The Indianapolis journal., 1891-03-15

Strong and Growing Sentiment Against
the Use of Intoxicants.

the Use of Intoxicants.
Kansas City Times.
Every now and then a screed whose cen.
trail thought is based upon .'the alarming
growth of the liquor traffic" is issued from
somewhere. Gloomy pigments are used to
portray the drift of the Nation toward
drunkenness. The growing curse of rum"
has the usual changes rung along the gamut
to oratOry. 1t is well occasionally that the
rejecting man who reads and hears this
sort of thing should make inquiry of his
own experience and take cognizance OF
what he daily sees to learn how much OF
truth there Is in charges of this kind.
Such o one will soon learn from proofs he
may find on every side that in reality the
tendency of the times is toward an eminent
degree of temperance. The necessities of
an age in which competition Is so intense,
in which only the clearest brains and least
abused bodies can successfully struggle
with the severe conditions now confront
ing those who would rise above the plane
teach men of sagacity that either absti-
nence or moderation is the only possible
foundation of success. The great corpora
tions demand and enforce sobriety among
their employees With many railroads the
habit is discharge. The clerk in the larger
mercantile establishments who finds morn
ing drains and noontide nlps a necessity of
his self-indulgence bars effectually his
hopes Of promotion, even II he retain his
place.
The personal habits of public men Of two
generations ago were what to-day would
be deemed disgraceful, were such that If
adopted to-day by the younger leaders of
political thought would hopelessly wreck
their careers. The people as well as indi-
vidual employers insist that those who
serve them shall do so with unclouded in
tellects. A dozen years ago the newspaper
man whose capacity to carry unnumbered
drinks was doubtful thought himself un-
ornamen tai to Bohemia. To-day the require
ment of his advance-talent presupposed-
is how little rather than how much use he
finds for intoxicants.
The light still wines and beers are with
extraordinary speed supplanting in common
use more potent liquors. The sentiment is
growing among drinking men that it isdIs-
graceful TO take glass too much. 1t is
no longer lordly to become as drunk as
day awakens no admiration for his bibulous
powers.
Under the effectual restraint of high
license-and the higher it is, the more val
liable it's otfice-the saloon has in most
communities been made orderly. 1t has too
the main it is only the social dregs which
nowadays invite police attention because
of drunken disorder.
Young men are learning the everyday
commercial value of temperance. The
good fellow" man is he who stays at the
ladders foot, and his comrades profit by
that objeet-lesson. In no walk of life are
the higher paths open as they were, not so
very long ago. to the mau who drinks.
Business men, professional men look upon
an employees convivial habits as a menace
to themselves. What once found ready
excuse now suffers not even liberation.
That 10 the plain lesson of the times. And
that is the reason common sense Is every
day forwarding the cause of practical tenn
perance.