swords for slaughter, and instruments of torture for the prolongation of human suffering. In like manner, the fruits of the Earth may be used as innocent and nutritious food, or be converted by fermentation and distillation into intoxicating poisons. And even the animals subjected to man's dominion, may by him be converted into useful aids to human labour, as in the horse for draught or burthen, and the dog for watchfulness; or be made instruments of death and destruction, as in the armed cavalry of warring nations, and in the blood-hounds of Spanish America.

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Thus much it has been thought necessary to premise, in order to show that the mere fact of the Deity having furnished the Earth with certain productions, does not justify any evil use which man may make of them; since his reason is given to him as a guide by which he may discover and distinguish the good from the bad, in the purposes to which he may apply them. In an enlarged and comprehensive sense, there can be no doubt that every creature of God is good :" that is, every production of nature is good for certain uses, when we have the wisdom to discover them. Venomous serpents and loathsome reptiles, no doubt, subserve some great end in their creation; but we do not therefore deem them fit for food: and many poisonous substances, in the mineral and vegetable world, are excellent medicines, but we do not therefore use them as an ordinary beverage. In all such cases, Experience is the surest test by which to

judge of the effects produced by the several creatures and substances with which the Earth is supplied. When Experience shows any particular use of any of these to be beneficial to health and innocent enjoyment, and not prejudicial to morals or religion, such use may be lawfully adopted: but whenever Experience proves the general or special application of any thing or substance to be injurious to health, destructive of innocent enjoyment, or fatal to morals and religion, it is as clearly unwise to continue so to appropriate them.

Judged by this practical test, we desire to call the attention of the reader to the history and effects of the use of Stimulating and Intoxicating Drinks, which, from the earliest ages to the present time, have been so powerful a cause in the creation of disease, crime, misery, and destitution, in all the nations in which this habit has prevailed; and which at the present day is beyond all doubt one of the principal sources of the painful contrast between the condition of the very opulent and the very poor, and of the retardation of that improvement in their circumstances, which, but for this cause, the labouring classes, of all Christian countries at least, might long ere this have realized and enjoyed.

Without drawing too largely on the history of the olden times, it may be permitted us to advert to some few of the more prominent incidents connected with this usage in the early ages of the world.

The first record of the planting of the vine is in

the history of Noah, who, after the flood is said to have "planted a vineyard; and he drank of the wine, and was drunken"-(Genesis, ix. 21.) The scene which followed this first act of inebriation, can leave no doubt of its having deprived him, for the time, of the clear use of his reason, and of its leading to that abandonment of all sense of propriety, which is as characteristic of drunkenness now as it was five thousand years ago.

In the instructions given by God himself to Aaron, the High Priest, whose sacred office rendered it important that he should be an example of purity to the rest of the nation; these are the words contained in the Sacred Volume :-" And the Lord spake unto Aaron, saying, Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation; lest ye die it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations, that ye may put a difference between holy and unholy, and between clean and unclean." (Levit. x. 8.)

In the history of Samson, the strongest man of his own or any other age, an express injunction was given to the mother who bore him, "to drink no wine or strong drink ;" and the same abstinence from both was enjoined on the son, whose strength was so remarkably exhibited both during his life and at his death. (Judges, xiii. to xvi.)

Solomon, one of the wisest, as Samson was one of the strongest of men, was so deeply impressed with the evil consequences resulting from the use

of stimulating drinks, that in his Proverbs he says, "Wine is a mocker; strong drink is raging; and whosoever is deceived thereby, is not wise." (Prov. xx. 1.) And again: "Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? who hath contentions? who hath babbling? who hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes? They that tarry long at the wine they that go to seek mixed wine.-Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it giveth its colour in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. At the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder." (Prov. xxiii. 29 to 32.)

The prophet Isaiah laments the evils brought on their own heads by the priests and prophets of Ephraim, from their use of intoxicating drink. "Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine! They have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink; they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble in judgment. (Isa. xxviii. 1 to 8.)

The destruction of Nineveh, whose inhabitants are described by the prophet Nahum, as "drunken as drunkards," (c. i. v. 10,) was mainly owing to the prevalence of this vice among its people, and they were destroyed amidst their feastings and revellings, when unprepared for a vigorous defence.

The fall of the mighty Babylon arose mainly from the same cause. The wanton act of burning the magnificent Temple at Persepolis, by Alexander the Great, was suggested during a drunken banquet, and instigated by Thais, a Greek courtezan. The assassination of his bosom-friend Clitus, by the same Alexander, at Ecbatana, was perpetrated in a drunken debauch; and this great hero of antiquity, so falsely surnamed "the Great," after subjugating nearly all Asia by his arms, himself suffered a premature death at the early age of 33, from a fierce fever brought on by excessive draughts of wine in a banquet at Babylon. Though competent to subdue the world in arms, he was unable to command himself; and thus the most powerful conqueror of his own or any other age, was himself conquered by the most potent slayer of the human race.

It would be easy to fill a volume with similar examples from sacred and profane history, of the evils arising from the use of stimulating drinks, but enough has been said to satisfy all those who are open to conviction on the subject. Let us turn therefore from the records of the past, to the actual state of present times, to enlarge our information on this subject.

It is worthy of remark, that during all the ages which have rolled by since the first proof of the intoxicating quality of wine was made manifest in the instance of Noah, up to a very recent period from the present day, neither the injunctions of the Sacred Volume, nor the admonitions of the priest