ADDRESS ON TEMPERANCE.

SEVERAL years have now elapsed, since the evils of Intemperance were first set before us in the language of plain, graphic, forcible eloquence. Repeatedly, since that time, has your attention been directed to this subject, by the most gifted of our fellow citizens, in each of the learned professions. It has, within a few years, attracted the attention, not only of this country, but that of many countries of Europe. The civilized world is beginning to inquire into both the extent and the effects of this most alarming evil. The results of these inquiries are now spread before us, and a visible check has been already given to this most terrific form of misery and vice.

Under these circumstances, then, are we assembled this evening. We do not come to ask, whether such an evil exists. This is granted. We do not come to ask whether it threatens destruction to every form of human happiness. This also is granted. We do not come to inquire whether this evil can be corrected.

The evidence is satisfactory that it can be. The question before us now is, what shall we do, to eradicate this vice from this town* and from this State? To look at an evil, to mourn over it, to ask whether it can be corrected, is not enough. It becomes us to ask, has not the time come to strike one effectual blow, and to banish this vice from among us altogether?

It shall be my endeavor this evening to lead your reflections to a decision upon this question. And, in order that we may decide with the better understanding, I shall attempt briefly to illustrate the INDIVIDUAL, the SOCIAL, and the ECONOMICAL effects of Intemper

ance.

First, The effects of Intemperance on the INDI

VIDUAL.

A single portion of alcohol, in any form whatever, adds force and frequency to the pulse, increases the heat of the skin, excites the imagination, inflames the passions, and gives a momentary buoyancy to the spirits. This is soon followed by lassitude, depression, torpor, and debility. These latter effects render the appetite for repeated stimulants more imperative. And hence it is, that he who once commences drinking, is preparing his physical system to render him the slave of drinking. He who drinks at eleven o'clock will need still more to drink at one o'clock, and then again at four and at six o'clock, and, at last, before breakfast. By this time he has become a drunkard. Thus, from the very nature of the case, the only infallible preventive of intemperance is total abstinence.

We see, from the effects of a single portion of alco* Providence, R. I.

.

hol, that it must fail to perform every promise which it makes to the drinker. Wine is a mocker. It is taken to increase muscular strength, it produces muscular debility. It is taken to produce animal heat, it produces permanent chilliness. It is taken to elevate the spirits, it invariably depresses them. Look not thou on the wine when it is red, when it giveth his color in the cup, when it moveth itself aright; at the last, it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder.'

Such are the immediate effects of a single act of indulgence, and such the powerful tendency which that indulgence has to become habitual. Its effects upon the physical system are then most alarming. These however have been, with so much ability, lately set before you, by a distinguished gentleman of this town, of the medical profession,* that a bare allusion to them will be sufficient for my purpose. It is found that the invariable effect of the use of ardent spirits is to destroy the appetite, and to paralyze the action of the whole alimentary canal. The stomach becomes inflamed and corrugated. The liver is either enlarged or indurated. The action of the heart becomes weak and irregular. The blood becomes dark-colored and deficient in vitality. The brain is found hardened, and its cavities in some cases actually filled with diluted alcohol. The skin becomes red, inflamed, and disposed to ulceration. The muscles are weak and trembling. The eyes suffused, watery, and rolling, so that a drinker cannot look you in the face. The breath is nauseous and alcoholic. The voice is guttural, and frequently tremulous, as though a palsy had stiffened the roots of the tongue. * Usher Parsons, M. D.

The hand shakes like an aspen leaf. Every thing shows that the vital powers are faltering, and that the moment is not far off when they will fail altogether.

And these indications are soon, very soon, fulfilled. It is scarcely possible to express how feeble is the hold which the drunkard has upon the principle of life. Let him only fracture a limb, the consequence is death. Let a fever seize him, and he perishes a maniac. Let pulmonary disease attack him, and he dies without a struggle. Let the atmosphere become heated but a few degrees above the ordinary temperature of a summer's day, and he falls dead in the street. Let the cold exceed the ordinary severity of winter, and he freezes by the road side or even while asleep in his bed. Let a wasting epidemic sweep over the land, and it hurries the drunkards into eternity by thousands. We are told that the cholera, that most alarming of all the maladies which the history of man has recorded, selects its subjects from the class of the intemperate, and that when it has marked its victim, it hurries him in a few moments to inevitable destruction. O, should this most terrific of all the scourges of the Almighty pass across the Atlantic, and move in judgment over America, as it has already moved over Asia, and the greater part of Europe, who can tell how fearfully great would be the number of its slain; or, how indiscriminately it would here, as elsewhere, smite the high as well as the low places of society with sudden devastation! Like the flying roll which the prophet saw, it is the curse of God going forth over all the earth, entering into every house, and unfolding the doom of every family, sparing neither age nor sex, rank nor station, parent nor child,

but marking every intemperate man and woman for instant, agonizing, strange, and horrible death.

These are some of the physical effects of Intemperance upon the individual. Turn now to its INTELLECTUAL and MORAL effects.

Every one must be convinced, that the condition of mind and body best adapted to intellectual energy, must be that in which, free from all excitement, and all prejudice, and all dullness, in the clear light of reason, we can perceive things as they are. This state of mind is to be procured by exercise and temperance, and it is one of the choicest rewards which they confer upon man. The intellect, however, is liable to become beclouded by disease. Every one knows the effect of a paroxysm of fever, how at one time the mind is goaded and wearied with its own imaginings, and how at another it sinks down into dull, sleepy torpor. Of what intellectual labor is a man, thus afflicted, capable? How would you pity him who was obliged to transact his business, in the wild delirium of an inflammatory, or in the heavy stupor of a typhous fever; and, how well should you suppose that that man's business would be transacted? It is commonly thought, that Napoleon lost all the advantages which he might have gained by the battle of Moscow, in consequence of a paroxysm of fever, which palsied his energies and beclouded his conceptions, and thus disabled him from comprehending the entire nature of his situation, and giving to the work of death the fearful energy of his usual combinations.

Now the effects of intemperance upon the intellect, are just as certain and as destructive as the effects of disease; and, instead of being temporary, they are per