The Indianapolis journal., 1889-12-29
REAL TEMPERANCE WORK.

The body OF men and women VINO are
in real earnest to extend the beneficent
influences of the Christian religion, or
ganize. for the purpose, secure a pastor,
hold meetings, and anxiously and zeal
ously consult and work to convince the
community in which they live of the i'm
portance and the value of the faith
which they believe and the works which
they perform. The more intelligently
and zealously they work, the more self
denial they show, and the more fully
they can exemplify the value to the
human soul of the religion they believe
and cherish, the greater results will
they accomplish. In such work they
are following the teachings and the ex-
ample of their Master.
But suppose it should occur to small
body of inpatient Christians that this
way of establishing the kingdom of
Christ is slow and imperfect-thatw work.
ing upon the conscience, the intelligence
and the Judgment of the masses for years
has not accomplished what they desire.
They see more outside their churches
than inside, and jump at the conclusion
that these few are the only ones who
have felt the elevating and sustaining
influence of the gospel, and at once
decide to abandon the methods of Christ
and adopt one more effective and potent.
Accordingly they go to the State and
demand the passage of law which,
ignoring moral influences and spiritual
forces, shall compel men to accept their
religion and practice it. What would we
think of them9 What would be the out
come? We would think of them as we
now do of religious teachers in the dark
ages, who invoked the arm of the civil
and military power to enforce beliefs
which are matters of instruction and
judgment. A small minority would be
demanding force of the civil authorities
to compel the majority to be Christians.
Words cannot be found in which to ex-
press the absurdity of such a line of ac-
ton. Those who suggest it would be
secuted as idiots. Nevertheless, that is
not much different which class of al
legged temperance reformers insist upon.
They demand law, and nothing else.
They do not so much as stop to ask if
public sentiment is educated up to the
law they demand. They will not see
from experience that in this form of gov
ernment law cannot be enforced un-
less sustained by public opinion. They
reject all the methods which have re-
suited in the steady growth of senti-
ment in favor of temperance, and would
begin with law. Francis Murphy is a
blathersllite with them, and the con-
scientious person who would enroll the
names of children upon temperance
pledge is regarded as well-meaning
but trivial person. To them a temper
ance meeting is meeting to demand
prohibition by their own way, and to
hurl epithets at those who fail to agree
| with them.
Law is all important in its place, but
| it cannot teach morals or change the
views of one man or woman as to
| whether intemperance is, or is not, the
evil it is. The work for temperance
| which is vastly more important than all
| law is that which must be done in the
home, in the Sunday school, in the pub
lie school, and the community, by the
advocacy and example of good men and
women. Until this is done; until public
sentiment is arous ID to the evils of the
whisky traffic and the crime of drunk
ard-making, law to prohibit will be
worse than useless, because it will be
defied, and defiance to law leads to law
| lessness and anarchy