The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1916-09-16
DOMAIN Or TEMPERANCE
GREAT BRITAIN AND THE
LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

The Daily Chronicle, of London,
prints the following striking comment
upon the attitude of the average Eng
lishman toward the liquor traffic.
Arthur Nee is the author
A British government that was not
afraid of beer would be spectacle
indeed for gods and kaisers. A Brit
ish government that could conquer
beer would make consols jump for
joy, and Germans fly for their lives.
For it has been the unwritten law of
governments since most of us were
born that you must not touch this
thing.
You may take a mans house in
England now, you may take his mo-
tor car, or his workshop, or the bust
ness he has built up during fifty years,
or the money he has saved for his
old age; you may take away his lib
erty and his only son, but you must
not touch his beer. If you are the
government of the greatest empire on
the earth, if the fate of human liberty
is in your hand, and if pot of beer
stands in your path, you must not
kick it out. Let it be; it is the holy
thing of England.
And what is this thing before which
kings and governments bow down?
What has it done for US in these bit
ter days, in the days in which VIC
should have found the strength we
need SO sorely now?
If it is true, as it is, that in fifty
years we have thrown away an army
as great as we have under arms to-
day, it is beer that has consumed
quite half of it. 1t has cut down the
flower of our manhood less quickly,
but not less horribly, than German
shells are doing now 1t has bred
weak joints, weak muscles, weak
brains, and little stunted bodies with
feeble minds, where we should have
had men fit for soldiers and women
fit to make a soldiers home 1t has
chained our men in slums that are
not worth fighting for; it has put
milestone round the neck of industry
so that we have Jagged behind our
enemy; it has poured our wealth into
the gutter; it has written rejected
as unfit" against the names of half
a million men who were willing to
join our army now in France.
1t is only in England, in the land
the noblest men on earth would die
for, that this foul enemy of our race
can work it's will. If our ships are
wanted for the war, and we must go
short of something, we must sacri-
flee the books and papers that build
up our minds, we must sacrifice the
food that builds up our bodies, but
the poison of the national life must
come in. 1t does not seem to have
occurred to a single member of the
House of Commons to ask why we
should give up sugar and paper for
beer, when the tonnage of all is about
the same, and the things we give up
are helping England, and the thing
that comes in freely is helping our
foes. Mr.. McKenna breaches econ
omy, Lord Selborne urges us to grow
more food; but Mr.. Runciman i'm
perils the fruit of all our orchards, and
ing, by keeping out sugar to let in
beer The fruit must perish on the
trees, the child must even lose it's
sweets, but it's father may have the
beer that too often sends him home
to beat it.
1t is the English madness; it is the
mystery of the war. Even we in our
old age, when this traitor has perish
ed with all others, shall hardly be-
lieve it. Who outside an asylum can
believe this simple truth about the
power of beer in England-that, de-
pending on foreign sources for our
food we set aside as much land for
this result-that il the German navy
could blockade us our children would
hunger for bread in two months, but
our men could drink beer for a year
or forever?
Europe may reel, but beer is king.
1t beats us all. 1t has beaten the
King, Lord Kitchener, and Mr.. Lloyd
George. 1t has beaten the Board of
Trade, the War Office and the Ad-
it has beaten the church-SO
far as the church has dared to inter
fere with it. 1t has beaten science:
science, which is saving soldiers
life for every one we lose, is helpless
before beer. The brewers are having
the time of their lives; but beer lays
it's toll on our land, it hampers the
army and the navy, it robs us of our
food, it destroys our wealth, it weak
ems every arm that lifts itself to
strike the enemy; even Belgium, per
ishing for bread, can get beer, or bar
ley for beer, from England in our
British ships.
And so we must not wonder that
if we win we win but slowly; for We
have to win, you see, with the enemy
ON our backs, and it is hard.