Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1898-07-25
w. C. T. u. COLUMN.
OUR WASTED RESOURCES.

| StrOUS anu lutollIS0uU OpiAiOho Soh
corning the great evil of intemper-
ance. We should feel that in no sense
can we afford to compromise with 1t
1t is right and proper for US to discus!
this topic in our devotional meeting
for we should make this subject {
matter of earnest thought and prayer
that we may not only have right
opinions but be always ready to speak
our sentiments.
| Our American nation is under &
worse slavery than that which caused
our last great war. To set free the
slaves of the South We gave million
lives and many millions of dollars
For the price of our slavery to strong
drink we sacrifice far larger number
of lives and more money, and desc
late more homes.
We are to consider at this time only
one side of this great subject-the
waste of intemperance-but we shall
find it enough for our space.
According to the best authorities,
we spend each year, as nation, for
intoxicating drinks the sum Of 81 900,
900, 600 We can have but little con-
ception of such sum, but an illus
tration may help US. What our coun-
try spends for drink each year would
buy 165, 100000 barrels of flour. If
placed in wagons, and each team
given ten barrels, the procession
would go two and half times around
the earth. If in one dollar bills it
would take 100 persons one year to
count them. Every ten years our
country's drink bill is more than the
total cost of the war of the rebellion,
and with it we could pay the whole of
our national debt in two years.
Wise political economists unite in
saying that the waste of intemper-
ance-
1. Causes bad trade. This is not
only true between nations and states,
but also in all the cities and villages
of the land where strong drink is sold.
By the lowest estimate given, the sa-
looms have an average business of
$4,000 each per year. If there are
twenty saloons in the town, every
merchant ought to know that 100000
go into the saloons which should go
into legitimate trade, and would but
for them. If there were no strong
drink, can we estimate the value Of
that 81, 900, 100000 added to the vol
ume of honest trade in our country?E
2. Prevents production, by with
drawing so much money and so many
men from the employments which
produce wealth. 1t is said in this
country there are 81, 800, 0O0,0 900 in the
wholesale and retail liquor business,
and that more than 100000 men are
in the work of making and
selling what can only harm the peo-
pie. This army of men and those de-
pendent on them are supported by
the real workers of the country, kept
in comfort that they may do more
harm. The saIoonkeeper is leech
upon the body polite. He is a pau
per. for he produces nothing for the
public good, adds nothing to the pub
lie wealth.
8. 1t is food destroyer. Brewers
and distillers destroy more than 3d.
900, 900 bushels of grain annually in
this country. We are told that that
amo unit would furnish 800 e-pound
loaves of bread to each family in the
United States. These loaves would
pave street 80 feet wide nearly
across the continent, and it would be
better to do that or throw them into
the Mississippi, than to turn the grain
into a curse. 1t is a sin to destroy
food, and no nation will prosper long
that favors such waste. I have
read that in the year of the great fam
inc in Ireland, when SO many died of
enough grain was distilled
in whisky on Irish soil to have saved
every life, and to have given all
enough to eat had it been made into
bread.
I have no space to speak of the
p auperism which is the sure compan-
ion of intemperance, or of the crimes
4 gainst our laws, of which it is said
30 per cent. can be traced to drunken
ness; or of how it impedes the pro-
gress of the gospel more than al
other influences. What a shame that |
a professedly Christian nation should
waste SO much money and time to
oraduce poverty, crime, degradation
and ruin.
How's This?