The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1896-10-15
CURSE OF THE DRINK HAe.T.
To What the Largest Part of the Worlds
Poverty and Woe Is Directly Charge

forms, is the cause OF untold misery,
both to the wicked participants in it,
and to multitudes of innocent indirect
victims of it's ravages. But drunken
ness, while productive of a vast train
of other evils, is one of the most potent
promoters of RIGHTEOUSNESS, and hence
a large share of the guilt to be laid at
the door of the latter vice must be Just
ly charged to the former. 1t is, in a
word, not only a terrible sin in itself,
but it is the prolific parent of sin.
More than that, it is the cause of by
far the greater part of the misery, want
and suffering of the poor. No other
single vice-no combination of other
vices-is productive of so vast an
amount of poverty as this. We have
been reading, with much interest, an
article in the September number of the
North American Review by Rev r. F.
Clarke, S. j.. entitled "Neo-Malthusi-
anism." OF the special topic of the pa
per we do not now propose to speak. 1t
is an interesting and instructive discus
sion, from the economic as we'll as the
Christian point of view, of a subject
that is pressing, with increasing in
sistance, upon the attention of the
Christian sociologist. 1t is to his state
ments, which are those of a man of
large experience, concerning the part
that drunkenness plays in deepening
and perpetuating the poverty of the
poor that we now desire to call atten-
ton.
Speaking of the wretchedness which
the so-called Neo-Malthusians attribute
to the too rapid increase of population,
he says: Il believe the experience of
every one who lives or has lived among
the poor, whether it be Catholic priest
or Protestant clergyman, sister Of
charity or district visitor, charity or
ganization agent or brother of St. Vim
cent de Paul, will bear me out in my
conviction that nine-tenths, if not nine
ty-nine hundredths, of the actual desti-
tuition among the poor is to be traced
directly or indirectly, to habits of
drink. 1t is not, as general rule, the
drunkard himself who has to pay the
heaviest penalty, at least in this world,
for his intemperance. 1t is too often
the helpless wife and the neglected
children who have to bear the burden
of their fathers sin. There is scarcely
a city or town in the whole world
from which all abject poverty would
not practically disappear if the vice Of
drunkenness could be banished."
This is Mr.. Clarke's deliberate verdict
after a life spent for the most part in
London and other cities of England,
where the opportunities for observation
are certainly unsurpassed. He fur
Their expresses his belief that ''in all
our complex civilization there is work
for all who have willing hands and an
honestheart. This proposition" he goes
on to say, sis one that will perhaps be
disputed. We have heard a great deal
of late of the submerged tenth, and of
the starving crowds who would fain
work if there were work to do" This he
does not believe to be really the case. Il
am convinced" he declares, chat
even in London there is room
for everyone" The real cause
of the existing misery lies else
where than in overcoming. "a
family where there are number o. big
boys and girls can earn a collective in
come that would keep them not only in
comfort, but in luxury, if it were not
for the curse of drink. Anyone who
knows the inner life of Manchester. St.
Helens, Dundee, Glasgow and similar
towns, will tell you that there is plenty
of money going in all of them, and that
the poverty, hunger, dirt, disease, the
ragged children, overcrowded houses,
beggars in the street, paupers in the
workhouse are to be traced, not to
overpopulation, but (allowing for ex-
ceptional cases) almost invariably to
drink"
This is, of course, only thereiteration
of a truth which has long been knoy5n
nnd frequently commented upon by the
opponents of the saloon; but coming
from the pen of a Roman Catholic priest
who has had special opportunities to
study the question, his testimony, so
unqualified, so sweeping in it's scope,
has peculiar value. 1t draws back once
more the curtain from that dark pic
ture which the drink habit has paint
ed for our instruction and warning,
but whose terrible lines have become.so
familiar as hardly to shock our sensi-
bilities.
And if drunkenness is the parent of
such woeful ills, what shall be said of
the traffic without which it would
scarcely exist in civilized communities
Its Punishment from the earth would
not, indeed, sweep away sin. That can
only come with a regenerated human
ity. But the suppression of the liquor
traffic would so enormously lessen the
misery of the poor, to say nothing of
the blessing it would confer upon the
well-to-do-that this world would seem
well-nigh a paradise, were it once abol-
ished. In what way this blessed result
can be accomplished is a problem to
tax the wisdom of the wisest. The
most determined enemies of the saloon
are not agreed on this point. But that
every good man. whether a confessed
Christian or not, ought to labor and
pray for the overthrow OF so tremen-
dous an evil-praying always. and la
boring according to what seems to him
the SureSt and most DermaDeDt method