ALCOHOLOGY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 75, 19 September 1911, Page 6

ALCOHOLOGY.

WILL EDUCATION SAVE US? (•Published by arrangement.) The idea of many is that education will save us as a people and individually from drunkenness and its attendant evils and miseries, even though we continue to use alcoholics, of course in strict moderation. In short, the propo«iti«n is that drunkenness is due to ignorance which education and instruction, combined with moral influences, will prevent as well as overcome. Now while we must all admit that deficient mentality and deficient morality very often' go together, or to put it baldly, awry sinner is a fool, and that is what the moderate drinker generally calls the unfortunate drunkard. Though there be a certain amount of truth in the argument that the schoolmaster is correcting the manners of the people to some extent, all his temperance lessons and charts will not prevent many of thoso who arc now moderate drinkers from falling into intemperance. Education may so enlighten the understanding thai ft man approves the right course, but it does not give him the power to adopt it. The judgment of the moderate man often would lead him one way—towards abstinence—ibut his weakened will power and his strengthened appetite leads him t* take more of the drink which his experience warns him against. Yes! a will power weakened and an appetite strengthened is always the effect of the drug alcohol. Dr. Cutten, in his 'book "The Psychology of Alcoholism," has a chapter on the -will," and examines tho question of the will power of the alcoholic very thoroughly, and concludes by saying: '"We have found the lack of will to be a serious result of the use of alcohol. 'Not only as a whole, but all the factors of will are injured. The alcoholic is devoid of the power to act at the proper time and in the right way, no matter how much he may admit such action to !>c right. On the other hand, he is equally powerless to inhibit incorrect action which is in line with his alcohol craving. He has the delusion of free-will, and thinks he can stop drinking if he wishes, but on account of a lack of nervous energy he has not the ability for sustained effort. The blood supply hj«» a powerful influence on the will. The experiments with orgograph and taptime prove what has 'l>een so long contended, viz., that the alcoholic hats lost the power of putting forth effort." What a warning all this is to those who trust in their moderation, and in their ability to maintain that moderation, and especiatya warning to the young. They may have a full knowledge of the effects of alcohol, and yet if they once begin to use it us a beverage they are beginning to undermine their will power, and who can say when the point is reached whore the drink is the master, and not the man. The history of individuals as well as that of nations tells us that education will not cure or even prevent drunkenness. The idea, too, is that this vioe is the failing of the weak-minded. The wisest, the most learned among all professions and walks in life have succumbed to strong drink, in fact, it is very often the sensitive, highly istnmg, nervous man, though he be a great, genius, who, if once he begins to drink, becomes a drunkard. We need only think of tho line of wise men who fell from Noah, the elect of God, right through tho centuries down to the latest drink destroyed genius of the present day to see that education is not of itself a sure defence. There is, however, one subject on which education will succeed, viz., if the lesson be always and constantly repeated and that lesson ibe "total abstinence." Anything short of that is dangerous, and with all the knowledge of the evil effects of alcohol thousands are now going under. With or without education,

"Where there's drink there's danger."