HE Rev. George W. Hodgson has at least shown that the cause of prohibition can be defended, and cleverly defended, with modesty and politeness, and candour and charity. He wishes that the question should be ventilated, as its importance deserves, in order that its settlement may be wise and permanent. He is not of those who try to stifle opposition by misinterpreting the motives of opponents, or of those who bid for the applause of the populace by sophistries that they know to be sophistries.

It is therefore a sincere gratification to me that Mr. Hodgson admits so many of my propositions. He grants 'that to protect a man against himself is meddling legislation, and therefore inexpedient and hurtful,' and 'that it is generally wiser in legislation to leave out the consideration of the endless and complex indirect claims of society.' But he considers these principles no arguments against prohibition, because the ill effects of intemperance are not at all confined to those who do wrong,' and because 'the ills resulting to others from the intemperate man's conduct' are not in any sense indirect.'

Of course I admit that the ill effects of intemperance are not confined to the intemperate. Neither are the ill effects of opium or candy-eating, of over-smoking, of tight-lacing, of sensual indulgences, of non-libellous falsehoods of the various bad habits that paternal lawgivers have fondly sought or may fondly seek to legislate out of existence at all confined to the sinIn some cases the worst conse

ners.

II.

quences of their vices fall on their innocent offspring. Besides, all such habits are infectious. Yet all sins directly affecting the doer only should, it seems to me, be kept under by moral agencies, by education, good example, entreaty, indignation, ridicule-tabooed by religion and society, not by the law.

But there are 'ills resulting to others from the intemperate man's conduct,' that are in no sense indirect.' The aggressions of the drunkard on the comfort of his neighbours are indeed direct and concrete enough to call for legal restraint; sometimes serious enough to require the sternest and most deterrent penalties allowed by civilization. The liquor traffic, directly, produces some intemperate drinkers; these intemperate drinkers do some direct harm to others; but the liquor traffic, it seems to me, directly injures only the drinkers themselves. In other words, the direct injuries of drinking falls on willing victims only, the direct injuries of drunkenness on unwilling victims also. Therefore, I believe in applying the screw to drunkenness rather than to drinking generally.

But Mr. Hodgson points out that 'indifferent' actions have to be prohibited, as for instance, catching fish out of season, lighting fires in the woods at certain times of the year, or letting one's cattle roam at large. Legislators seldom create, perhaps never should create, these mala prohibita' save where the nuisance is positive, not contingent; or where the dangers of not curtailing liberty overwhelmingly overweigh the inconveni

The

ences of curtailing it, in the minds not only of the legislators, but also of the community. Letting one's cow roam at large is an action of the former class. Catching fish or lighting fires in the woods at certain seasons are actions of the latter class-much more clearly so than drinking strong drink, as is proved by the lack of intelligent hostility to their prohibition. greater the numbers and respectability of unbelievers in a statute, the fainter naturally will be the stigma attaching to convictions under it. Yet I see now that one horn of my dilemma was rather blunt: a well-enforced Prohibitory Act would not materially 'sap the sanctity and majesty of law,' for when a Prohibitory Act is well enforced, it will be by a majority imposing enough to support the judgment of the law by the more dreaded judgment of society.

'Does the evil directly resulting to the whole community from the liquor traffic outweigh any possible good coming from it? If this question can be answered in the affirmative,' says Mr. Hodgson, 'it gives the TRUE BASIS FOR PROHIBITION.' 'It appears to me that the question narrows itself down to this issue,' he says, in another paragraph,ʻor, at least, that this is the first and main issue. If it can be shown that the facts are as above stated' (that the evil resulting to the whole community from the conduct of those who drink to excess 'outweighs any possible advantage that the community can gain from unrestricted liberty in this particular') then prohibition becomes an act of enlightened policy.'

This conclusion seems unwarranted. Because a practice does more harm than good, it by no means follows that its statutory prohibition does more good than harm. A cure may be worse than a disease. There are therapeutic agents that induce maladies worse than those they heal. Granted that Ireland is chronically discontented and turbulent, the Imperial Government would not, therefore, be justified in effectually stamping out the turbluence and

discontent by converting the island into a tranquil wilderness. The Imperial Government, accordingly, feels bound to go on trying less thorough and less arbitrary expedients.

Probably the liquor traffic (as it is at present conducted in this country and some others, thanks largely to the uncompromising attitude of most prohibitionists), does entail more evil than good, more pain than pleasure, to the community as a whole. But this is an argument only that an efficient and proper cure is desirable; not that my cure or your cure is either an efficient or a proper one.

If the evils and danger of prohibition were confined to inconveniencing moderate drinkers, or sometimes impairing their sleep or their digestion, the desirability of adopting this particular remedy might be granted. These minor hardships, though certainly deserving consideration, are probably overweighed by the evils of the liquor traffic. But I submit that prohibition, if it did prohibit, would be too hurtful and dangerous an agent to employ, for the various reasons spcified in my former article, only a few of which Mr. Hodgson has disputed.

The strictness with which a general prohibitory law would be enforced would naturally depend upon the numbers and sincerity of the majority who would have spoken and voted for it. My forecast of the future is, however, very different from Mr. Hodgson's. A grand reaction set in, in Great Britain and America, against the notorious intemperance of our fathers. This movement, after the manner of moral and political revolutions, has, in my opinion, gone too far in some directions from excess of zeal. The prohibitory agitation in which Mr. Hodgson shares, and the rabid intolerance of moderate drinking in which Mr. Hodgson does not share, are, from my stand-point, extravagant and transient outgrowths of the great reaction.

