The record-union., 1896-06-21
APPEAL FOR TEMPERANCE.
Sobriety the Only Hope Of Humanity
Happiness.
A Paper Read at the Epworth League
Convention by Mary J. Grim
of This City.

League, nelu IN THIS CITY d. lew udy .
since, Mary J. Grim of this city read
paper on Temperance" in which she
| said:
| OF the many great questions agitating
the hearts and minds of the people OF
to-day there is none in which so many
are interested as the subject of tenn
perance. For the saloon is a. public
enemy-the enemy of the home, the
school, the church and the State. 1t is
an unmixed and unmitigated evil,
| blighting everything it touches. In its
victim it poisons the blood, skaters the
nerves, darkens the intellect, sears the
conscience, paralyzes the will, mana
cles the man and consigns him, body
and soul, to unquenchable fire.
! In the home it brings idleness, hum
| ger, discord, contentious, cruelties, mis-
cries innumerable and unbearable, and
transforms this most sacred retreat into
hell on earth. 1t throws it's dark
shadow over the school, and the drunk
ards child, clad in rags, cringes and
covers with degrading shame-the in
nocent object of scorn and contempt
or seeks shelter in the more congenial
| schools of vice and crime in the slums
of the city.
| In the State it seiZes the sources of
political life and the channels of public
information, and by bribery and boy
cotting buys and browbeats it's way to
power. 1t obstructs wholesome legis-
lation, perverts the judiciary, paral-
Yves the executive and defeats the ends
of good government.
| 1t is everywhere the great power of
I ay- @f oil xr;1I a;x,;o he
mightiest revolt against God and right
| eousness, and the most diabolical as
sault upon Christian society Like
mailed warrior, it tramples under it's
feet helpless women and children, and
offers their quivering hearts a sacrifice
at the shrine of Mammon. 1t destroys
everything which a Christian people
hold sacred, and, polluting the COM
merce of the world, sends desolation
and death to the ends of the earth.
| Now, there certainly is some reason
why this great evil has gained such
stronghold in land where there are so
many Christian people, homes and
schools. Someone is to blame. Who is
lit? The saloon-keeper is not entirely to
blame. God knows he is bad enough,
but even he is as good as the saloon he
keeps, and the saloon is as good as the
law that allows it; and the law is just
as good as the men who made the law
and the men who made the law are just
good as the men who voted for them.
OF course each political party thinks
the other is to blame, but the real
trouble lies back of both the Demo-
cratic and Republican parties. Their
demagogism has brought US to the
brink of national disaster. But putting
out one set of demagogues and putting
in another set, and then reversing the
process two years later, is no sufficient
remedy. The trouble is not that there
is dearth Of brains and patriotism in
| the nation, but dearth of it in politics.
We sowed the seeds of slavery for a
hundred years, and fostered it, but at
last the reaping time came in the civil
war, when our fair land was drenched
in the innocent blood of true Americans
! thousands OF homes were made desc
late, and sad walls of widows and or
phans were heard all over our once
| happy country. The cursed license sys-
| tenn has been fostered and protected for
| many years by the votes of both saint
| and sinner alike. Ministers, deacons
| and church members have all voted for
whisky men and license parties until
sin seems ruling with high hand Not
withstanding it ruins annually thou
sands of homes, and drags down both
old and young to ruin, we continue to
vote for it and call ourselves a Christian
nation and temperance people!
| Satan trembles when he sees the
weakest saint upon his knees" but I
really think he must smile when he
hears temperance man pray. know
ing he will go to the polls and vote a.
whisky ticket.
| In looking over statistics we find that
there are $S0,00O,OOO paid out annually
for teachers to train the children of our
land for citizenship and society, but we
also pay 100000 saloon keepers more
than $1.000,0O0,00O annually. All the
silver coin and all the silver bullion in
the United States to-day only amounts
to about 5000, 600, 600.
The tariff question engrosses the at
tention of the nation from one end to the
other, and the President and Congress.
the press and the people. are wonder
| fully agitated over it, Yet the entire
revenue derived from the tariff is less
than $300,0O0,000 annually, while the
people spend every year more than one
billion dollars for liquor, and we hear
very little about that
Bishop Fitzgerald in his address be-
fore the Boston Conference two years
ago. in speaking of the prohibition ques-
tion, said: Something must be done.
as we'll as said, and the doing must be
/ consistent with the saying, otherwise
the saying will pass for naught. We
may declare license, high or low. to be
vicious in principle and powerless as a
remedy, but such declaration will avail
nothing If at the next election we vote
the ticket of a party that has in its plat
form license plank and on It's ticket
the names of men who are commit
ted to the license policy. The platform
having been adopted, and the men nomi-
mated by a convention composed in part
of liquor manufacturers, liquor sellers
and liquor drinkers, who shall first cast
a stone after having voted for men who
are pledged to sin by legalizing the V~af-
fic?"
The church is the friend Of man. the
conservator of public welfare, the home.
the school and the State. By its divine
charter it stands, and must forever
stand, immovably and uneompromis-
ingly for Righteousness. It's most sacred
| obligations compel it to proclaim war
| against the saloon. This it has done.
and is till doing through all of its
branches. The most terse, comprehen-
sive and emphatic expression concern
ing the iniquitous business that was
ever phrased, 1T can never be legalized
without sin,' was given by the Metho-
dist Episcopal Church to the world.
The Epworth League is one Of the