Milford chronicle., 1889-08-16

all my fingers cut off, would say, Bring the
Ratchet and cut them off now" have
dear friend in Philadelphia, whose nephew
came to him one day, and when he was ex-
horted about his evil habit, said, "Uncle,
can't give it up. If there stood a cannon,
and it was loaded, and glass of wine set on
themouth of that cannon, and knew that you
would fire it off just as ! came up and took
the glass, l would start, for l must have it"
Oh, it is a sad thing for a man to wake up in
this life and feel he is a captive. He says,
81 could have got rid Of this once, but !
can't now. might have lived an honorable
life and died Christian death; but there is
no hope FOR me now; there is no escape for
me. Dead, but not buried. am a walking
corpse. am an apparition Of what l once
was. am a Gagged immortal, beating against
the wires Of my cage in this direction and in
that direction; beating against the cage until
there is blood on the wires and blood upon
my soul, yet not able to get out. Destroyed
without remedyW
go further, and say that the inebriate suf-
fers from the loss Of his usefulness Do you
not recognize the fact that many Of those
who are now captives Of strong drink, onlv
little while ago were foremost in the churches
and in reformatory institutions Do you not
circlel Do you not know that they prayed in
public, and some of them carried around the
holy wine on sacramental daysf Oh, yes;
they stood in the very front rank, but they
gradually fell away. And now, what do you
suppose is the feeling of such a man as that,
when he thinks of his dishonored VOWS and
the dishonored sacrament; when he thinks Of
what he might have been and of what he is
nowl Do such men laugh and seem very
merryi Ali there is, down in the depths Of
their soul, very heavy weight Do not
wonder that they sometimes see strange
things and act very roughly in the house
hold. You would not blame them at all, if
you knew what they suffer Do not tell such
as that there is no future punishment. Do not
tell him there is no such place as hell He
knows there is. He is there nowl
THEIR HEALTH GOES TOO.
go on, and say that the inebriate suffers
from the loss Of physical health. The older
men in the congregation may remember that
some years ago DR.. Sewell went through this
country and electrified the people by his lee
lures, in which he showed the effects Of al
cohol on the human stomach. He had seven
or eight diagrams by which he showed the
devastation Of strong drink upon the physical
system. There were thousands of people that
turned back from that ulcerous sketch, swear
ing eternal abstinence from everything that
could intoxicate.
God only knows what the drunkard suffers
Pain files on every nerve and travels every
muscle, and gnaws every bone, and burns
with every flame, and stings with every
poison, and pulls at him with every torture.
What reptiles crawl over his creeping limbsi
What fiends stand by his midnight pillow
What groans tear his earl What horrors
SILVER through his soull Talk of the rack,
talk of the Inquisition, talk of the funeral
pyre, talk Of the crushing Juggernaut-he
feels them all at once. Have you ever been
in the ward of the hospital where these in
ebriates are dying, the stencil of their wounds
driving back the attendants, their voices
sounding through the nightl The keeper
comes up and says, "Hush, now, be still
Stop making all this noise" But it is effec-
tual only for a moment, for as soon as the
keeper is gone they begin again; sob, GOdl
Oh, Godl Helpl helpl Ruml Give me
ruml Helpl Take them Of mel Take them
off mel Oh, Godm And then they shrek,
and they rave, and they pluck out their hair
by handfuls, and bite their nails into the
quick, and then they groan, and they shrek,
and they blaspheme, and they ask the keepers
to kill them: "Stab ne Smother me-
Strange me. Take tho devils of men Oh,
it is no fancy sketch. That thing is going on
in hospitals, aye, it is going on in some of the
finest residences of every neighborhood on
this continent. It went on last night while
you slept, and tell you further that this is
going to be the death that some Of you will
die. l know it. l see it coming.
HIS HOME IS RUINED.
~. -
loss of his home. l do not care how much he
loves his wife and children if this passion
for strong drink has mastered him, he will
do the most outrageous things, and if he
could not get drink in any other way, he
would sell his family into eternal bondage
How many homes have been broken up in
that way, no one but God knows
Oh, is there anything that will so destroy
man for this life and damn him for the life
that is to comet l hate that strong drink
With all the concentrated energies of my
soul, hate it. Do you tell me that man
can be happy when he knows that he is break
ing his wife's heart and clothing his children
with rags2 Why, there are on the streets of
our cities today little children, bare footed,
uncombed and unkempt, want on every patch
of their faded dress and on every wrinkle of
their prematurely old countenances, who
would have been in churches today, and as
well clad as you are, but for the fact that
rum destroyed their parents and drove them
into the grave. Oh, rumi thou foe Of God,
thou despoiler Of homes, thou recruiting Off
Ger of the pit, 1 abhor theel
WORST OF ALL HIS SOUL IS LOST
But my subject takes a deeper tone, and
that is, that the inebriate suffers from the
loss Of the soul The Bible intimates that in
the future world, if we are unforgiven here,
our bad passions and appetites, unrestrained,
will so along with US and make our torment
there. So that ! suppose when an inebriate
wakes up in this lost world be will feel an
infinite thirst clawing on him. Now, down
in the world, although he may have been
very poor, he could beg or be could steal five
cents, with which to get that which would
slake his thirst for a little while; but in eter-
nifty, where is the rum to come froml Dives
could not get one drop Of water From what
ehalice of eternal fire will the hot lips Of the
drunkard drain his draughti No one 10
brew it No one to mix it. No one to pour
it. No one to fetch it. Millions of worlds
then for the dregs which the young man just
now slung on the sawdusted tiOOr Of the
restaurant Millions Of worlds nov TO-.
the rind thrown cut from III, punch
bowl Of an earthly banquet. Dives
cried for water The inebriate cries
Tor rum. Oh, the deep, exhausting, exas-
perating, everlasting thirst Of the dru ,kard
In HE'LL Why, if dend came up to arth
for some Internal work in a grog shop, and
should 80 back taking on its wing just one
drop Of that for which the ipebriate in the
lost world longs, what excitement it would
make there Put that one drop from off the
tends wing on the tip Of the tongue of the
destroyed inebriate, let the liquid brightness
just touch it, let the drop be very small if it
only have in IL the smack of alcoholic drink,
let that drop just touch the lost inebriate in
the lost world and he would spring to his feet
and cry: "That is rumi nhal that is rumW
and It would wake up the echoes Of the
damned: "Give me rumi Give me rumi Give
me rumr In the future world, do not be
lieve that it viii be the absence Of God that
will make the drunkard's sorrow; do not
believe that it will be the absence Of light; !