The Jasper weekly courier. [volume] (Jasper, Ind.) 1858-1922, 1901-08-02
w. c. U. COLUMN.
CONDUCTED BY MRS. n. L. HOBBS.
ALCOHOL FROM a PHYSICIANS
STANDPOINT.
\ Talk Given 10 Trinity Church, South
Bend, BY J. W. Milligan, N. D.

Continued from last week.
Every organ tells its story of al
coholism. Stomach, liver, kid
neys, heart and blood vessels, brain
and mt rves-five among the most
important organs of the body-all
diseased. Five chances OF death
where there should be not one.
What wcnder under the circun.
stances, no life insurance company
OF standing will accept as a good
risk the alcoholic. These are not
eleemosynary institutions; they re-
fuse because it does not pay, these
men must assume their own risks.
Bad as the result is for the indi.
vidual, there are hers that to my
mind are worse. There is an old
law, that "The soul that sinneth, it
shall die" This is perhaps not a
law OF love, go far as the individual
is concerned, but it is Of incalcula-
BILE benefit to the race, for it is ma
ture's method Of stamping out an
evil. Many will not believe this;
many will not see it. But he who
has come much in contact with the
defective classes knowsit to be true.
He who has investigated the social
problems of the day sees it. He
who has thought much along these
lines sees as plainly as though
blazoned across the arch Of heaven
in letters Of fire this old truth: ssBe
not deceived, God is not mocked;
for whatsoever man soweth that
shall he also reap."
Unfortunately the individual
alone does not reap the entire har-
vest. There are two or three gen.
erations besides who share it with
him. That was a wise man who
when asked, when should a child's
education begin? replied, Forty
years before it was born" No
finite man can trace all the intrica-
cies of heredity, or say whence are
derived all the threads Of character
that 60 to make us what we are.
But this much we can see: there is
no greater blessing can be bestowed
upon child than to come into the
world with sound normal hereditary
tendencies.
This boon is denied the children
OF alcoholics. Ii is among these
that so great number Of detectives
are found. The defect may be ey.
ident to all, as the child who is epi-
leptic, or imbecile. 1t may be less
evident to the casual observer, but
none the less visible to him who
looks closely; for investigation re-
veals among this class large num-
bers Of those who are uncertain, un-
stable, cratic, neurotic; without q
fixed purpose in life; without the
ability to maintain fixed purpose;
driven hither and thither, to and
fro, by the whin which for the mo-
ment is uppermost.
And if this burden OF hereditary
taint were not sufficient, it is in
creased rather than diminished too
frequently by the home training, at
the hands Of nervous mother, or
an irrascible father; and without
the special reference as to whether
the home surroundings are those Of
the brown-stone front or the tene-
ment district.
What then is the legacy OF alco.
hol TO posterity? 1t is this: A
greatly increased tendency to in.
of all kinds, q greatly
increased tendency towards insani-
y Of all kinds; a greatly increased
'endency to pauperism and crime
,f all kinds.
As . financial proposition this
loes not pay, and as q tax-payer I
protest. As tending to hinder the
development Of the race it does not
pay, and as a physi, clan l protest.
As degrading humanity and debas.
ng mankind il does not pay, and
- a man most emphatically pro-
est.
And Nebuchadnezxar beheld in
ais vision, until = force mightier
han the image arose and over
brew Il. So the advocates OF tenn.
'erance are striving by precept and
to inculcate these princi-
lies, to educate the people, to de-
elope a public sentiment that shall
. able at length, by the grace of
Tod, to overthrow the evils OF alc0-
Iol.-Phalanx.