rts other poisons to check disease,
gives life to the beast. I need not stop to prove it. It is manifest to
the child. Let every distillery in the land cease, and every dram-shop
be closed, and total abstinence become the principle of every
individual, and the demon will be dead; yes, take away from him his
wine, his brandy, and his whiskey, and he will perish for ever. But here
is the very brunt of the battle. We have hunted the monster through the
land, and driven him into his den; and now we must stand at the very
mouth of the cavern, and contend with our fellow-men and
fellow-sufferers--yes, and fellow-Christians too--who are either afraid
to attack the monster, or are determined he shall live.

And first, we are met by a body of men who tell us that alcohol is
useful. And what if it is? What if every benefit that the moderate and
immoderate drinker can think of, flows from it? What will this do to
compensate for its giant evils which are desolating our land? Is man so
bent on self-gratification that he will have every sweet, though it be
mingled with poison? Will he exercise no reason; make no discrimination
between unmixed good and good followed by desolating woes? Tea was good.
But, said our fathers, if with it we must have all the horrors of
British tyranny, away with it from our dwellings. My countrymen, "the
voice of your fathers' blood cries to you from the ground, 'My sons,
scorn to be slaves!'" Away with the shameful plea that you cannot do
without an article which subjects you to an evil ten thousand times
worse than all the horrors of British tyranny. You kindle the fires of
liberty by pointing to the woes of the prison-ship, and the bones of
your countrymen whitening on the shores of New Jersey. O, crouch not to
a tyrant who binds a million in his chains, and demands thirty thousand
annually for his victims. I blush for the imbecility of the man who must
have an article on his farm which eats up his substance and his vitals,
and may turn his son into an idiot and a brute. Better have no farm.
Better go at once, with his family, into the poor-house, and be
supported by public charity.

Next comes canting Hypocrisy, with his Bible in his hand, telling us
that "every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be
received with thanksgiving." What does he mean; that ardent spirit is
the gift of God? Pray, in what stream of his bounty, from what mountain
and hill does it flow down to man? O, it