The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1894-05-31
TEMPERANCE NOTES.
DRINK AND MORTALITY.
Tho Evil of Intemperance rs Viewed by
Life-Insurance Authority.

Tho Evil of Intemperance rs Viewed Dy
Life-Insurance Authority.
1t must be regarded, we think, as a
fact beyond dispute that intemperance
is one of the most prominent evils from
which this country suffers. 1t is cry
ing evil, in its individual as well as its
collective sense. socially as well as COM
| mercially; and, while no doubt the last
| decade has witnessed considerable i'm
| provement in this respect among the
population at large, and perhaps among
| the middle classes in particular, still
| the veriest optimist will hardly deny
| that much remains to be accomplished.
| Every influence which tends to help
forward the progress of so desirable a
reformation is therefore to be wei
| coined. The moralist may i'm
press his generation with the
Nervousness of intemperance as
an an offense against the happiness
of families. The social reformer
may show-and he will hardly expert
ence much difficulty in doing so-that
| this vice, beyond all other causes, fills
our jails and finds occupation for the
| hangsman. The economist may prove
to demonstration that expenditure on
| lntoXlcantS is mere waste, tending to
bankruptcy and ruin, and that if APP
| piled in more rational directions it
! would lead to comfort if not opulence,
| These, it must be confessed, are poterco1
If not unanswera BILE arguments, which
ought to carry conviction to all who
are not past praying for. Still, moth
ing is to the average man so precious
as the sometimes question: BILE boon of
| Life itself; and, if he can once be con-
WINGED that, as the inevitabl result of
habitual excess, his tenure of the ex-
| istence which he prizes will be consid-
erably curtailed, the argument will
appeal to his selfshness with an effect
which more generous considerations
will probably fail to produce.
Obviously the employment of an ar
| gument of this nature lies strictly
within the province of the actuary.
The physician may hold up a warning
finger and point TO the proba BILE effects
of intemperance upon this or that
vital organ. His patient will listen
| perhaps; but, while he thinks that the
doctor may be right, he is too apt to
conclude that the deductions of his ad-
wiser proceed from merely theoretical
premises. Nothing, however, is more
practical than figures; of all facts, they
are the most stubborn. If, therefore,
the experience, not of one, but of sew
eral assurance companies which keep
separate and distinct the results fol-
| lowing the insurance of temperate"
as compared with the average of gen
eral lives, is that the mortality
amongst the latter is largely in excess
of that amongst the former, we are
here provided with an argument which
appeals with unusual force to the
selfish instincts of humanity. To those
who have observed and studied the cir
! cumstances with an unbiased mind, it
! is no new revelation that such is the
| fact. The experience of the United
| Kingdom Temperance and General in
stitution has been strictly in accord
| with it-not as an occasional or isolat-
| ed occurrence, but as an unvarying law
( applying itself over a long series of
years, 1t is true that for years efforts
| have been made by some writers to
minimize the conclusions to which
these results point, on the ground that
the general section of this class of
life office is more or less visited by the
infusion of a proportion of excessive
drinkers; but, for our own part, we
I have never been ablento perceive that
the suggestion adequately or even APP
proXimately explains the enormous dis
proportion between the mortality
amongst temperate and that amongst
average lives. -Insurance Observer
| lEnpl