The temperance problem and social reform / by Joseph Rowntree and Arthur Sherwell.

  • Rowntree, Joseph, 1836-1925.
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The temperance problem and social reform / by Joseph Rowntree and Arthur Sherwell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    nent of Europe and in the United States are reviewed. Happily, in some cases the experiments have been con- ducted for a sufficient length of time to enable the results to be accurately measured, and the experience so gained is of great value. The failures are perhaps as instructive as the successes. We know far better than we did fifty years ago what is and what is not possible. The inquiry here attempted resolves itself, finally, into two main questions: What in this age and in this country are the causes which create intemperance? and what are the influences which can be brought to bear in counteracting it? In the consideration of the first of these questions, the present writers have not been unmindful of the effect of climate, of race, of heredity, of drinking usages, of the character of the liquor consumed, of the absence of facilities for healthful recreation, and of the combined and power- ful influence of past and of existing laws. They have sought also, as a matter of the first moment, to present a true picture of the conditions under which vast numbers of our countrymen live. Without a vivid realization of these conditions it is easy to ignore many of the elements of fascination in the public-house, and to overlook agencies which must be brought into play to counteract its influence. The agencies which make for Temperance fall into two main divisions—those which are of a restrictive or controlling character, and those which seek to dry up the springs from which intemperance flows. For the sake of convenience they may be spoken of as the