As it is the quality of this malignant liquor to corrupt the mind, it likewise destroys the body.... Drunkenness not only corrupts men by taking away those restraints by which they are withheld from the perpetration of villanies, but by superadding the temptations of poverty--temptations not easily resisted even by those whose eyes are open to the consequences of their actions, but which will _certainly_ prevail over those whose apprehensions are laid asleep, and who never extend their views beyond the gratification of the present moment.... Instead, therefore, of promoting a practice _so evidently detrimental_ to society, let us oppose it with the most vigorous efforts; let us begin our opposition by opposing this bill, and then consider whether the execution of the former law shall be enforced, _or whether another more efficacious can be formed_.... No man, unacquainted with the motives by which senatorial debates are too often influenced, would suspect that after the pernicious qualities of this liquor, and the general inclination among the people to the immoderate use of it, it could be afterwards enquired, _Whether this universal thirst for poison ought to be encouraged by the legislature?_ LORD LONSDALE said--In every part of this great metropolis, whoever shall pass along the streets, will find wretchedness stretched upon the pavement, insensible and motionless, and only removed by the charity of passengers from the danger of being crushed by carriages or trampled by horses, or strangled with filth in the common sewers; and others, _less helpless perhaps, but more dangerous, who have drunk too much to fear punishment, but not enough to hinder them from provoking it_.... No man can pass a single hour in public places without meeting such objects, or hearing such expressions as disgrace human nature,--such as cannot be looked upon without horror, or heard without indignation, _and which there is no possibility of removing or preventing_, WHILST THIS HATEFUL LIQUOR IS PUBLICLY SOLD.... These liquors not only infatuate the mind, but poison the body; they not only fill our streets with madmen and our prisons with criminals, but our hospitals with cripples.... Nor does the use of spirits, my lords, only impoverish the public by lessening the number of useful and laborious hands, but by cutting off those recruits by which its natural and inevitable losses are to be supplied. The use of distilled liquors impairs the fecundity of the human race, and hinders that increase which Providence has ordained for the support of the world. Those women who riot in this poisonous debauchery are quickly disabled from bearing children, or, what is still more destructive to general happiness, produce children diseased from their birth, and who, therefore, are an