Temperance by Bishop Ireland

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Nov 13, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 43.

Temperance.

By Bishop Ireland

The Sin of Intemperance.

THE need of the hour is a grand tidal wave of total abstinence sweeping over the land. The strongest protest possible must be made against intemperance. Total abstinence is the protest. Will it be made with sufficient force to save the people? This is the vital question for the future of America, and I might add for the future of religion. What is to be done? Anything. I speak to those who by position, influence, talent, or office, ought to take an interest in the people.

In the name of humanity, of country, of religion, by all the most sacred ties that bind us to our fellow-men, for the love of him who died for souls, I beseech you, declare war against intemperance. Arrest its onward march! If total abstinence does not appear to you the remedy, adopt some other. If you differ from me in the means you propose, I will not complain. But I will complain in the bitterness of my soul if you stand by, arms folded, while this dreaded torrent is sweeping over the land, carrying with it ruin and misery. . . . All classes, high and low, offer holocausts upon the altar of intemperance. The brightest mind and the noblest heart are numbered among the victims. Human wrecks, whose fortune it has dissipated, whose intellect it has stifled, are strewn over the land as thick as autumnal leaves in the forest. Alcohol directly inflames the passions; it is oil poured on the burning fire. It fills the mouth with blasphemy, and arms the hand for murder. It turns man into an animal; it makes him the demon incarnate. One week’s perusal of the daily papers fills the mind with horror at the shocking accidents, the suicides, the murders, the ruin of innocence, and the crimes of all kinds, caused by intemperance.—Bishop Ireland.