Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1880-03-03
The Viper In the First Glass.

One Of the latest contributions to the lit
erature of the bottle v hich have seen is
the following note, written last week, and
now lying before me
"My Dear Sir am sorry 10 inform Won that
have again fallen and am now held Mt jefferson
Police Court, Sixth Avenue and Tenth streets
Will You not, in Gods name, come and pay my
fine and deliver me Please come at once will
repay you. am sick and almost beside myself"
The author of the above distressing note
is young man of fine family, fine educa-
tion, and attractive manners He was for a
short time a student in theological semi
nary. Twelve hours before he was locked
up in d" Jefferson Police Prison as a street
drunkard he was at DR.. Buntings "Chris-
tian Home for 1nebriates, in Seventy-eighth
street. For several weeks he had been an
inmate OF that excellent institution. Know
ing how often the wretched youth had fallen
before, Dr. Bunting secured situation for
him TO keep him from the temptation of idle
ness. Before shutdown he had slipped away
from his new place of employment, and was
arrested for drunkenness in the open street.
And all this, too, in young man of gentle,
refined manners, not yet out of his twenties.
What are the lessons of this last text in
the ever-enlarging chapter Of damnation by
the dram Several lessons. The first one
is that when drunkard has reformed 3"
often, and fallen quite as often, he gets used
to falling. His will grows weaker every
time, like rope that has been broken re-
peatedly and is the worse for every mending.
Tie becomes hardened in conscience by every
blow given to conscience. His self.respect
has been wounded so often that he grows
reckless. lie has broken so many good
promises that he does not really believe him.
self when he signs the pledge for the fif-
tenth or twentieth time.
A second lesson from my fallen friends
case is that drunkenness becomes horrible
disease. 1t is as much a self-inhicted dis.
ease as consumption would be which was
brought on by sleeping on the wet ground.
This young man tells me that when the ap-
petite clutches hold of him he is powerless to
resist. lie is swept away like chip on the
rapids of Niagara. This utter impotence
makes him the more desperate. Bitterly
has he learned that Gods Word meaneth-
"Whoso committeth sin is the slave of SIM"
What miracle the grace of God may yet
work for my poor friend no one can predict !;
but up to this time no efforts, prayers or
promises have been of any avail. The de-
mon OF appetite still hurls him into the fires
and into the flood and when cast out he re-
turns again with seven other evil spirits,
and the last state of the man is worse than
the first
But there was time when my friend
A was sober boy, untainted with the
cup. When he let it alone he was safe. He
saw his father drink and began to tamper.
Ills first glass opened perdition to him.
Touching that first glass was like touching
victim of yellow fever; it was fatal. That
last dram which sent him into police cell
was but the last drop of his first drink.
Every day | see Gods truth written up in
more and more vivid lines of fire on the sky
-" Look not on the wine when it is red (;
for at last it biteth like an adder aud sting
eth like viper" Total abstinence is the
only gospel of salvation from the bottle
We have got to preach it from our pulpits,
and teach it to our Sunday-schools, and en-
force it in our homes-that the viper lies
coiled up in the first glaSs.-Dr T. L. Cuyler