St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1899-06-03

pure and his life is pure. All the powers
| of earth and hell cannot take that Glib
raltar. If man is right. all the bonn
bardment of the world for 5. 10, 20, 40
years will only strengthen him in his
position. So that all you have to do is
to keep yourself right. Never mind the
world. Let it say what it will. 1t can
do you no damage. But as soon as it is
whispered: sHe drinks" and it can
be proved. he begins to go down. What
clerk can get position with such q
reputation? What store wants him?
What curch of God wants him for a
| for an executor? .-He drinks." /
stand before hundreds of young mem
and I say it not in flattery-splendid
young men who have their reputation
as their only capital. Your father gave
you a good education, or as good an
education as he could afford to give you.
He started you in city life. He could
| furnish you no means, but he has sur
rounded you with Christian influences
and a good memory of the past. Now,
| young man, under God you are with
your own right arm to achieve your
fortune, and as your reputation is your
only capital do not bring upon it sus-
picion by going in and out of liquor es-
adjustments or by an odor of your
breath or by any glare of your eve or
by any unnatural flush on your checks.
You lose your reputation and you lose
your capital.
Oh, my young friends, want to tell
you that there is point in inebriation
beyond which if a man go he cannot
stop! But sometimes man will be
more frank than that. A victim of
strong drink said to reformer: 1T is
impossible for me to stop. 1 realize it.
But if you should tell me couldn't have
a drink until tomorrow night unless /
had all my fingers cut off, would say:
Bring the hatchet and cut them off. "
had a very dear friend in Philadelphia
whose nephew came to him and was
talking about his trouble and confessed
it. He confessed he could not stop. My
friend said: "You must stop" He said:
Il can't stop. If there stood cannon.
and it was loaded, and there was
glass of wine on the mouth of the eau
non, and knew you would fire it off
If 1 approached, would start to get
that glass of wine. l must have it. l
can't get rid of this habit. can't get
away from it." Oh, it is awful for
man to wake up and feel that he is a
captive! 1 hear him soliloquizing. say
ing: II might have stopped three
months ago. but can't stop now. Dead,
but not buried; am walking corpse.
am an apparition of what I once was.
I am Gagged immortal and my soul
beats against the wires of my cage on
this side and beats against the wires of
my cage on the other side until there
is blood on the wires and blood on the
soul, but can't get out. Destroyed
without remedy"
Again, the man suffers from the loss
of usefulness. DO you know some Of the
men who have fallen into the ditch were
once in the front rank in churches and
in the front rank in reformatory insti
tutions? Do you know they once knelt
at the family altar and once carried
the chaliee Of the holy communion on
sacramental days? Do you know they
once stood in the pulpit and preached
the Gospel of the Son of God? We will
not forget the scene witnessed some
years ago in my Brooklyn church when
a man rose in the midst of the audi
ence, stepped into the aisle and walked
up and down. Everybody saw that he
was intoxicated. The ushers led him
out, and his poor wife took his hat and
overcoat and followed him to the door.
Who was he: He had once been q
mighty minister of the Gospel of Jesus
Christ in a sister denomination, had
often preached in this very city. What
slew him? Strong drink! Oh, what
must be the feeling of man who has
destroyed his capacity for usefulness.
DO not be angry with ties man. Do not
lose your patience with him. Do not
wonder if he says strange things and
gets irritated easily in the family. He
has the Pyrenees and the Andes and
the Alps on him. Do not try to per-
suade him that there is no future pun
ishment. DO not go ints any argument
Knows there is. He is there now!
But he suffers also in the loss of phys
ical health. The older people in this au-
dience can remember DIR. Sewell going
through this country electrifying great
audiences by demonstrating to them
the effect of strong drink upon the hui
man stomach. am told he had eight
or ten diagrams which he presented to
the people, showing the different stages
in the progress of the disease, and am
told tens of thousands of people turned
back from that ulcerous sketch and
swore eternal abstinence from all intox-
icants. God only knows what the
drunkard suffers. Pain files on every
nerve and travels every muscle and
gnaws on every bone and stings with
every poison and pulls with every tor
ture. What reptiles crawl over his shiv-
ering limbs! What specters stand by
his midnight pillows! What groans tear
the air. Talk of the rack. talk of the
funeral pyre. talk of the Juggernaut-l
he suffers all at once.
See the attendants stand back from
tnat ward IN the hospital where the in
ebriates are dying. They cannot stand
it. The keepers come through it and
say: Hush up, now! Stop making this |
noise! Be still! You are disturbing all
the other patients. Keep still now!"
Then the keepers pass on, and after |
they get past then the poor creatures
wiring their hands and say: 80 God! |
Help. help! Give me rum, give me
rum! 0 God! o God!" And they |
shrek and they blaspheme and they cry |
for help and then they ask the keepers
to slay them. saying: "Stab me. stran-
gle me, smother me! o God, Help,
help! Rum! Give me rum! O God! |
Help" They tear out their hair by the
handful. and they bite their nails into
the quick. This is no fancy picture. 1t
is transpiring in a hospital at this mo-
ment. 1t went on last night while you
slept. and, more than that, that is the
death some of you will die unless you
stop. see it coming. God help you to |
stop before you go so far that you can
not stop. 4