just in the proportion of his indulgence, does his part to encourage and sustain the manufacture and sale of this bane of human peace. There are many who drink the liquor, who would scorn to make it, many who buy that would be ashamed to sell. Now, though not in the same ratio, yet to a certain and a culpable extent, every consumer gives his vote, and pays his tax to uphold the traffic.

Almost all that has hitherto been advanced is entirely consistent with the assumption, that the article, in particular cases, is neither useless nor dangerous. The assumption is false, as we shall endeavour to show. Waving the disputed question of medicinal value, it is undoubtedly true that spirituous liquors are, in every case, useless and dangerous. They are useless, and therefore it is wise to abstain. We are all alarmed at the evils, the horrid, innumerable, damning evils, which this single article has introduced. Unless, then, we are indemnified by its manifold virtues, in the full amount of this loss and suffering, it is unwise, it is sinful, it is cruel to encourage the traffic or use. What are the countless benefits of the intoxicating draught? Has it contributed to human. strength? While it has brought the youth to premature imbecility, and the sturdy vigour of the robust labourer to palsied helplessness, it has never permanently braced a muscle, or added one tittle to the physical power of its votaries. Has it given nourishment to the body? With united voice, our most eminent, and most unprejudiced physiologists protest against the delusion. Has it prolonged life, or averted disease? It has but marked out the first victims of epilepsy, apoplexy, malignant fevers and madness, while it claims as its own peculiar instruments of torture, delirium tremens, and mania a potu.

Ardent spirits are injurious, even to the temperate drinker, as he is called, and therefore it is wise to abstain. This we may pass over at the present time, as pertaining rather to the evils of intemperance, which we have thrown out of the field of inquiry. Yet it is not to be passed over in the private meditations of the serious Christian.

Ardent spirits, whenever used, open the door for temptations to him who indulges, and no man under such influence is safe. Every drunkard was once temperate. It was by gradual steps that he explored the loathsome and fiery deep, in which he is now groping towards final destruction.

No human eye can mark the point where temperance ends,

and intemperance begins; and wherever that imperceptible boundary may fall, the victim is always secure in his own apprehensions. The debased and squalid sot, who creeps into the recess of his dwelling, which he supposes to be unknown, and quaffs the beloved stimulant, while he endeavours vainly and ludicrously to conceal his disgrace, was once a man who despised the drunkard; and, even now, flatters himself that he is not detected. And each of us may have known as honest, honourable, industrious and kind, the brutal wretch who now brings daily sorrow into the family circle, pours mortification into the heart of a virtuous wife, and robs his offspring of their daily food. That appetite, once grown strong, knows no restraint; and we learn to feel the words of the poet:

"Tis quenchless thirst

Of ruinous ebriety that prompts

His every action, and imbrutes the man.

O for a law to noose the villain's neck

Who starves his own, who persecutes the blood

He gave them in his children's veins, and hates

And wrongs the woman he has sworn to love.-Couper.

Let it be repeated, no man is safe who treads upon the crumbling brink of this precipice. The only safety is in a total relinquishment of the seductive draught; and no individual, in the view of these things, can continue in the use of ardent spirits, and consistently pray Lead us not into temptation.' Are you willing, we might ask, to lay before your sons and your brothers, even the possibility of becoming drunkards? Alas! perhaps they have already taken the irrevocable step. Perhaps they are, even now, possessed by that demon, and marked out as his prey. The cup which you cannot abandon, is the centre from which emanate those baleful influences, which, though they leave you untouched, may yet murder the dearest object of your love, blast the honour of your family, and cover your grey hairs with unavailing regrets and burning shame. Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it giveth its colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. At the last, it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder. Prov. xxiii. 31.

II. The measures of the Temperance Society, as founded upon the principle of entire abstinence, are to be defended.

It is to be presumed, that the most decided friends of ardent spirits will not controvert the position, That it is the undoubted right of any individual to lay it down as a rule

