Blue-grass blade., 1895-01-06

was born such. His immediate father
may not have been drunkard, but the
disposition may have skipped over" the
father in that case, as in other diseases
because drunkenness is adisease-or the
father may have overcome, by special
effort, the tendency to drunkenness in
him, but the drunkard is drunkard
from inherited prediction, and just as
the drunken ancestor who was the
author of his existence had no right 10
impose burden OH society by bringing
that drunkard into existence, so that
drunkard has not now right to damage
the public veal, or even greatly to jeop-
ondize the public welfare and happiness
by bringing into society those who from
almost prenatal necessity must prove
criminals.
Drunkenness is brimd ./dcic evidence
of one species Of insanity. In most in
stances the mind is so diseased in that
direction that the unfortunate is incapa-
BILE Of appreciating the argument against
drunkenness; or, If he does appreciate
this, his body is so diseased that he has
not the mental courage to resist the ami
NAL appetite for intoxicants.
IF am not drunkard, while I con-
gratulate myself and my children that
this is true, / am entitled to but little, II
any, credit for it.
am not drunkard simply because I
am not born with the appetite for liquor
that some others have, and because
am mentally so constituted that drunk
enness would not be an agreeable pastime
to me.
To use my brains in investigation and
discussion, and in opposing what con-
ceive to be errors in nv fellow men. is,
to me, greater entertainment than get
ting drunk would be, and, because
have not inherited any prediction to
drunkenness, simply and naturally in
cline to entertain myself by thinking
and reading and writing. because that is
most pleasant to ME, while man born
with the prediction to drunkenness
would just as naturally entertain himself
by getting drunk. OF course, from my
stand point the other man is in error,
while he looks at me in astonishment
that shS<ri take pleasure in my kind
of life, in ,ad Of living what he calls
his jolly ano .ollicking lite
We therefore naturally antagonize
each other. He says that have no right
u lHITluSc upOH HIS pCISoudi IiDSIty W
get drunk, and that his mind and body
belong to him, and that he therefore has
right to damage them If he desires to
do so,
make the square issue with him that
as we deprive insane men of their liber-
ty, and confine them in asylums, because
we have the right to defend ourselves
against the damage that insane men are
liable to do. so we have right forcibly to
refrain men from getting drunk, because
we have a right to defend ourselves
against the damage that drunken men
are liable to do; and as all laws are made
to promote the greatest good of the
greatest number, we of the majority
have the right to defend our progeny
from the progeny of the drunkard and
therefore we have the right to take
from the drunkard any right to bring
children into the world.
Let us then enact laws accordingly,
and the emasculation of half dozen
young men in Lexington who are hope
less drunkards, and who have no right
to entail their crime upon society by be-
getting children, would strike terror
into the whole State of Kentucky that
would so turn public sentiment against
our famous whisky making, as soon to
destroy it; consummation that must be
before our present low order of morals
can be improved.