The counter reaction is beginning now. The natural assumption, I still claim, is that most of the inert majority' who did not vote for or against the Scott Act in the Maritime Provinces belonged to the unroused and uncanvassed party. Mr. Hodgson knows some cases where the very absence of opposition made it difficult to awaken enough interest to induce voters to come forward.' But in many more cases the hopelessness of an unorganized party's succeeding, or the fear of social and business persecution, kept others from the polls-and no workers tried to rouse these voters from their inaction.

Even if Mr. Hodgson is right, he dwells too much on the state of feel

ing in these Provinces. The history of the Scott Act elections in the wealthier and more inteliigent Provinces of Ontario is another and a more important history. Dundreary observed that the dog wagged its tail, instead of the tail's wagging the dog, because the dog was stronger than the tail. For a similar reason Ontario, with the city of Montreal, will eventually wag this Dominion in matters of opinion. To tell which of two parties will be the more numerous a score of years hence, it is more important to estimate their wealth and intelligence than their present numbers. The feeling of New York and Massachusetts and Pennsylvania on a question involving no local interest is more likely to change the feeling of the rest of the Union, than the feeling of the rest of the Union is to change the feeling of these States; and what these States are to the Union Ontario is to the Dominion.

At present I know of no Christian country, or even county, where prohi bition is satisfactorily enforced. Rumour says that the Scott Act is enforced in Charlottetown as well, if not better, than it is anywhere else-possibly owing to the large personal influence of Mr. Hodgson himself. Yet

I find this paragraph in the Halifax Recorder of January 19:

"The following, from the Charlottetown Patriot of Tuesday, seems to give the experience of the Scott Act, wherever introduced. Our contemporary says:

"The sad and sober truth is that the Scott Act is working very badly in this city,-in fact it is not working at all."

'In most cases, its introduction and " carrying" seems to be regarded as a joke.'

Mr. Hodgson declares that total abstinence, so far as he can see, is nowhere commanded in the Bible; and evidently further agrees with me that the founders of Christianity probably drank alcoholic wine. If we are right in this belief, is not a prohibitory law a condemnation of, or a reflection upon, the conduct of the founders of Christianity? This is, of course, only an argumentum ad fidem, and can have no weight with unbelievers. Mr. Hodgson properly calls it absurd to talk of the total abstainer giving up his Christian liberty.'

'The asserted analogies between prohibition, sumptuary laws, and religious persecution, will hardly bear examination. Their superficial likeness suggests a misleading comparison.

Religious persecution, when not directed against opinion alone, deals with conduct on account of the spiritual or eternal consequences supposed to result from it. These consequences, being wholly outside of the range of the legislator's action, his interference is unjustifiable.'

Eternal evils are not more outside the proper range of the legislator's action than are those temporal evils that an individual brings on himself; while the lawgiver has a much stronger excuse for usurping jurisdiction in a merciful effort to lessen the former than the latter evils.

Sumptuary laws,' says Mr. Hodgson, attempted to deal with one particular evil, extravagant expenditure.' I may have used the expression, but I do not recollect saying much about sumptuary laws. My analogous cases (adduced to show the danger of admitting that the baneful abuse of a thing justified the prohibition of its use)

favour statutory prohibition, and the final triumph of those who favour nonstatutory restraints. Before the close of the American civil war, they used to sing by their camp fires on both sides of the Potomac, 'When this cruel war is over,' and to yearn for peace. The North won decisively, and the rest was grateful to the nation; had the South won decisively, the rest would have been equally appreciated.

The satisfaction, however, at the final triumph of prohibition would not be so universal as Mr. Hodgson supposes. Many of those who are wont to look ahead would feel that the victory was a prelude to new wars.

WE

E had been engaged for more than a year, and the longedfor promotion, which was to make Edward's income sufficient for our start in life, had not yet been obtained.

His income, such as it was, being derived from an appointment in the Canadian civil service, was, however, an assured one.

My dear mother, remembering, I suppose, her own youthful days, when she set at defiance the authority of her guardian, and eloped with a gallant but very impecunious lieutenant in Her Majesty's navy, whose first cruise took him away from her for nearly two years, at last withdrew the opposition she had offered to our beginning married life on so little, and consented that our marriage should take place at an early day.

This decision, I well know, was not arrived at without much anxious thought, for although we had not been extravagantly brought up, we had neither of us learned the value of money by the want of it.

I had nothing to look forward to, as my widowed mother's means consisted of an annuity, to terminate at her death. We were married, and the first year of our wedded life sped swiftly and happily away.

At first we boarded, but with the opening of the second year we determined to begin house-keeping, and it was shortly after being settled in our own house that the incident I am about to relate took place. I had been very busy for months, devoting all my time to the manufacture of articles for the adornment of our abode, to the possession of which I looked forward

with no small degree of pride and pleasure. We had been obliged to devote much time, too, to the selection of a house.

Ottawa was not rich in houses at the time it became the seat of Government, and all familiar with it in those first years of its greatness, will remember the fact, and how exorbitant were the rents demanded for the most indifferent dwellings. Fortune favoured us, however, and we were among the happy few who, in the spring of 186-, rejoiced in the possession of a nice house in a pleasant locality.

When, a few years later, Edward came unexpectedly into possession of the pretty English home, where we have lived ever since, and where all our children, except our oldest boy, were born, it was not without sincere regret that we left the modest little house in which we had been so happy, notwithstanding, to use a rather hackneyed expression, that night of terror spent within its walls.

My husband was too busy to accompany me in the many rambles I had in quest of a suitable abode, but my dear little friend, Minnie Lucas, was always my pleasant companion. When I had at last made up my mind that there were but two houses left to make a selection from, neither of which suited my fancy, it turned out that there was something better in store for us.

'How would you like the Darwin's house, little woman?' said Edward, one afternoon.

Very much, dear, but they are not leaving it, are they?

'Yes, they are not only leaving it,