for his own conduct, to avoid altogether the use of intoxicating liquors. It has never been contended, that any moral obligation constrains men to this indulgence; or, that there is any moral turpitude in abstaining from the excitement. Single cases of such abstinence are by no means new. In every age, since the acquaintance of man with the dangerous stimulant, individuals have here and there been found unwilling to approach it. And long before any fellowship in this forbearance was dreamed of, abundant have been the instances of abstinent and temperate men. Even now, it is by no means rare, to discover one and another whose habit it is to refrain from every thing of the kind; and we have not learned that any umbrage is taken at such a peculiarity, even though dissolute wits may affect to despise the water drinker. Various considerations may lead a man to adopt such a maxim. The care of health or reputation, the wise fear of seduction, the desire of holding forth a salutary example may prompt him; and no one, even among the profligate, doubts his right to pursue his own course of life, any more than the right to choose his own regimen, or adjust his own apparel. And, as in any given case, he who, from private reasons, chooses to avoid ardent spirits, acts according to his own acknowledged right; so no one can deny that the same individual is altogether free to frame a resolution, or if he chooses to take a vow, that he will persevere in this way. It may be deemed unnecessary, whimsical, rash or fanatical, but no one dreams that there is hereby any breach made upon the liberties of others. Such resolutions are made by every man, under every variety of circumstances, in matters of economy or trade or religion; and with the privacy of such a transaction, no one presumes to interfere. Private engagements of this nature are found useful in the conduct of our domestic affairs. They add the force of an obligation to what was before simply a prudential maxim. They decide, once for all, upon a class of actions, instead of leaving the mind in painful vacillation upon every emergency. They afford a brief apology in every case of objection or expostulation.

That there is nothing morally wrong in such an engagement, appears from the case of the Nazarites under the Old Testament, who bound themslves for a certain length of time to abstain from all intoxicating liquors. It is true, that this example has no weight when adduced as an argument for our abstinence, but it is a case in point, to answer at once every

charge of moral impropriety in voluntary obligations to such abstinence.

Indeed, so clear is the case, that it is certain we should never have heard any strong objections raised against single cases of such resolutions. The great English moralist, during many years of his life, abstained totally from the use of wine, in compliance with a resolution of this nature; and though he moved in a circle somewhat dissolute in this particular, no one, we believe, brought any charge of error or fanaticism against Dr. Johnson.* Nay, there is not a man among the ranks of the objectors, who does not feel himself free, at any moment, to discard ardent spirits or wine from his table, as well as any beverage or dish which he disapproves; and to fortify his purpose by a resolution, or even a vow.

It may, indeed, be urged that there is always danger in such resolutions, since such is the weakness of all human purposes, that they are very liable to be violated, and that thus the sensibility of conscience is wounded, and moral fortitude impaired; also, that through the strange perverseness of our minds, we are the more likely to rush to the opposite extreme, after the removal of the barrier. There is some truth in the premises, yet the argument founded on them leads us much too far; since it would equally deny the prudence of any fixed rule for human conduct, any purpose of holy living, any serious attempt of the libertine to amend his life. Grant that, because defeated purposes are mischievous, no purposes of good, no resolutions of temperance or safety are to be admitted, and you tear away one of the strongest barriers against vice, and aids of virtue, from the wise and good of every age. It is, therefore, as prudent, and as just, for me to determine that I will not indulge in ardent spirits, as to determine that I will avoid the excesses of the table, or the accumulation of debts beyond my means.

We frequently hear it said, that it is unnecessary to form such a resolution, inasmuch as he who believes that total abstinence is prudent and useful, may be supposed to have strength of purpose sufficient to confine himself to the path which he approves. In reply to this, let it be observed, that we suppose too much, when we presume that every man who

See in Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson, the record of a conversation which took place, April 7, 1778.

VOL. III. No I.—G

"sees the right" may not "the wrong pursue;" the adage of the heathen poet is familiar:

The stubbornness of fact repels the conclusion every day. Men indulge daily in that which they know is leading them to ruin. Witness the bankrupt, the gambler, the drunkard, the debauchee. There are, moreover, seasons of allurement, when the mind which is influenced by a floating impression of what is right, without being held down by settled resolutions, will waver and fall under the fascination. This takes place without shame, because there is no consciousness of deviation from any prescribed rule.

We suppose too much when we presume of ourselves, that we need no deliberate engagement to retain us in the way of duty. It would be a waste of words to argue this point. Its illustration may be read in the case of the invalid who daily tampers with forbidden food, the sluggard who indulges in excessive sleep, the father who suffers insubordination in his family, the tradesman who neglects his business and the sinner who restrains prayer before God. And, in another view of the same objection, it may be truly said, that the very argument concedes the principal thing for which we contend: "The prudent man has strength of purpose enough to abstain, without the yoke of resolution.' If, indeed, there is a purpose to abstain, and a purpose of some strength, it is all that we ask. The resolution which we defend is not a sacred covenant, not a religious vow, but a fixed determination to avoid a certain evil. But if there is not a purpose to abstain, of some strength, if there is no more than an indolent preference of such abstinence, we deny that we have any guarantee that the individual will not succumb at the first attack.

It is urged that such a determination is invidious, and implies a tacit charge of intemperance, against all moderate drinkers. To this it is a sufficient reply, that if the objection has any weight, it lies against abstinence itself, which has been vindicated, and not the resolution to abstain; and that the same scruple might be raised against any course of life, or moral habit, which might happen to militate with the opinions of the multitude. It is, therefore, reasonable that every man should be left to enjoy the right of laying down for himself