The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1907-08-25
IS AGAINST .
PROHIBITION
"Marse Henry" Tells of Men
Who Made Kentucky
Famous.

| Your Uncle "Marse'' Henry, as
might be expected, is against proh1-
bitiOn. In a speech which he deliv-
cred in Lexington, KY, at the opening
of the state fair there recently-no
less than a half dozen marked copies
of which have come to The Journals
editorial roonls-COlOnel Watterson
says:
Men of Old Kentucky.
| Il protest against that religion
which sands the sugar and waters
the milk before it goes to its prayers.
/ l protest against that morality which
poses as a saint in public to do as it
pleases in private. AS the old woman
said of the old mans swearing, II
there's anything l do hybominate, it
is hypocrisy In my opinion that
which threatens Kentucky are not
the gentlemanly vices of the race
course and the sideboard, but perfidy
and phariseeism in public and in pri-
Vate life
The men who made the Bluegrass
famous, who put the brand of glory
upon its women, dts horses, and its
vintage, were not ashamed to take a
! drink nor to lay wager, though they
paid their losses and understood
where to draw the line. They marked
| the distinction between moderation
and intemperance They did not
need to be told what honor is. They
/ believed, as l believe, that there is
| such thing as pretending to more
virtue than honest mortals can hope
to attain.
Warns Against the "Isms."
Il warn our people against the in
! trTsiOn of certain isnls' which de
scribe themselves as progress and
muster under the standards OF what
they call God and morality but
which, fifty years ago, went by very
| different name; isms' which take
their spirit from Cotton Mather, not
from Jesus Christ; isms' which,
where they cannot rule, would burn
at the stake; ismS' which embrace
the sum of adj fanatrcism and intOler-
ance, proposing that, instead of the
rich, red blood of Virginia, ice water
shall flow through the veins of the
people; 'iSmS' which, in one word,
would blot Kentucky out of the galaxy
OF stars and recreate her in the dread
image of Maine and Kansas.
L refuse to yield to these Hold
ing the ministry in reverence as
spiritual advisors, rejecting them as
| emissaries of temporal power, l do
not intend, il | can help it, to be COM
| PEELED to accept a rule of modern
clericaliSm, which, if it could have its
| bent and sway, would revive for us
the pTteSt-ridden systems of the
Middle Ages. | do not care to live
! In world tnat is too good to be
| genial; too aScetic to be honest; too
| proscriptive to be happy. 1 do not
| believe that men can De legislated
| into angelS-even reil-nosed angels.
! The blue laws" of New England
dead letters for the most part-slid
more harm to the people, while they
| lasted, than all other agencies united.
[ would leave them in the cold stor-
age to which the eeXcratiOn of some
and the neglect of all consigned them
long ago, not enbalm them and im-
| port them to Kentucky to poison the.
| meat and drink and character of the
| people.
Ever Ready to Make Merry.
Il shall have my home life, my pro-
fessfona1 career and my familiar as
| sociateS to say whether | do not
place, and have not always placed,
the integrity of man, the purity of
woman and the sanctity of religion
above all earthly things; but | hope
| never to grew too old to make merry
With my friends and forget for
! little that | am no longer one and
twenty! When the time arrives for
me to go to my account, | mean to
go shouting; to go with my flag fly
ing, and, as l never have lied to the
people of Kentucky, please God 1
| never shall
Il have told them a great many
unpalatable Things. | have met their
disapproval full in the face. l have
lived to see most of my admonitsons
against this, that and the other vain
hope Virn4cated by events. l want to
live yet a little longer still to TEN
the truth and shame the devil; but
If obScurlty and adversely and neg
lect shall Overtaf1e me it will be a
comfort even IN the valley of the
shadow of death that from first to
last l fought, not for the speckled
gospels of the Short-haired women
and the lengjhared mon Of Babylon,
but for the simple manhood and love
ly wonfanhood OF old Kentucky
never New Kentucky, but always and
forever Old Kentucky-your birth
right and mine"