at need of "sword," or "armor," or a "lamp unto the
feet?" for if, in answer to prayer and faith, a man's evil nature is
instantly changed, he is no longer subject to temptation, and cannot,
therefore, enter into combat with evil; and if God lift him out of the
darkness of his carnal nature into the light of regeneration solely in
answer to prayer, what need of any lamp unto his feet or light unto his
path? He is no longer a pilgrim and a wayfarer, journeying heavenward
through an enemy's land.

We press this subject on the reader's attention, because so much of
success or failure in this great Gospel temperance work depends on a
right understanding of spiritual laws and a true comprehension of the
means of salvation. Holding, as we do, that, for the thousands and
hundreds of thousands of unhappy and wretched men and women in our land
who have become the almost helpless slaves of an appetite which is
rarely, if ever, wholly destroyed, no true succor lies in anything but
Divine grace and help, we feel that a great responsibility rests with
all who, in the providence of God, have been drawn into this work.

Referring to the loose, and we cannot help saying hurtful teachings of
too many temperance revivalists, Rev. Charles I. Warren, writing in the
New York _Christian Advocate_, says:

"Religious conversion, all are agreed, is the first necessity for all
men, and especially for inebriates, as the surest hope of a real and
permanent reformation of life. And intemperate men, especially those
who become demented rather than demonized, it is well known, are always
easily moved by religious influences, even when so drunk that they would
wisely be deemed incompetent to execute a will for the disposal of
earthly property, and incapable of giving testimony in a court of law.

"Yet, this idea of a spiritual renovation of the heart, while the head
is too intoxicated to apprehend a moral obligation, is almost beyond
rational belief. It is difficult to conceive that any man, in such a
state of voluntarily-induced imbecility, too drunk to hold intelligent
converse with men, can be competent to transact business with God, to
receive and answer those calls from the Holy Spirit that decide the
eternal destinies of the soul."

And he adds: "We judge instinctively that all men, intemperate or sober,
must work out their own salvation with fear, while God works in them to
will and to do."

This is the key-note to the whole subject of sp