The Chautauquan, Vol. 04, December 1883Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle
History
The Chautauquan, Vol. 04, December 1883
Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle
Chautauqua Institution -- Periodicals; Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle -- Periodicals
One does not need the vision of a prophet to see that the day of the
triumph of prohibition in our country is coming on. The right is to
win. The time is in the not-distant future when state laws and state
constitutions will say that men shall not make their living by pandering
to the depraved appetite of fellow men. The rum-seller’s business will
be made illegal and criminal. Even those who are looking forward to the
prohibition of the liquor traffic by the national constitution will not
long be called fanatical and visionary. But meanwhile other work for
temperance besides that looking to this condition of things, so much to
be desired, should not be neglected. Personal effort to preserve the
youth and reclaim men is always demanded. People are clearly in error
who say: “Prohibition or nothing.” Laws whose aim is the curtailing of
liquor selling, should be sought, enacted, sustained and enforced as
better than none at all. Until we can have prohibition, let us have as
stringent restrictive enactments as possible. It is a short-sighted view
of things which prompts such a sentiment as this: “If we can not have
prohibition, let us have free rum.” The adage of the “half-loaf” and
the “whole” is full of sound wisdom. We can but think there are earnest
temperance men who make a grave mistake. Prohibition—unquestionably the
true measure to apply to the liquor traffic, and for whose adoption we
should persistently work—fills their minds and hearts. They bend their
energies to secure this. But for other legal measures, falling short
of this desideratum, and aiming only to restrict the wretched traffic,
they have no support. Everywhere restrictive liquor statutes are seen
very imperfectly executed for want of interest and determined effort
on the part of temperance people, whose rigid enforcement would work a
grateful change in our communities. If the law says that the saloon shall
not be opened on Sunday; that it shall be closed at a certain hour of
the night; that intoxicants shall not be sold to youth under a certain
age, or by any provision looks to the diminution of the great curse of
our people, it should be regarded as good so far as it goes, for so
much of prohibition as it contains, and should have the support of good
citizens, though their hope looks and their labors are directed to the
total prohibition by law of the sale of strong drink as a beverage. To
make the best and most of what we have is the true policy in every issue
of life. If we can not have prohibition now, we can see that our laws
are enforced. When they are thoroughly enforced, we will be much nearer
prohibition.
AN EXTRA DAY IN THE CALENDAR.
“There is an island off the coast of New Zealand where the day of the
week changes. There Saturday is Sunday, and Sunday, Monday. When Sunday
noon closes, Monday noon begins. A man sits down to his dinner Sunday
noon, and it is Monday noon before he is done eating.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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