The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1885-12-23

How happy we can be.
I wish O merry Christmas
To every child and man,
Indeed, to every woman, too,
Who practices our plan.
In such a godly warfare
Right onward let us steer;
So l wish you a merry Christmas
And a happy coming year.
Rev. W. E. Churchill, in Temperance
Banner.
Why Canon Farrar became q Rotal
Abstainer.
Canon Far7ar, in aspeech made BY him
at the recent reception given in his
honor in New York city by the National
Temperance society and the Church
Temperance society, said:
"About ten years ago or more l hrst
became a total absta;ner because l was
easily convinced that the use of alcohol
was not a necessity, and a great deal
turns upon that. I saw, for instance,
that whole nations had not only lived
without it, but had fourished without
it. I believe that the human race had
existed and had fourished a considera'
BILE time before it was discovered. l
saw the remarkable fact that there were
sope twenty thousand persons in Eng
land, and that though many of them
had made themselves mere tunnels Tor
drink; though they had been accustomed
TO drink from their childhood; though
most of them had been brought to
prison, either directly or indirectly,
through drink, yet the very day that
they entered the gates of the prison all
drink was entirely taken from them' and
vet there was not a single instance on
record in which any one Of them had
suffered in consequence. On the con-
trary. men who have entered the prisons
sickly and blighted, have been made
compulsorily sober by an act OF parlla'
ment, after a few months left prison
hale and strong and hearty; and women
who had been put into prison perfectly
horrible and hideous in their loathsome-
ness and degradation, after a short
period of deprivation from the source OF
their ruin left prison with the bloom o.
health and almost of beauty.
"Then. again, I saw in the carefully
prepared statistics of insurance societies
that total abstinence, as an indisputaole
fact, contributes to longevity. Then l
saw that, so far from alcohol being a
necessity for great feats of strength,
many of the greatest athletes in the
world. from Samson downward, whose
drink was only the crystal brook, had
achieved without alcohol feats far more
mighty that they could possibly have
achieved with it; and, as far as intellec-
tual exertions arc concerned, great
writer's, though they have not always said
with Pindar that water is best, have yet
! constantly drawn from temperance far
better inspiration than they could pos
sibly have produced chemically from the
fumes of wine. Then I found that q
great number of gu most eminent ply
sicians had declared most positively that
in hundreds and thousands of cases alco-
hol was the prolific source of disease,
even those who took it in quantities con-
v~entionally deemed moderate; and, on
the other hand, that other physicians
who were opposed to total abstinence as
q general rule still confessed that the
! young and the healthy, all who eat we'll
and all who sleep we'll, can do without
it and are better without it.
Gail these proofs and many Others
convinced me very speedily that it was
not necessary for me to continue to touch
any form OF alcohol; and 1 gave it up
the more readily because I balieve that
the abandonment of it was one element
in that very needful simpliication of life
which gets rid of all artificial wants and
which is peculiarly desirable in an age OF
luxury like this"
roo5 gr,,:o.. ~ A Io,Io,~