THE REV. MR STANFORD AND TOTAL ABSTINENCE.

Evening Star, Issue 3350, 14 November 1873, Page 2

THE REV. MR STANFORD AND TOTAL ABSTINENCE.

To the Editor. Sir, —In your issue of Wednesday Mr Stanford seeks to justify his statement as to the teaching of our Lord at Cana of Galilee by stating that our Lord there “ created a quamity of strong intoxicating wine (126 gallons), sufficient, had it been drank, to have inebriated the whole company and from this he gathers his idea of the teaching to which I have taken exception. Suppose I grant that Mr Stanford is correct in his assumption as to what our Lord did at Cana, and in his inference from that act, I reply that like principles are only applicable in like circumstances; and as the circumstances, condition, and habits of society, in relation to the [use of alcoholics here and now, are very different from what they were when our Lord attended the marriage at Caua of Galilee, that which would be a safe rule and sound principle of action then and there, may not be, and as I am bold enough to assert, is not a safe rule and sound principle here and now. If the teachings of Mr Stanford on this subject are to be accepted, we should no longer pray, as taught by our Lord, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evilbut “ lead us into temptation that we may prove our power of resistance.” We should not now act on the maxim of Paul, not to put a stumbling block in our brother’s way, but should place it there that he may show with what agility he can surmount it. But I altogether demur to the assumption of Mr Stanford as to what was done at Caua, and challenge him to the proof. As a set-off to the quotation from Dean Alford, permit me to quote from the preface to a work by Drs Dawson, Burns, and P. R,

Lees, in which they make a critical examination of “ all passages of Holy Writ beering on ‘wine’ and ‘strong drink,’ or illustrating the principles of the temperance reformation.” i\s the result of such an examination, they state that their “second proposition assumes a more positive form (than their first), viz., that the Bible teaches, clearly and fully, by a series of continuous and consistent testimonies that intoxicating drink is an evil article, poisonous to the body, seductive to the soul, and corrupting to the circumstances of man ; or, to put the idea in another shape, we hold that the Bible vindicates its claim to inspiration by having anticipated on this point the fullest witness of science, and having exhausted the teachings of human history.” I am, &c., An Abstainer. Dunedin, November 14. To the Editor. Sir,—As Mr Stanford has contented himself—in justifying his attack on total abstinence —with making a quotation from Dean Alford, perhaps you will kindly find room for the following reply which Dr, Lees gives to the note of that justly celebrated, but not always wise commentator. Dr. Lees observes: — 1. That Strauss and other unbelievers agree with the Dean in believing the Evangelist to describe the manufacture of 126 gallons of intoxicating liquor for a company of guests at a village wedding feast; and on this common assumption Strauss founds an objection against the moral character_ of Jesus. Such a supply of intoxicating drink would undoubtedly have presented a temptation to drunken excess, and would not have been analogous to all, or to any things in the Divine procedure, for “God is not tempted with evil, neither tempteth He any man.” . 2. That the Lord, by this miracle, has stamped His condemnation on the disuse of intoxicating liquors, or pledges to that end, is not at all evident from the phraseology of the Dean, for he roughly claims as proved the very point at issue—that the wine produced was intoxicating ; and he is of a transparent pet'dlo principil in representing alcoholic liquors, which can spring from the destruction only of good food, as being in themselves the gift of the Divine bounty, as directly as the corn of the field and the fruit of the tree ! He further assumes (in opposition to all fact and experience) that there is no difference between intoxicating and unintoxicating substances in their tendency to seduce and deprave mankind ! 3. That abstainers refuse the bounty in order to save themselves the trouble of seeking the grace, is at once impertinent and slanderous, though a Dean has written the words. Intoxicating liquors are abstained from, because they have no claim to be regarded as a true food; and as offering by their very action on the frame, a temptation to excess, which it is the distinct office of Christian wisdom to avoid. The grace of God is surely as much displayed in leading men away from needless temptation as in protecting them in it. 4. The Dean’s prophetic forecast of the demoralisation to be produced by the temperance movement has now been many years in print, but remains as far from lulfilment as at first. The facts are against him. 5. The advocates whose “miserable attempt” excites the Dean’s contempt, can afford to smile at his miserable travesty of their object, which is not, as he appears to conceive, to prove all the wines of Scripture to have been unfermented, but to ascertain by examination and induction what the tes timony of Scripture really is concerning the things to which the name “wine” is attached in the English version. As to the miracle of Cana —Augustine, Chrysostom, Bishop Hall, Mr Law, and Archbishop French, must also be charged with the miserable attempt of which these temperance advocates are accused ; and in such company they can complacently listen to all that the Dean’s ignorance and arrogance may allege against them. [The inconsistency of some of these authorities does not militate against this inference.] 6. The gross inconsistency of the Dean himself will be seen by a reference to his notes on Rev. viii. 10. The only difference between him and those whom he stoutly abuses is that they recognise the identity of alcohol in wine with alcohol in ardent spirits, and the Dean does not, So far, Dean Alford and his revie’wer. Let me add in closing that I think the whole discussion somewhat irrelevant—the question for ua being, not what course Christ may have felt free to pursue at a time and in a country when intemperance was all but unknown, but what course of action his principles as expounded, say by the Apostle Paul, would suggest to us to-day and here. How can Mr Stanford affect to treat with contempt those who take their stand upon the very words of the great Apostle—“ It is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby thy brother stumbleth or is offended, or is made weak ”?—I am, &c., Daleth, Dunedin, November 12.