We _mean by the proposition_, that it is an employment which _violates the rules of morals that ought to regulate a man's business and conduct_. The doctrine proceeds on the supposition, that there is somewhere a correct standard of morals--a standard by which a man's whole conduct and course of life is to be tried; and that _this_ business cannot be vindicated by a reference to that standard. Or, for example, we mean that it is man's duty to love God, and seek to honor him, and that this business cannot be vindicated by a reference to that standard. That it is man's duty to love his fellow-men, and seek to promote their welfare, and that this business cannot be vindicated by that standard. That it is man's duty to render a valuable compensation to his fellow-men in his transactions with them, and that this business cannot be vindicated by that standard. That every man is bound to pursue such a course of life as shall promote the welfare of the entire community in which he lives, as shall _not_ tend to promote crime, and pauperism, and misery, and to make widows and orphans, and that this business cannot be vindicated by that standard. In one word, that by any rules of life that have been set up to regulate the conduct of men, whether in the Bible, in the necessary relations of the social compact, in the reason and conscience of Christians, and of other men, this business is incapable of vindication, and is to be regarded as immoral. In this proposition, however, it is important to be understood. We mean to confine it simply to the business where it is sold as an article of _drink_. For to sell it as a medicine, with the same precaution as other poisons are sold, would be no more immoral than it is to sell arsenic. And to sell it for purposes of manufacture, where it is necessary for that purpose, is no more immoral than to sell any other article with that design. Between selling it for _these_ purposes, and selling it as an article of drink, there is, as any one can see, the widest possible difference.