The Red Cloud chief., 1884-02-08
Beer.

Beers
We devote much space in this issueta
the statement of the best physicians and
surgeons of Toledo, as to the effect Of
beer upon the human system. The
statements are of all classes of ply
sicians. We have not selected those OF
known Temperance principles, but have
taken all. What they say of beer is NOT
colored by any feeling for or against
Temperance. Their statements are the
cold, bare experiences of men of science
who know whereof they speak.
1t should be borne in mind that To-
ledo is essentially a beer-drinking city.
The German population is very large.
there are five of the largest and most
extensive breweries in the country here,
and there is probably more beer drank
in proportion to the population than in
any city in the United States. The
practice of these physicians is therefore
largely among the beer-drinkers, and
they nave had abundant opportunities
to know exactly its bearing upon health
and disease. Every one of them bears
testimony to the fact that no man can
drink beer safely, that it is an injury to
any one who uses it, in any quantity,
and that its effect upon the general
health of the country has been eve
worse than that of whisky. We know
that it has been, for one reason if for nc
other. 1t has entered the field of drunk.
ard-making under false pretenses. II
was accepted by many men as a safe
substitute for whisky, and thousands
favored its use on that ground, forget
ting that it is an alcoholic beverage the
same as whisky, and that whoever uses
alcohol as a stimulant must have the
amount of alcohol that is necessary to
produce the effect desired, and, so far
as effect is concerned, it does not make
a particle of difference whether that
alcohol is in the form of beer. wine OF
whisky, because every drinking man
will take what alcohol he wants into his
system to produce the desired effect.
To reduce it to plain English. men
drink to get whatever degree of drunken
ness they desire. There is drunk in
beer the same as in any other liquor.
Beer is from eight to twelve per cent.
alcohol. If an odncs of alcohol is what
is required to produce the desired effect
upon a man, he may get it in four drinks
of whisky, while it would require a gal
Ion of beer to produce the same effect.
If he Graves the ounce of alcohol and
seeks for it in beer he Is going to drink
the gallon, thus not only getting the
same amount Of alcohol, but loading his
stomach with a gallon of fluid charged
with all sorts Of unhealthy principles.
Thousands upon thousands of confirmed
drunkards have been made by beer, be-
cause it has been held that it could be
INDUCED in safely.
There is no safety in alcohol. Wnen
a man says: "Oh 1 drink nothing-I
take a glass of beer now and them"
that man is fairly on the road. Better
for him the naked fact of the undisguised
whisky.
We specially call attention to another
fact. L~ife-insurance companies have
no sentiment. They are as coli-blooded
as banks. They do business upon strict
ly business principles. Their business is
one based purely upon experience from
which certain memorable rules have
been established. A l~ife-insurance com
pany WtU not insure the life of q con-
frmed beer-drinker. Why? Because it
is q certain fact, as certain as anything
can be, that the beer-drinker can not
Hue long enough to make insurance prof.
table to them. The "expectation" of
life in a beer-drinker is cut short by his
appetite. No i~fe-insurance company is
going to take a risk upon a body into
which is being poured every day the
seeds of disease, any more than a ma
rine-insurance company is going to take
a risk upon a rotten hulk. No life-in-
surance company is going to take q
risk upon a man who is inviting Bright's
disease of the kidneys, ~infammatory
rheumatism, congestion of the liver
and enlargement of the kidneys. all of
which are as certain to come to him
as he is to persevere in beer. And the
beer-drinker as a rule does persevere
till death stops his contributions to
brewers. These institutions dread beer
more than they do whisky, for its effect
upon the system is even worse. Anon
beer-drinker at forty is considered a
good risk-a beer-drinker at that age
can get no insurance at all. As we said
there is no sentiment in life-insurance
companies. They act entirely upon facts
which are the result of experience.
Their figures never lie.
One other fact we desire to call at
tention to, while we are about it. There
are degrees in beer. Much more beer
may be drank without death in Germa-
ny than in America, for one reason: In
Germany the brewers are under Gov
eminent control and here they are not.
Beer in Germany has to be made of
malt and hops only-here it may be
made of anything that the brewer
chooses. He may use any poison in it
that his cupidity suggests. There is a
very great percentage of them who
would use strychnine if it would lessen
the cost of beer.
Then, again, in Germany beer is kept
till it is sound. It is not exposed for
sale till it has undergone all its fer
mentations and is as harmless as n
alcoholic liquor can be. 1t is not so in
this country. The rate of interest
makes it an object to turn beer into
money as DON as possible, and there
fore beer made Monday is sold Satur-
day, with the yeast not yet half worked
of, and in a condition to undergo fer
mentatiOn in the stomach of the drink
er. The beer made and sold in this
country. were it pure, 10 altogether too
new for even the confirmed beer
drinker. 1t is bad enough at best-as