Keep Clear God’s Connection With Man
133
“Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging:
And whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.”
“Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath con-
tentions?
who hath babbling? who hath wounds without
cause?
Who hath redness of eyes?
They that tarry long at the wine;
They that go to seek mixed wine.
Look not thou upon the wine when it is red,
When it giveth his color in the cup,
When it moveth itself aright.
At the last it biteth like a serpent,
And stingeth like an adder.”
—Proverbs 20:1
;
Proverbs
23:29-32
.
Never was traced by human hand a more vivid picture of the de-
basement and the slavery of the victim of intoxicating drink. En-
thralled, degraded, even when awakened to a sense of his misery, he
has no power to break from the snare; he “will seek it yet again.”
Proverbs 23:35
.
Intoxication is just as really produced by wine, beer, and cider as
by stronger drinks. The use of these drinks awakens the taste for those
that are stronger, and thus the liquor habit is established. Moderate
drinking is the school in which men are educated for the drunkard’s
career. Yet so insidious is the work of these milder stimulants that
the highway to drunkenness is entered before the victim suspects his
danger.
No argument is needed to show the evil effects of intoxicants on the
[103]
drunkard. The bleared, besotted wrecks of humanity—souls for whom
Christ died, and over whom angels weep—are everywhere. They are
a blot on our boasted civilization. They are the shame and curse and
peril of every land
139
The Ministry of Healing, 330-333