ccess."

Xenophon tells us that at one time the Persian princes had for their
teachers the four best men in the kingdom. (1) The wisest man to teach
wisdom. (2) The bravest to teach courage. (3) The most just to train
the moral nature. (4) The most temperate to teach self-control. We
have them all in the Bible, and in Christ our teacher, an example. "If
it is a small sacrifice to discontinue the use of wine," said Samuel J.
May, "do it for the sake of others; if it is a great sacrifice, do it
for your own sake." How many of nature's noblemen, who might be kings
if they could control themselves, drink away their honor, reputation,
and money in glasses of "wet damnation," more costly than the vinegar
in which Cleopatra dissolved her pearls.

Experience shows that, quicker than almost any other physical agency,
alcohol breaks down a man's power of self-control. But the physical
evils of intemperance, great as they are, are slight, compared with the
moral injury it produces. It is not simply that vices and crimes
almost inevitably follow the loss of rational self-direction, which is
the invariable accompaniment of intoxication; manhood is lowered and
finally lost by the sensual tyranny of appetite. The drunken man has
given up the reins of his nature to a fool or a fiend, and he is driven
fast to base or unutterably foolish ends.

With almost palsied hand, at a temperance meeting, John B. Gough signed
the pledge. For six days and nights in a wretched garret, without a
mouthful of food, with scarcely a moment's sleep, he fought the fearful
battle with appetite. Weak, famished, almost dying, he crawled into
the sunlight; but he had conquered the demon, which had almost killed
him. Gough used to describe the struggles of a man who tried to leave
off using tobacco. He threw away what he had, and said that was the
end of it; but no, it was only the beginning of it. He would chew
camomile, gentian, toothpicks, but it was of no use. He bought another
plug of tobacco and put it in his pocket. He wanted a chew awfully,
but he looked at it and said, "You are a weed, and I am a _man_. I'll
master you if I die for it;" and he did, while carrying it in his
pocket daily.

Natural appetites, if given rein, will not only grow monstrous and
despotic, but artificial appetites will be created which, like a
ghastly Frankenstein, develop a kind of independent life and force, and
then turn on their creator to torment him wi