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The Ministry of Health and Healing
the person to prison or to death, while often the family is left in
financial straits, dependent on church or civic organizations.
Considering only the financial aspect of the question, it is irra-
tional to tolerate such a business! But what revenue can compensate
for the loss of human reason, for defacing the image of God in a
person, for ruining children, reducing them to pauperism and degra-
dation, and often perpetuating in them the evil tendencies of drunken
parents?
People who have formed the habit of using intoxicants are in
a desperate situation. Their brains are diseased, their will power
weakened. Without divine help, their appetite is uncontrollable.
They cannot be reasoned with or persuaded to deny themselves.
When in the company of others who are drinking, a person who
has resolved to quit is led to pick up the glass again, and with the
first taste of the intoxicant every good resolution is overpowered.
One taste of the liquor, and all thought of its results vanishes. The
faithful spouse is forgotten. The children may be hungry and without
clothes, but that no longer matters. By legalizing the traffic, the law
gives its sanction to this downfall of the soul and refuses to stop the
trade that fills the world with evil.
Must this always continue? Will souls always have to struggle for
victory, with the door of temptation wide open before them? Must
the curse of intemperance forever rest like a blight upon the civilized
world? Must it continue to sweep, every year, like a devouring fire
over thousands of happy homes? When a ship is wrecked in sight of
shore, people do not idly look on. They risk their lives in an effort
to rescue men and women from a watery grave. How much greater
the demand for effort in rescuing them from the alcoholic’s fate!
We are all woven together in the web of humanity. The evil that
befalls any part of the great human family brings peril to all.
Many men and women who through love of gain or ease would
have nothing to do with restricting the liquor traffic have found, too
late, that the traffic had a terrible impact on them. They have seen
their own children become alcoholics and ruined. Lawlessness runs
riot. Property is in danger. Life is unsafe. Accidents by sea and by
land multiply. Diseases that breed in an environment of filth and
wretchedness make their way to lordly and luxurious homes. Vices