The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1918-06-15
DOMAIN OF TEMPERANCE
SOME HISTORY.

During Lincoln's time it was Gus
tomary for merchants and. for bust
ness men to keep jugs of whiskey in
their places of business Clergymen
kept it in their houses. Many of them
took a drink before going into the
pulpit to fill them with the right
spirit
1t was customary to drink whiskey
at weddings and ON all sorts of occa-
sions. At that time alcohol was gen.
orally used among physicians as a
valuable, medicine, In fact, it was
very widely used remedy.
1t was not, until 1920 that the first
temperance society on record in
America was formed lin Massachu-
sets, and this was their pledge:
We, the undersigned, recognizing
the evils of drunkenness andresolved
to check its alarming increase, with
consequent poverty, misery, and
crime among our people, hereby SOL
emnly pledge ourselves that We will
not get drunk more than four times
year, viz,
Fourth of July, Muster Day, Christ
mas Day, and Sheep Shearing."
1--WE have come far since then and
done much to check the excessive use
oil alcohol and make drunkenness bad
FORM !" says writer, "but it was only
within the last few decades that we
began to seriously question the wis
dom of the daily use of alcohol, even
in the mildest form and in strictest
moderation
Experiments have proved that men
cannot do SO much work under the
stimulus of alcohol, although they
often think they are doing more.
Alcohol increases the flow of gastric
juices. 1t benumbs and half paralyzes
the nerves which surround the blood
vessels and the brain, thus causing
certain congestion which deceives the
victim into thinking that his mental
power is increased when it is really
diminished.
Those who use alcoholic drinks,
eten in moderation, jeopardize their
health and their life, and hazard their
| success.
When even moderate drinkers are
afflicted with pneumonia their tenn
perature runs very high, and they
often die after only two or three days
of illness, because their disease-resist-
ing power has been so undermined
the cell life SO deteriorated by alcohol
The red blood corpuscles have been
SO weakened by the alcohol that they
are not able to give sufficient sustain
ing, resisting power to carry them
through the crisis. The fever quickly
burns up their little vitality.
| Abstainers have a much stronger
grip on life. 1t has not been SO many
years since some of the life insurance
companies considered a moderate
drinker better risk than total alb
1 stainer A man once protested
against paying more than was charg-
| ed to moderate drinkers, and this pro-
| test led to the forming of an insur-
ance company on another basis, which
| is now the universal standard.
| A test of policyholders showed that
there were seventy-nine deaths out of
a hundred abstainers, and ninety-four
1 per cent among drinkers.
i Every habitual user of ale is likely
to have fatty degeneration, the sub.
stitution of fat and abnormal tissues
| in the blood vessels, the heart, and
in the nervous system, as well as in
other tissues.
i When people become ill, how quick.
i ly they give up alcohol and tobacco,
the whole system revolts against it.
That is Natures open protest.
twenty-five per cent of insanity
and seyenty-fiye or eighty per cent
of the crime in England is due to al
coholic drinks, and we know that a
great part of pauperism is due to this
arch enemy of the race.
In America we use about twenty
two or twenty-three gallons of alco-
holic drinks per capita, about three
times the amount used in Great
| Britain.
i Did you know that part of the in
crease in the consumption of alcohol
is due to the fact that greater and
/ greater proportion of women are
drinking? OF immoral women, over
/ eighty per cent are estimated to have
i been brought to vice by alcohol In
the handicapping of child, morally
and neryously, the mother who drinks
mildly is far more responsible than
the father who drinks heavily.
| %. S. Mdrden, In Physical Culture.