West Virginia freeman. (Parkersburg, W. Va.) 1881-1886, 1885-02-04
TEMPERANCE LECTURE.
By Abraham Lincoln.

The following are extracts from
a speech delivered by Abraham
Lincoln over forty years ago, before
the Washington Society at Spring
field, H.:
"Although the temperance cause
has been in progress many years,
it is apparent to all that it is just
now being crowned with a degree
of success hitherto unparalleled.
"The list of friends is daily swell
ed by the addition of fifties, OF hun
dreds, and of thousands. The
cause itself seems suddenly trans
formed from cold, abstract theory
to living, breathing active, and
powerful chieftain, going forth
'conquering and to conquer The
citadels OF this great adversary are
daily being stormed and dismant-
led his temples and his affairs,
where the rites of idolatrous wor-
ship have long been performed, and
where human sacrifice has long
ben wont to be made, are daily des-
ecrated and deserted. What one
of us but can call to mind some re-
lative, more promising in youth
than all his fellows, who has fallen
sacrifice to his capacity? He
ever seems to have gone forth like
the Egyptian angel of death, com
missioned to slay if not the first
the fairest born of every family.
Shall he now be arrested in his de-
solating career? Of our political
revolution of '76 we are Justly
proud. 1t has given US degree of
political freedom far exceeding
that of any other nation of tne
earth. In it the world has found
a solution of the long-mooted prob
lem as to the capability of man to
govern himself. In it was the germ
which was vegetated, and still is to
grow and expand into the univer
sal liberty of mankind.
"But with all these glorious re-
suits, past, present and to come. it
has its evils too. 1t breal he'd forth
famine, swan in bloc J, and rode in
fire; and long, long after, the Or
phan's cry and the widows wall
continued to break the sad silence
that ensued These were the price,
the inevitable price, paid for the
blessings it brought.
Turn now to the temperance
revolution. In it we shall find a
stron ger bondage broken, a viler
slavery manumitted, greater ty-
rant dethroned, in it, more of want
supplied, more disease healed, more
sorrow assuaged. By it, none
wounded in feeling, none wounded
in earnest, even the dram maker
and dram-selier will have glided
into other occupations so gradually
as never to have felt the change,
and will stand ready to join all
others in the universal song of
gladness. And what noble ally
this to the cause of political free
dom! With such an aid, is march
cannot fail to be on, till every son
of earth shall drink in rich fruition
the sorrow quenching draughts Of
perfect liberty. Happy day, when
all appetites controlled, all passion
subdued, all matter subjected,
mind, all-conquering mind, shall
live and move the NOR arch of the
world. Glorious consummation
Hail, fall of fury! Reign of rea-
son, all hail!
"And when victory shall be COM
plete-when there shall be neither
a slave nor a drunkard on the
earth-how proud the title of that
land which may truly claim to be
the birthplace and the cradle of
both those revolutions that shall
have ended in that victory! How
nobly distinguished that people
who shall have planted and nurtur-
ed to maturity both the political
and moral freedom of their species