Religious and educational aspects of temperance / by various authors.

Date:
[1874?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Religious and educational aspects of temperance / by various authors. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    sum well; teach them also the leading principles of one or more of the sciences if you can, and if you have the time and oppor- tunity for doing so ; but over and above all this, I would ask you to make them acquainted with the first, the most useful scien- tific discovery of the present day, viz., that alcohol is a poison. (Cheers.) Alcohol is no food, but acts injuriously on the human system, whether taken in large doses or in small. Teach them this fact: teach them to grasp its meaning, and I say that by so doing you will be the means of snapping asunder that chain which coils round them, and threatens to squeeze out of them ultimately every ves- moral stre ngth and principle. Dr. French has told us this evening that general education has failed to put a stop to intemperance. Doubtless it has. We can- not hope to see drunkenness die out with the spread of education. What makes it so easy to glide from moderation to excess is not the want of education in a man. A man needs something more than what goes by the name of education if he is to keep from ever gliding into excess from moderation. There is something in the drink, or, if you like, there is something wanting in the man, which makes the step from moderation to excess a wonderfully easy one. (Cheers.) You have all heard of the man who tried to ford the stream at the height of the flood. In leaping from one stepping-stone to another he lost his footing, and was drowned. Some people said he was drowned because the water was too deep; others said that he was drowned because he was too short; but through the water being too deep and the man too short he lost his life. Why didn’t he take the bridge 1 (Cheers.) We want you to take our bridge. (Loud cheers.) Do not attempt to cross the stream at its flood when our bridge of total abstinence is now on a safer and firmer foundation than ever. It is conclusively proved by Dr. Richard- son, by Sir William Gull, and by Sir Henry Thompson, that even moderation is a mistake, physically and economically, if not often morally. (Hear, hear.) Oh ! I think the appearance of Dr. Richardson’s little book most opportune. I have read it through carefully, and have been delighted with it. As Mr. Olver said, it is full of most interesting facts, and these facts are lucidly stated, and so beautifully arranged that I find it very difficult to believe that even Mr. Wright could not be made to understand them by careful teaching. (Laughter.) We have gone before the Birmingham School Board in this matter, for I hear that the book has been added to our list. Further, it is not meant entirely for the use of teachers. The London boys are intelligent enough to grasp everything that is in it. (Laughter.) I am not quite sure that it will not be found to be the easiest book, as it will also be the best reading book in our schools. (Cheers.) Of course, introduce the book (and I shall be very glad to see it), but be fair when you treat upon the question. State,