River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1888-04-19
History on Alcohol.

History is said to be the philosophy
| of life. This being so, we can reason
| ably expect TO draw temperance les.
sons from it. Let us then look into
| that wide field of history from the
| day of that horrible scene in the tent
of the patriarch down TO the events of
| to-day.
We see there that from the flood
down strong drink has been TO the
masses of mankind curse intolerable
| in its incidence and interminable in its
malignity. Even the most ancient
writer's have, like Igcretius, described
with horror anu indignation the
agonies, pains and crimes caused by
drunkenness, and some of the most
| ancient people, of which history gives
us any record, have like the Spartans
endeavored to repudiate its seductions.
To-day in support of our views we
can refer to books the most refined, to
authors the most able and fastidiously
delicate, nay even to eminent states
men, men the least welded to our
convictions.
For instance, read Mr.. Trevelyan's
chapter ION the Age of the Gout" IN
his life of Charles James Fox; read
HavelOck's marked contrast of the
siege of Glugree by an army without
drink and the siege of Lucknow by an
army with drink. Again, read the
thrilling history of the English mutiny
and see how drunkenness of the
English troops nearly cost TO England
tie total loss of the Indian Empire.
Recall how Washington at Trenton
entrapped those poor, reveling, blind
Hessians. Read KInglake s account of
the British soldiers in the CTimean
war, gentle IS women and brave as
lions until. and only until drink Came
To demoralizs and degrade them; read
the testimony OF many able generals,
that sober army is almost without
crime, then read of the effects pro-
duced by the introduction of gin
among the lower classes of Eng and in
1924, "A year, which on that account IS
branded in history as unapproachabie
in prolific calamity; read the testI.
nOny of Whltefield, that gin Was
making the English people what they
had never been before, cruel, pas
sionate and inhuman, and that these
cursed spirituous liquors, as he calls
them, had changed the very nature OF
the people; read the denunclatiOn of
that same gin act by the most eminent
statesman of his time, Lord Chester
field, as an act calculated for the
propagation of diseases and crimes,
depression of industry and the destruc-
ton of mankind.
IT thou art { poetical turn of
mind, turn thine eyes to Shakespeare
and read the forcible sentence, 20
thou invis. BILE spirit of mine, if there
is no other name thou art known by,
let us call thee devil; read Bishop
Hale's statement 200 years ago, that a
deluge of fire was needed to purge the
world from drunkenness; how 2OO
years ago the English Chief Justice
Sir Mathew Hale declared that four
crimes out of five were the issue d.
rectly OF indirectly of excessive drink
ing; study the lives and writings of
Burns, Lamb and Foe, or coming near
er TO our own time, read the denuncIa-
ton of liquor by men of letters, as
Ruskin, Morley, Carlyle ana Lord
Colerldge and almost every Judge IN
England, because he has learned 10y
daily experience as criminal judge.
that drink is almost synonymous with
crime. All along History lifts its
warning voice saying beware OF
strong drink.
Listen to sentence, that coming
as it did from the lips of w. E. Glad
stone, at that time premier OF England,
seut thrill of manifest commOtlon
through an assembly as unsusceptlble
of temperance sentiments as the House
of Commons. He said then and has
since retracted not one word, drink
has produced evils more deadly, be-
cause more continuous, than the great
historic scourges of war, famine and
pesLllence combined. This tremen-
dous sentence, 50 fatally true, SO aw-
fully descriptive, 30 complete lustlh-
cation of all we have done OF perhaps
reproof for having done so little, con-
talns three of the most pOrtentlous
words in the English language-war,
famine, pestilence. War, many "A gray
headed veteran knows from expert
ence, knows its agOnieS, its horrors,
It's crimes, its widowed homes, Its
orphaned children, its CHASTITY wounds,
Youths with their lives prematurely
cut off, brave men with their precious
life blood slowly throbbing from every
vein in the chilly moonlight on many
crimson turf. Famine We know; 1t
turns men into wild beasts and makes
even a mother cruel 10 the very infant
at her breast. Pestllence you have
read of, how it turns the inhabitants
of whole cities into poltroons, how
men fly from it in thousands panic
stricken, how it parallzes industry,
snatches the last consolation from the
living and halIowed grave from the
dead.
Now voters of River Falls is there
to be in our midst vice, that causes
evils more deadly because more con-
Linuous. than the three great historic
scourges of war, famine and pestllence
combined! Is the regnant sex stlll TO
continue cold and Indifferent, make
no manly effort to put an end to this
world wide cOntlagration! Are we
still TO continue to belle our very
manhood God forbid!
In time of war he is the nOblest who
saves the life of fellow soldier and
receives the civic crown; in time OF
famine the giver of ''three grains of
corn in time of pestilence he, who
| like King Humbert of Italy STANDS oe-
tween the living and the dead helping
| where help is needed.
P1essed is the peaee-maker;
blessed he who feedeth the hungry;
| Blessed he who healeth the sick;
hence thrice blessed the young ladies'
of River Falls, who have enough of
moral sand,' enthusiasm and cour-
aye to grapple with an evil more
deadly ia its effects, because more
continuous. than the three great his
toric scourges of war, famine and pes
| thence combined.