The record-union., 1891-04-20
VALUE OF TEMPERANCE
common Sense is Every Day Forward
ing the Cause.


Every now and then a screed whose
central thought is based upon "the alarm-
ing growth of the liquor traffic. is issued
1rom somewhere. Gloomy pigments are
| used 10 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 occa-
slonally 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 one will soon learn from proofs
he may hnd on every side that in reality.
| the tendency of the times is toward an
eminent degree of temperance. The ne
cessItles of an age in which competition
| is so intense, in which only the cleareSt
brains and least abused bodies can sue
| cessfully struggle with the severe condi-
tlons now confronting those who would
rise above the plane, teach men of sagac-
| !ty that either abstinence or moderation
IS the only possible foundation OF success.
| Ihe great corporations demand and en-
1orce Sobrlety among their employees.
WIN many railroads the penalty of adj
dlctlon to the liquor-drinking habit is
discharge. The clerk in the larger mer-
camille establishments who finds morn
! Ing drams and noontime nips a necessity
OF his self-indulgence bars effectually his
hopes of promotion, even if he retain his
| place.
The personal habits of public men of
| two generations ago We're what to-day
would be deemed disgraceful; were such
| that If adopted to-day by the younger
| leaders of political thought would hope
| leSSly wreck their careers. The people as
well as individual employers insist that
those who serve them shall do so with
unclOuded intellects. a dozen years ago
the newspaper man whose capacity to
carry unnumbered drinks was doubtful
| thought himself unornamental to
| Bohemia. To-day the requirements 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 surplanting in COM
mon use more potent liquors. The senti-
ment IS growing among drinking men
much. 1t is no longer lordly to become
as drunk as a lord The ''three-bottle
| gentleman" to-day aWakens no admira-
ton for his bibulous powers.
| Under the effectual restraint of high
| icense-and the higher it is the more
valuable its office--the saloon has in most
communities been made orderly. 1t has
| too much at stake to encourage carousal.
In the main 1t 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-tellow'' man is he who stays at the
| ladders foot, and his comrades profit by
| that object lesson. In no walk Of life are
the higher paths open as they were, not
so very long ago, to the man who drinks.
! business men, professional men, look
upon an employees convivial habits as
menace to themselves. What once found
ready excuse now suffers not even tolera-
| ton.
| That is the plain lesson of the times.
| And that is the reason common sense is
every day forwarding the cause of practi-
| cal temperance.-RGn8dS City Times.