The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1890-06-28

TEMPERATE DRINKERS.
They Not Only Neglect the Good, Blu
Encourage the Evil.


Encourage the Evil. =
The obligation to complete abstineRs
from Intoxicating liquors rests upon twol
considerations. tho danger to ourselves
and the injury to others. X
The danger to ones self is apparent
The poisonous effect of alcohol upon
the human system, even when noder7
ately used, is now generally, by scien'
tific authorities, conceded. But tn
danger to the user would still remaiI
even if it were decided to be food rathr
than poison. In fact, the direct phyi-
cal effect of alcohol is its least alarl-
ing quality. The result that shodd
make every moderate drinker turn pie
with apprehension is the appetite which
it engenders. Every draught taken is,
without question, another step toIard
that abnormal condition in which dsire
has passed beyond control, and the
victim has become bond-slave tt the |
habit No medical testimony is NEEDED
as to this. 1t is matter of common
observation. There are, no oubt, |
among moderate users those who scape |
Some are saved $50 as by fire." others
maintain to the end the mastery 1 their
inclinations. But the number hat an
nually pass from the ranks of the
moderate consumer to those OF the
drunkard is notorious, and if the truth
were known, it is probable thai there Is
almost no one who, using intoxicating
liquor at all, does not pass beyond the
limit that his own conscience and rea-
son prescribe. Thus the risk that every
moderate drink er incurs is extremely
great. When the doctrine of chances
is candidly applied the odds he must
see to be against him, and the thought
of the fate that awaits him if his
chances fail, is enough to make him
tremble.
Now the immortality of moderate
drinking turns largely upon this ele-
ment of risk. No doubt it is often the
duty of men to incur risk. There are.
useful and praiseworthy callingo
which the risk to bodily health anu
sometimes to moral purity is constant
and often extreme. But needless expo
sure to danger shocks the moral sense.
The man who recklessly leaps from
Brooklyn bridge or drifts over Niagara
Falls in barrel commits crime, even
in the eye of the law. His body, his
life, is not his own in the sense that he
may wantonly throw it away. The risk
incurred is culpable in the degree in
which it is unnecessary. When the use
of opium to assuage great pain has en-
tailed the opium habit the victim is less
censurable than if, in thoughtless self
indulgence, he has become needlessly
slave. The sin of the moderate drink
er is, that for passing eradication he
is willing to imperil his body and his
soul. He can not plead necessity, for
the experience of the last seventy-fve
years incontestably proves that alcohol
as beverage is not necessary. Total
abstinence has passed beyond the stage
of experiment. Thousands of individ-
| uals and of families and not few whole
communities have lived happily and
| we'll without intoxicating drink. He
| can not plead that in his especial case
| the risk is not considerable. This no
man can say beforehand. The power of
| physical and moral resistance can never
be known until the experiment has been
JEltu, anu llO pOihS III VIC
| presence of what is now known as to
the nature and effects of alcohol can be
| justified in trying the experiment. 1t
| is but to cast himself from precipice
in the hope that God, or fate, will save.
| him. Such temerity is no less sin
now than in the temptation which Satan
| brought to Christ eighteen centuries
ago.
The other consideration that imposes
| involves the effect of ones example
upon his family, friends and acquaint-
ances, and his relations to the drink
evil as it exists in society at large.
Every moderate drinker not only i'm
perils his own safety but he throws the
weight of his example in the scale
against the safety of others. When
these others are known to be peculiarly
susceptible to temptation or are, in
any way, especially committed to mis-
guardianship, his responsibility is i'm
mensely increased. There is nothing
upon which the righteous indignation
of community more heavily and justly
| descends than upon mans teaching
vice-to children for example. The
most deadly charge against Socrates
that malice could invent was that he
corrupted the youth" No moderate
drinker is free from this sin against the
souls of his fellows. Even if he could
be upernaturally assured of his own
security, nothing can relieve him from
blood -guiltiness in the case of others.
The power of example is more obscure
and subtle than a physical cause, but
no less potent. If one could administer
some material poison to friend which
would unconsciously transform him in
to dipso-maniac such an act would be
NO more culpable than to lure him by
Eae seductiveness of personal example
) a drunkard's doom. The far-famed
Mexican tO!0achi or weed of madness. Q