Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1879-03-11
Intemperance.
BY REV. DR.. MUNSEY.


IfSatan by proclamation was to reas
semble the famous council of Pandemon.
ium, where all the thrones, principal
ties, and powers of hell met in conven-
ton, to commission and dispatch a
demon to earth, best qualified to arrest
the progress of civilization, to palsy the
arm Of philanthrophy, to retard the
wheels of the chariot of the Gospel oi
the Son of God, to blight the fearful
hopes ofthe fond mothers heart, to blast
with the mildew of death the aspirations
of youth, to turn widows and orphans
homeless and friendless out to die, and
to swell the population of their own
dreadful domain, they could not have
sent q more potent fiend to carry on and
consummate every item in this black
inventory, than the hideous monster
kTENIPERANCE. His successes have
met hell's most sanguine hopes. This
moment he has millions of our fellow
creatures chained to his burning car.
and with wheels rolling in blood and
tears, eiroumvolving upon their axes
like lightning down the slippery high
way of death, he is dragging them to
the drunkard's dreadful home.
In the beginning it SO quietly weaves
about its victims a web whose fibres are
so frail and yielding, it excites no alarm.
II become drunkard preposterous /
never take dram because love it, no
not T." Yet here the career of every
drunkard opens. The difficulty Is to
make men feel they are as liable to fall
as other men.
o, for some power the gift to gle us
To see ourselves as others see us"
But the net strengthens. With every
repeated dram the fibres lengthen and
link out, till before the man is aware of
it he is bound hand and foot in chains
of habit as inseverable as links ofada-
mant. The habit once formed the mind
becomes so besotted as actually to tax its
energies with the invention of argu
ments and apologies for the indulgence
of the appetite: my health is so feeble
my constitution needs stimulus-my
occupation exposes me to the inclem-
ency of the weather. necessarily lose
so much aleep-I am so liable to take
cold-the atmosphere is so damp and
the pavements and ground SO wet" As
remedy when sick, as preventative
when well, wet or dry, cold or hot, sad
or joyful, in every condition and circum-
stance in life, however inconsistent or
contradictory, he finds a reason for the
intoxi icating draught.
The inchoative steps of drunkenness
are found, in the illustrations before ad-
duced, in dram drinking. The first
the nature oflhe beverage, and the nature
of the man who takes it is the crisis of
the drunkard's life. The first little
dram is the first little breeze which Whit
fies over the plain, the fnrerulner plsy-
ing on the outposts of the simeon which
is following with the roar of a thousand
winged demons, lifting in it's poisonous
coils the burning sands Of Deaths Sa.
hara. The first dram is the easy path
way meandering awhile through flow
cry meadows and messy lanes, then
sinuously ascending the bleak mountain
of Intemperance, that Limbus land ly
ing on the confines of hell, overhanging
eternal horrors, pitchy darkness aud
fiery gorges, into which poor drunkards
stumble to rise no more. Yet thousands
are travelling this road. Look at the
vast host of merry tipplers, but COM
mencing their journey. Now, look
away to those dina mountain spurs and
dismal peaks, winding amid the black
and desolate rocks. till disappearing on
the other side they DESCEND rapidly to
the burning lake.
True, hundreds are reeling over pre-
cipitous Drinks, and are hurled down
awful slopes and vertical cliffs into gap
ing abysms through which fiery rivers
run and empty into the sulphurous lake
beyond. But the others regard it not,
but stupidity stagger along to a similar
fate. In this dread land the ravens of
hell build their nests and hatch their
hideeus progeny, and shave the murky
gloomy with their sombre wings, and
fill the drowsy air with their lugubrious
croakings. In this dread land, burning
serpents sired by the serpent of the still,
crawl, and hiss, and squirt their venom.
In this dread land, phantoms ride on
every breeze, and g0blins crouch on ev-
cry rock, and spectres dance on every
hill, and wan and dusky ghosts pursued
by Demons armed with blistering
scourges, and satyrs welding thongs of
forked flames, fit and scream till every
black plume in horrors crest stands
erect and quivering in the jarring air
frighted its every breath with their
shrieking woe.
Oh, this dread land is the land of in
temperance, of which Bacchus is the
vicegerent governor, and Satan is the
king-and the first dram is the wicket
gate. and dram-drinking the road to it.
Enter not the gate at the head of the
way-shun the first dram-make that
the rule of your life and you are safe
forever. The regular dram-drinkel
sooner or later becomes a drunkard.-
This is the rule-if he does not, it is the
exception. Touch it not, taste it not
handle it not, fly from it. Young man,
the glass you hold in your hand is the
chalice of death. In the name of God
in the name of heaven, in the name Of
your gray-haired mother and aged sire
for the sake of yourself, body, soul and
mind, lift it not to your lips nor drink
its accursed contents. The glass n youl
hand is the chalice of death-demons
laugh in every sparkling bead, and
dance i'll every drop. Oh, dash 1t doa0n
DASH IT DOWN!
This IS the only ground of safely
There is platform upon which the ene'
my never ventured citadel he never
attacked; an atmosphere whose healthy
breezes never waited the sickening
fumes of inebriation community new
er disgraced by a drunkard's swagger
or liquor vender's curse. Would know
where? 1t is the beautiful land of Tenn
perance, where the healthful balm tree
waves its living foliage, where the tree
Of life drops full and ripe the luscious
fruit OF Immortality. In that happy
land fountains limpid and pure as heav
en- are bursting up from every sequester
ed glen and mountain foot. Bright rlv