. At Binghamton liq-
uor could be obtained by half hours
walk in almost any direction.
| - - I0oE, Il
drunkenness, however, our best experts
tell us, are vice and not disease. If all
) vehement craving for drink is disease,
then a keg of firewater may convert 9
group of savages into madmen before
they have tasted it. The power of the
pledge shows that in most cases drunken
ness is vice and not a disease. DR.. Buck
mill tells the story of an eccentric at Rug
by who promised the school physician
that he would not touch drink for year
although he had been what is called
confirmed drunkard. His case had beef
supposed to be one of disease, but he KEEP
: his pledge and won q wager from tn
physician. At II O'Clock, on the endin!
of the year, he began to drink again, ant
. never ceased till he died.
Very surly is the deep tone of recen
science concerning what is called moder
ate drinking. DR.. Bucknill writes:
s'Of late years the upper class of Eng
lish has become sober, and its CROWN;
;, opinion stamps drunkenness more ant
! more as a disgrace; and that some smal
proportion of its members are left benin
: in the shameful indulgence of the oil
: vice is certainly not a matter of nationa
: concern. But they will ruin themselves
No doubt, and why should they not P
Their possessions will be better placedi i
sober hands, and their undeserved socis
position will be yielded to the advance {
more worthy candidates. But they wi
kill themselves! And this also is NOR
likely than lamentable, especially if the
leave no offspring TO inherit the curse {
)r their qualities. 1t would be nationa
e nay u worldwide blessing, if alcohol wei
" really the active poison which it is so o
re ten represented to be, that men who il
to dulge in it might die off quickly. tt
ii French have somewhat improved upc
r. pure spirits in this direction by the invel
Sy ton of absinthe, which causes epileps
ii and the Americans, with their vile cor
as pounds of raw whisky taken into emp
n stomachs, are far ahead of ourselves. A
ut American drunkard who sticks to h
in work has much better prospect of fl
n ishing it within a reasonably short tin
he than the Englishman."
he Sixty years ago Lyman Beecher atten
ed an ordination at which $40 worth
. LIQUORS were drank by New England mi
70, isters. To-day Mrs. Hayes-whom m
's' God bless !--expels intoxicating beverag
u from the Presidential manson.
w. 4. So far as drunkenness as Il vice lea
me