LIQUOR LAW REFORM.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 4157, 17 July 1874, Page 3

LIQUOR LAW REFORM.

EDITED BY THE HON. WILLIAM FOX, M.H.IS. [The Editor of this journal is not responsible for the opinions herein expressed. The column is solely under the charge of its special Editor,] ABSTAINING BISHOPS AND PREACHERS. Bishop Hadfield is quite correct on one point. It was not the Bishop of Christchurch, as we stated, who moved the resolution which invited the Church of England to join in the crusade against intemperance. It was the Dean of Christchurch, not the Bishop—though the Bishop is, we know, favorable to the cause; and President, we believe, of the Christchurch Temperance Society. But Bishop Hadfield is not correct in charging us until “ deliberately publishing what is untrue.” This is just one of the instances of Bishop Hadfield’s “speaking unadvisedly with his lips.” A more “advised” speaker would have said that we had made a mistake, or been misinformed. It is not usual for gentlemen filling dignified positions, to charge people with deliberately publishing untruths. Except, however, our attributing the resolution to the Bishop instead of the Dean of Christchurch, we are not aware of having' committed even an unintentional error. Bishop Hadfield says that he offered no opposition to the resolution. Well, a shorthand reporter who reported the proceedings at tho time, records that Bishop Hadfield said that “He did not desire to say anything about the matter, as he intended, to vote against it. They all knew that many vices prevailed in society, and he did not know why they should single out intemperance in this way.” Now, as the resolution invited the clergy to single out intemperance, and the Bishop was ready to vote against it if there had been a division, and said so, we really cannot seo that we in the least exceeded the truth in saying that he opposed the motion. However, let it pass. Two years ago, we had no expectation of seeing Bishop Abraham a total abstainer and advocate of the cause at Exeter Hall. Years bring wisdom to some men—we may yet live to see, and we will hope to see, Bishop Hadfield a convert also, following in the steps of his self-denying predecessor. Wo expressed in our last our belief that if tho preachers of tho present day would single out special vices as subjects for attack, like old Hugh Latimer and others, wo might see more practical results from their preaching. In the United States the most eminent preachers of the day assail intemperance from the pulpit, and have done much by the practice to encourage the progress of’ the temperance cause. Beecher’s five sermons did great work in their day. We print below the substance of one delivered at Brooklyn on the 15th March last, by the Rev. T. D. Talmage, one of the most eminent clergymen of this day. We cannot help thinking that if our Bishops and other clergy would assail intemperance or any other vice, occasionally, with like vigor, it would add to the interest of their sermons, and not bo distasteful to those of their hearers who might go to church for some other reason than respectability or form’s sake.

THE WOMEN’S TEMPERANCE CRUSADE. SERMON BY T. DE WITT TALMAGE, The text was from Judges v. 12 : “ Awake, awake, Deborah; awake, awake.” The children of Israel had fallen into the hands of the Canaanites, and needed some leader to deliver them. A woman and prophetess, Deborah, arose, and, aided by General Barak, went forth with ten thousand men. The Canaanites had nine hundred chariots of iron, each having on its sides scythes, which mowed down two long swaths of slain wherever it moved. Yet, having God with her, Deborah vanquished the enemy, and the leader of its hosts, Sisera, fled to the mountains. Another army of Canaanitisb and infernal influences has come down to destroy this fair land of ours. It comes armed with the decanter and demijohn, and legislative enactment and brewers’ tanks, and apothecary’s bitters, and the distillers’ worm that never dieth. To meet these influences, some very brave men have gone forth and tried to break to pieces these iron chariots of destruction, but the country slept until a few weeks ago in the West the voice of the Lord Almighty rang through the churches, and the houses, and the gin palaces, and away off upon the prairie, saying, “Awake, awake, Deborah ; awake, awake.” , And now, at this moment, the great Austerlitz goes on, while earth,' and heaven, and hell await the stupendous issue. There is great need of something radical in fighting intemperance, and this can be shown in many ways. A generation of children are growing up with a hereditary taste for strong drink. Many a man sits down to write his will, and says, “ In the name of God, amen. I will and bequeath to my children my houses, my lands, and my property, share and share alike. Signed and sealed in the presence of witnesses.” But he does not know that he is at the same time making a double will, and that he might say, “In the name of disease, and sorrow, and death, amen. I will and bequeath to my children my appetite for drink, and my prospects of a drunkard’s grave. Signed and sealed in presence of the astonished hosts of heaven, and the jubilant harpies of hell." And there are millions of children growing up in surroundings which will inevitably lead them to the vice. While our children are in Sunday School singing “ Hosanna,” many times as many have the rum bottle for their toy, and imitating their elders, are singing the song of the drunkard. Then there are thousands of gin palaces along our streets, hanging out lamps of red and blue, which seem to be lit by a flying spark from the hell to which they are trapping so many. They used to occupy our corners — now they are everywhere. They call themselves hotels, saloons, casinos, retreats, and lager beer establishments. If you want to get out of the smell of rum you have to go five or six miles out of town, and even at the outskirts it is sometimes worse than in the city. These places are where all the crime and riot and lawlessness in our midst are fomented. It is here that men whet their courage to commit atson, or burglary, or murder. And our drug stores, which should be the means of preserving health and life, are dealing forth destruction and death. Alcohol is put up in the form of “ bitters ” bitters they are, leading to a bitter life, a bitter death, and a bitter eternity. A man will take bottle after bottle, until the cork of the last will fly off, and a fiend will jump from out its mouth and, clutching him by the neck, will say, “Ah ! I’ve been chasing you these fifteen years. I’ve got you now !” Oh, if a man is to be killed, give him a fair chance—put on the outside of the bottle what it is. Death is everywhere charming men into its embrace under various guises. It calls itself burgundy, or cognac, or claret, or Schiedam schnapps ; but, like the fabled monster, it gulps down its hundred victims at a time.

