The Monitor. [volume] (Woodstown, N.J.) 1884-1892, 1889-12-20

III

What 1t Meant.
Fifteen years ago a hand oftimid women
went out from The first Crusade prayer
meeting to visit the saloons, singing, "Gise
to the wind thy fears What has their
outgoing meant in the past? What will it
mean in the future?
1t meant a revolution in woman work
and in thousands of women's lives. The
echoes of that Crusade hymn have rung
around the world. and nowhere have they
left woman just as they found her.
Through all the long years that alcohol
had cursed her home, she had wept and
prayed in secret, but in the great congre-
CATION she had been dumb, silent as the
lotus. boated god of the Nile. The Cru
SADIE touched her lips with a coal from off
Gods altar, and melted the seal of Gen.
turtles. Were all other signs wanting to
prove this the work of God, the unsealing
of woman's speech. and enduing it with
such power, would be sufficient. Sitting
III our National Convention, and listening
to the telling words which poured forth,
not from one pair of lips alone, but from
scores, thinking of hundreds Of others
that carry Gods temperance evangel with
convincing power, remembering that fiji
teen years ago not enc pair of them in
twenty had ever uttered even a prayer in
the hearing of any but the Heavenly
Father, this gift of tongues seems akin to
that at Pentecost.
The lives of thousands of women have
been transformed and elevated. There has
come into them the realization of the duty
we owe to every human being weaker.
wickeder, more tempted than ourselves.
Realizing this, time becomes too precious
to be frittered away in gossip, or crochet,
or aimless pleasure. Hence hundreds who
fifteen years ago were but butterflies, or
drudges, today have met on a higher plane,
and together are proving themselves worthy
to be daughters of the King, by doing
His work in His way.
The Crusade has meant a revolution in
temperance work. Before, it was mainly
4 work of reformation; now it has become
largely a work of formation and of pre-
v%ention. So soon as women were called
to the leadership, the mother-heart assert
ed itself in its care for the children. 1t
did not take this crystalized mother-loye
long to recognize the fact that the streams
which keep full the awful river of drunk
eaness start in the home, and recognizing
this, determine to shut off the supply.
Some results of this work are seen in the
two hundred and three Thousand children
marshalled under the banner of the Loyal
Temperance Legion, marching on to vic
tory sounding the battle cry, ''Tremble,
King Alcohol, we shall grow upn' in as
many more taught in home and Sunday
school to preserve the body pure because
it is the temple Of the living God, and in
twelve millions of children in public
schools who are being taught the truth
about alcoholics and tobacco, in accord
ance with state law.
The Crusade has meant the conservation
of thirty thousand young lives 10 the ser
vice of God ard humanity in the Y. w.
~ NO ~ ~ hob III up
to Gods ideal of daughters, as corner
stones, polished after the similitude of a
palace" And by their side stand thous-
ands of their brothers, each fighting evil
with 1.-THE strength OF ten, because his
heart is pure" 1t has meant matrons in
scores of prisons, proving that no matter
how low a woman has fallen, the w. G..
T. L. recognizes her as a sister and
stretches out sisterly hands to lift her up.
1t has meant that thousands of foreign
ers flocking to our shores, have had
brought to them the gospel of temperance
in the tongue to which they were born;
that sailors the round world over have
heard the same message; that our coun-
try's defenders nave been enlisted by regi-
ments into veteran service against our
country strongest foe; that the men who
peril their lives for us on the m%ultitudin-
GUS lines of railway, nave been made to
feel that We appreciate their service, and
seek to repay it by guarding them against
a danger more fearful than colliding
trains.
1t has meant a campaign for the obsery-
ance of the Sabbath in which ii, 000, 900
volunteers are enrolled; that TIE olive
branch of peace and arbitration has this
year put forth half a million leaves for the
healing of the nations differences, and
that the question Of the relation of CAPT
tai to labor is being studied as never be-
fore, from a Christian and a temperance
standpoint.
1t has meant the rearing Of a Woman's
Temperance Publication Association,
which in one year sent out over 125, DOC, 900
ing through 90, 900 papers hich otherwise
would carry no temperance teaching into