enslaving. As in the case of tobacco, it grows into a necessary of life-a luxury in one sense no longer-and canot be laid aside without an effort; such effort implying not only the loss of pleasure and comfort, but the invasion of discomfort and pain of no slight amount and degree.

Thus we see that the power of alcohol as a luxury, though in one sense undeniably great, is not free from most serious qualifications: a power to free, with a power to enslave; a power to gladden, with a power to sadden; a power to raise animal enjoyment, with a power to depress what is best in the mind and spirit; a power to impart a temporary sense of increased health and vigor, with a power of all the while sapping and undermining both. And it falls to be the duty of every sane man to weigh these matters gravely; the boon with the bane, the purchase with the price, the pleasure with the penalty.

Men in health and comfort have no apology for adopting or continuing such a luxury, if, after calm consideration of the subject, they have been brought to an intelligent conviction that the evil overbalances the good. For the miserable in mind and body, we can at least find, if we cannot admit, an excuse. He has a strong temptation, and a bitter experience tells him he can secure a temporary success. "Give strong drink

unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more." But here again Scripture is often "wrested" to their "own destruc tion." They will interpret this literally, at least they

act as if they did so; as if the "forgetting" of poverty, and the "remembering of misery no more," were final and conclusive. They are lulled into a pleasant dream, but the dream is not forever; sooner or later they must awake, and the dread realities of their lives are all the more dreadful when thrown into sudden contrast with the delusive dream. Alcohol, in this respect, is Satan's chloroform.* For his own ends he drugs men with it, or lets them drug themselves, when pained and miserable; for a time they not only forget their dulness, but are borne away into regions of happiness; but, as the influences of the drug cease, the pain and the misery return-too often with a redoubled poignancy. If they would be rid of their evil, they must have done with such deceitful palliatives, and brace themselves to face the only legitimate cure.

Alcohol is alleged to have other powers besides those that can be conveniently arranged under the heads of Poison, Medicine, Food, and Luxury. These we shall now proceed briefly to consider.

* Carrying out the surgical illustration here, let us ask what is the operation performed by this enemy of mankind, while his patient is made for a time senseless to the pain? Not the excision of any morbid and malignant growth; not amputation of a member which, through injury or disease, has ceased to be useful, and become injurious to the system; not the use of the cautery for the cure of any disease either of body or soul; but excision of the better part of the mental nature, amputation of moral control, and the searing of the conscience with a hot iron -not done all at once, but at many sittings; the foolish patient "etherized" all the while.

VI. The power of alcohol to sustain a man under bodily labor.-Many believe that such power exists to a very great degree, and they ground their belief on personal observation. All is based, however, on a fallacy

Labor exhausts vital strength-wasting structure lowering function. The natural remedy for such exhaustion is food and rest. Waste of tissue is repaired, and the living power of the renovated tissue reaccumulates, ready for a fresh bout of working.

The exhaustion of bodily labor, remember, implies disintegration of substance, as well as diminution of power, especially in two tissues. the muscular and nervous: the muscular is the direct agent of work; the nervous is the inciter and inspector the "oversman;" and both are more or less exhausted by their respective duties.

Now, how is such exhaustion to be either retarded or recovered from? We again say, by food and rest, properly arranged in regard to time and quantity, as we have elsewhere endeavored to explain.* Let a man have sufficient food, and sufficient rest, at the proper times; and he needs no other corporeal help for the due discharge of his daily toil. He is thus enabled to overtake as much work as his frame is naturally fit to bear. And if, under such circumstances, he break down, or threaten to do so, it is a sign, not that he needs more working-power, but that, being overtasked, a portion of the exacted work should be foregone. And, consequently, the man who stimulates himself, under such cir

"Labor Lightened, not Lost."

cumstances, is guilty or folly; while he who stimulates another, in similar circumstances, is guilty of cruelty and oppression.

Now, can alcohol be brought under the category of "food" here? As such only can it prove a true antidote to exhaustion by labor. No one asserts that it has any power to repair muscular tissue.

Has it any power

to nourish or repair nervous tissue? This question is open to debate; but our best authorities answer it in the negative.

Well then, if you give alcohol to a man exhausted, or being exhausted, by labor, what effect does it produce? Does it not revive him, giving to his hand a stronger grasp, and to his limbs new vigor? do not the strokes of his hammer gain a fresh force, and does not the task which he had almost abandoned become rapidly consumed? How is this? Not that he has got any nourishment or repair-any real return of strength; but because he has been goaded on to expend the remainder of his then existing strength or working capital, more rapidly and determinedly than he otherwise would or could (or should) have done the ultimate result, of course, being, that when the task is done, the man is done too. The exhaustion is infinitely greater than it otherwise would have been.

The alcohol does not give substance and strength to either of the decaying tissues; it only stimulates one of them the nervous; and so forces on this to force on the other. The nervous system is to the muscular as the rider to the horse, guiding and controlling its movements. Alcohol provides this rider with a spur

and whip; whereby the poor horse, jaded though he be, may be urged on to do an amount of work which otherwise he would have broken down under. With what benefit to the horse? Exhaustion, fatigue, founder. With what benefit to the rider? There is retribution here the result is, fatigue and founder too; for the alcohol, acting as a stimulant to the nervous system, exhausts its force and disintegrates its tissue in compelling it to urge on the muscles to a more rapid exhaustion of their force and disintegration of their tissue. The spur and whip, in their effects, exhaust the horse, but the labor of whipping and spurring exhausts the rider too; and after the effort is over, both the inciter and the incited are in much the same plight. Had it not been better to have ceased from work for a time, giving the beast of burden its food and rest, the dismounted rider likewise seeking his refreshment and repose; so that, after a while, both might have started with new mettle?

If alcohol has any power whatever in giving strength, wind, endurance, condition, why do trainers make so little use of it in preparing their men for feats of great exertion? All trainers use it, we know, most sparingly; not only in small quantity, but much diluted. And the best trainers do not employ it at all; strictly forbidding its use, indeed, because experience has told them of its hurtful tendency, in opposing rather than favoring their object in view.

"Ah but," you reply, "when the hour of trial has come - whether it be in the strain of the boat-race, the stride of the runner, or the struggle of the brutal prize