There are two questions they might ask him in reference to this question : Ist. Do you approve of the women’s movement in the West ? 2nd. Do you believe a similar movement should be inaugurated in the Bast ? Aa to the first, he would say that some things had been done in the West of which he did not approve, but when there are so many fools masculine, we must expect to find a few fools feminine. Yet he did not hesitate to say that this movement is the grandest and most magnificent spectacle the world has ever witnessed since Deborah, at the call of the Lord God Almighty, put to flight the hosts of Canaanites. (Applause.) Of course many would laugh and ridicule the actions of the women as undignified. Many would say that they had better be at home crotcheting, or watching the oven to see that the bread did not get too brown. Oh, my soul! which would have been most dignified, for a woman to wait wearily for hours in a desolated home, with her half-clad children, for the tottering steps of a husband, or sou, or brother ; or to put on the only hat and shawl not yet pawned by her companions, and go out under the leadership of some great-souled Deborah with the whole famished family at her back, and attempt by the artillery of prayer and song to put an end to those institutions where their domestic ruin had been inaugurated. Who. are you, sitting in your prospered homes and pampered ease, that you should be so severely critical of the women of the West ? It seems that by the force of prayer and. Christian song there were in a little while 300 saloons shut up, and in some of the villages all the drinking places were closed. You say they will open again soon. I reply, is it nothing to shut up the fire of hell for six weeks ? It would appear that the rum-sellers do not know how to fight these new weapons. They can withstand the Maine Liquor law ; and the National Temperance Society; but they cannot contend against prayer, and “Coronation,” and “ Old Hundred,” and “ Brattle-Street,” and “Bethany.” In one of the cities a German regiment was brought out to disperse the women. They came down in battle array, but, oh! with what poor success! For that German regiment was made up of gentlemen, and gentlemen don’t like to shoot women with hymn books in their hands. They found that gunning for female prayer meetings was very poor business. No real damage has been done, although there has been threat after threat of violence all over the land. Let us give fair warning to all military companies, to all mayors, to all courts of law, that on the very day that one of these Christian women engaged in this holy war shall, under the point of a soldier’s bayonet, or under the stroke of police club, fall down wounded or slain, that day there will be a fire kindled in this country, a fire of indignation and national wrath that all' the waters of the Mississippi and Ohio and Hudson can never put out; and it will keep on—-that influence will keep on rolling as with a besom of destruction, all over this country, until the last liquor shop and the last gin store and the last brewery shall be trampled out under the feet of an indignant people. (Applause.) I tell you the curse of the Lord God Almighty is on that business, for ever and ever, Amen. Oh, if my voice shall, through the printing press, reach those noble women of the West, I bid them God speed.