Permanent temperance documents, of the American Temperance Society. Vol. I.

Date:
1835
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Permanent temperance documents, of the American Temperance Society. Vol. I. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ceived were the community, that it was generally thought to be proper. It was licensed by the government, and sanctioned by Christian churches. Some who were officers in these churches, and who profess to be ministers of the gospel, were actively en- gaged in furnishing that which tended, with its whole influence, to prevent the progress of the gospel, and to perpetuate spiritual death to all future generations. But a great change has been commenced; and one which, in the rapidity and extent of its progress, has no parallel in the history of man. Already is it spoken of, by the wise and the good in this and other countries, as one of the wonders of the world. “ The great discovery,” says a European writer, “ has at length come forth like the light of a new day, that the temperate members of society are the chief agents in promoting and perpetuating drunkenness. On whose mind this great truth first rose, is not known. Whoever he was, whether humble or great, peace to his memory. He has done more for the world than he who enriched it with the knowledge of a new continent; and posterity, to the re- motest generation, shall walk in the light which he has thrown around them. Had it not been for him, Americans and Europeans might have continued to countenance the moderate ordinary use of a substance, whose most moderate ordinary use is temptation and danger; and, amidst a flood of prejudice and temptation, urged on- ward by themselves, they would have made rules against drunken- ness, like ropes of sand, to be burst and buried by the coming wave. Temperance Societies,” he says, “ have not only made America truly the neiv world, but in a few months they have produced an un- paralleled change in many districts of the United Kingdom.” And says another writer, “ Temperance Societies have arisen on our darkness like the cheering star of hope. They now flash across our Eastern hemisphere with the bright and beauteous radiance of the bow of promise.” And says another writer, “ It would be an act of ingratitude towards our American friends, were we in any degree to throw into the shade the obligations under which we He to them for having originated this noble cause. If the names of Washington and others are deservedly dear to them for their struggles in the cause of freedom, there are other names which will descend to the latest posterity, as the deliverers of their country from a thraldom more dreadful by far than that of any foreign yoke.” “The American Temperance Society,” says a writer of our own country, “ has accomplished more good than any other ever formed, in the same space of time. The precipice over which we were falling has been described, the alarm has been sounded, and we are not lost. Heaven has decreed that we shall not be lost. God has said to America, as he did of old to ancient Sodom, ‘ I will save
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