The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1888-08-03

Dye, to make the conscience slack;
Nothing vile do our casks lack-who'n buys
Home Visitor
WHAT lNTEMPERANCE DOES.
Drunkenness the Parent of likeness and
Poverty-The Losses 1t Causes to the
Workfng-Men.
Intemperance has been ruinous in
its consequences to National industry.
On careful investigation 1t will be
found that idleness and poverty have
been the uniform companions of free
indulgence in the use of intoxicating
liquors. Drunkenness is the parent of
ldleness, for no man can apply himself
to the business of his trade either
while he is drinking or when he is
drunk. Part of his time is spent in
loll1ty and part in weakness. When
he is with his companions he is too
gay to think of the consequences of
neglecting his employment, and when
he has overburdened his stomach with
liquor he is too feeble and too stupid
to follow it. Poverty is the offspring
of idleness, as idleness is of drunken
ness. The drunkard's work is little
and his expenses great. and, therefore,
he must see his family distressed and
his substance reduced to nothing.
(Johnson's Debates 1742-S.)
The injurious effects of intemperance
on industry was found by investiga-
ton to be extinction of disposition for
practicing any useful art or industri-
GUS occupation. Such, indeed, will be
found to be the universal tendency of
this vice. Those who indulge in strong
rink have little inclination or even
capacity for improvement. Selfish
ness and apathy predominant in the
character of the drunkard, and feel
ings of amendment, however frequent
ly they may arise, are quickly dissi-
pated in the love of sensual gratifica-
ton. Loss of time is another lament
able result of indulgence in intoxicat-
ing liquor.
1t is impossible to estimate the
amount and value of this lost time.
Time is the means by which labor can
be accomplished and money earned,
and lost time is therefore the loss of
labor and of wealth. A medical writer
in the Christian Observer has made
some calculations, by which he at
tempts to prove that the drinking of
one glass OF wine only in day is at
tended on an average with the loss of
one hour of time. If it were possible
to calculate the value of all the loss
of time thus occasioned, there is real
son to believe that it would amount to
a sum sufficient to prevent much if not
the whole of the poverty which at pres
ent exists in the land. Loss of labor
is a natural consequence of the vice of
intemperance. Wealth has been said
by an eminent writer to consist of all
that man desires as useful or delightful
to him. Labor is especially the prop
erty of the working-man. Every thing,
therefore, which Injuries this property
must very greatly impair the condition
OF the working classes. Intemperance
not only causes positive loss of time,
but induces physical debility and rem
ders it's victim unfit for active and con-
tinued exertion.
The loss of productive labor in every
department of occupation through in
temperance is equal to one day in six
throughout the Nation, or to five
million dollars out of every six that
are produced. This, however, ap-
pears to be a small portion only of the
actual loss which the Nation susta ms
from the use of Intoxicating liquors,
an amount which, from moderate
calculation, may be fairly estimated at
little short of two hundred and fifty
million dollars per annum.
Loss of capital is another result of
intemperance. Capital, or rather
money, is the proceeds or fruit of
labor. Labor was the first price, the
original purchase money which was
paid for all things. 1t was neither by
gold nor by silver, but by labor, that
all the wealth of the world was orig
inally purchased. Labor procures
wealth, but economy increases it.
Capital is that by which mankind lays
the foundation of additional wealth.
The use of intoxicating liquors, with
few exceptions, prevents the accumula
ton of capital.
To the poor man capital is in partic-
ular to be desired as means of ele-
waiting his condition in life. If the
drunkard has at times an inclination
to increase his worldly possessions, his
general improvidence deprives him of
those advantages which he would 9TH
erwise possess.
Loss of employment is a common eff
feet of Incorporate habits, and oper-
ates in various ways in producing pow
erty and distress. Oh, that working
men were wise; that they understood
their own best interests and would not
spend their money for that which is not
bread, and their labor for that which
satisfies not! How utterly insensible
is the creature who will work hard
from Monday morning till Satur-
day night and take those earnings,
needless of his family's wants, to satisfy
a saloon monster, who, like the devil
himself, feeds on the miseries of man.
kind! 1t is true that working-men do
not reap the just fruits of their toll.
Yet if all men would become sober
they would soon be in a position that
they would have the recompense for
their labor, for then they would COM