St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1885-12-10
OLE Ga1edunian,
THE CURSE OF DRINK.

Canon Earrar, the distinguished En-
glishman, who has lately been receiv-
ed in this country with such marked
Respect, in one of his addresses before
his return uttered these remarkable
words
| do not know any body in the
world which is less susceptible to the
sudden passion for social reform than
the British house of commons. L had
the honor TO attend, not at all unfre-
quently, ut their debates, and it is of
all bodies perhaps the calmest and
least liable to be swept by any over
towering enthusiasm. Only twice l
Blink in my life have | seen anything
like the manifestation of thrill of
Emotion pass through that very i'm
passible body but on one of those Oc-
easiOns to which | allude L did see
manifestation of a thrill of emotion
bass through all those assembled MEM
bers, just as the summer breeze sweeps
the corn, when some four years ago,
Think it was on the 18th of March, Mr..
Gladstone, standing at the table of the
bOuse of commons in his position of
BRINE minister, made use of the re-
harkable words, that the evils wrought
by drink were more deadly because
more continuous than the three great
historic scOurges of war, famine and
pestilence combined. / heard those
words spoken; they made me shiver,
and do believe they made the very
coolest member of parliament present
who heard them, shiver. They were
not original they were not spoken for
the first time by Mr.. Gladstone they
were spoken for the first time by a
very eloquent and excellent man, Il
member of parliament, Charles Bux-
ton, who himself had been a brewer,
'and who therefore was able to give
ample testimony to the truth of what
he said. Still, Mr.. Gladstone accepted
4 fbem he quoted and endorsed them
4 With all the weight of his manifest
authority, of his high position, and of
4 lis vast knowledge of mankind. He
h Excepted and endorsed those words,
Ind he has never withdrawn them, and
h Mr.. Gladstone is not II total abstainer.
Many of us temperance refOrmers i'm
England think that he might have
lone more for us and made larger con
&HessiOns to us than he has done, and
Ne are not such great admirers of what
ne has done in the direction of tenn
sberance legislation but at any rate he
contributed to our cause magnificent
4 eervice in that strong sentence-a SEN
#kence so awfully true, so fatally de-
ssfriptive, and so ample a justification
4of everything which we have ever done
5of tried to do, nay, more, so shifting IL
zFhprOOf thatiwhat we have done or tried
- do has hitherto been so little.
| would ask you only to consider
what those words mean, if words mean
.any thing at all. Those who are older
a mOng you have had experience of
Jar, and know what it really means.
& on know it's horrors, its agOnies and
LIS crimes; you know of lives of youths
7brematurely cut short; you know of
men who are beloved and dear to
thousands, sObbing their life away un-
er the chill moonlight upon the Grim
sOn turf; You know of it's widowed |
homes and of its orphaned children.
And we know something too, recently,
in great tracts of Asia, of
what famine means ; we know how the
Spectre stalks among mankind. 1t al |
ters the nature of the very hearts of
8nhen, and makes the eye of the mother
zpitiless to her own babe upon her
Breast. We know from the record of
4bhis year what pestilence is. We
q know it changes the inhabitants of
eities into Il mass of poltrOOns who fly
panic stricken because of the dreadful
8plague. But here is n vice perfectly
preventable stalking among us, which
produces evils more deadly because
more continuous than war, famine and
pestilence combined and yet we are
so bold, so neutral, selfish, immoral,
s and quiescent as to make no serious or
united effort to grapple with that in
sOlerable curse. Why, in ancient days
ln times of war a man received IL civic
rOwn if he saved the life of citizen,
Ind in times of famine man was re-
5garded as benefactOr when he made
Il wO grains of corn grow where one has
GROWN before, and in days of plague
I've know of multitudes of men who
stood between the living and the dead.
Il f in times of war, blessed are the
peacemakers ; if in days If famine, it
Is a noble thing to feed the hungry;
hnd if in time of plague it is divine to
peal the sick, then surely we must be
SAt the last gasp of national honor we
must be in the final paralysis of ma
siOnaI selfishness if we can tolerate
lhe fact that this vice, producing evils
% deadly and so preventable, is to
talk among us.
CONCERNING GREETINGS.