, 1880-03-11
PUGET SOUND ARGUS.
TEMPERANCE EDUCATION.


arv is one of the ablest articles on
Temperance that we remember ever
having read. It's arguments are so
cogent and furcible that we copy the
article entire, aud trust that those OF
our readers who seldom peruse 4
temperance article will read this
caudjdly and fairly:
By vote OF the Board of Edu-
cation of the City Of New York on
the sixth Of November last, the Eu
sIish school book prepared by Ben
ianin Ward Richardson, called The
Temperance Lesson Book" was
adopted among the text books which
the city teachers are at Liberty to
use. "Scribner's" says:
1--WE hope there are good many
teachers in the city who are willing
to take up this book and teach it to
their classes, for there is no doubt
that boys go out into the dangers OF
the world lamentably ignorant of
those that await them among the
drinking shops. We are sorry thai,
this instruction must come iuto the
schools through special text books
though it is better that it came in
this way than net at all. 1t must
come at last, into all competent
schools, but when that point is
reached, it will come in books on
physiology and political economy, in
natural and perfectly Legitimate
way. A special text book on TEN
perancs may be we'll enough in the
absence OF the general books in
which the topic has its appropriate
place and space; but it is like text
book ON opium eating. In short, the
incompetence Of ths books on phys
iology and political, economy has
forced the friends of temperance
into the use of this make shift which
is surely great deal better than
nothing.
There is, probably, no'hallucina.
ton SO obstinate as that which attri.
butes to alcoholic drink certain
virtue 1t never possessed. After all
the influence OF the pulpit, and the
press, after all the warning exam
pes of drunkenness and consequent
destruction, after all the testimony
OF science and experience, there
hinges in the average mind an i'm.
preston that there is something good
in alcohol, even for the healthy man.
Boys and young men dc not shun
the wine cup as a-poisoner of blood
and thought, and the most dangerous
drug that they can possibly handle;
but they have an idea that the tenn.
perance man is fogy or foe to a
free social life, whose practices are
ascetic, and whose warnings are to
be laughed at and diSregarded.
Nov, in alcohol, in its various
forms, we have foe to the human
race so snbtle and SO powerful, that
it destroys human beings by the mil
lion, vitiates all the mental processes
OF those who indulge in it, degrades
morals, induces crime and pauperism
and crime in the superlative degree
when compared with all other causes,
corrupts the homes of millions and
makes hells of them, and wastes the
national resources more certainly and
surely than war, yet SO little have
the writer's upon physiology and po
litical economy regarded this Vital
and economical factor in human af.
fairs, that the friends of temperance
have been obliged to get up and
push special text book upon it..
Hereafter no text book on either
physiology or political economy
should be adopted in any school in
the country that does not competent.
ly treat of the alcohol question.
sit is cruel thing to send 4 boy
out Into the world untaupht thar nj.