The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. MONDAY, AUGUST 14, 1899. PROHIBITION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 191, 14 August 1899, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

MONDAY, AUGUST 14, 1899. PROHIBITION.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For tho wrong that needs resistance, For the futuro in the distance, And the good that we can do.

During his recent visit to England the Rev. L. M. Isitt was struck by the marked difference between the attitude of the Church there towards. Prohibition and that adopted in this country. Methodism is the backbone of tlfe movement in New Zealand. Wesleyan ministers relieved from their ordinary duties, parade the colony as prohibitionist lecturers, and the Primitive Methodists, not to outdone by the followers of John AVesley, have passed a resolution in favour of making- teetotalism a necessary condition to admission to the Snerament. This has been appealed against to the Home Church, but if allowed it will come to pass that the cup of brotherly kindness which passed from hand to hand at the Last Supper of Jesus and His disciples will have become a rock of offence among- believers; and not faith in a Divine. Saviour, but a narrow sectarian fetishism relating- to meat and drink will, with one section of the Church, have been t made the test of admission to the Christian communion. What, it may well be asked, is the cause of this wide divergence of opinion between the English and colonial divisions of a. Christian body which acknowledges the same standards of faith? Evtreme Prohibitionists tell us that it is the corrupt; I<* power of the liquor traffic, for so self-blinded have they become to the proportion of. thing-s that, this insolent taunt is hurled at the head of everyone who dares to resist their arrogant dictation. We think, however, that much more rational explanations may be found. It should not be forgotten that the ! assertion of the right of private judgment, which lies at the very foundation of English liberty, owes ! much to the zeal and self sacrifice of the Nonconformist bodies, and that spirit has not yet been lost among the Churches of Great Britain. History, however, teaches that the spirit of ecclesiasticism is the same in all ages and among1 all creeds. Even the Puritans, who had suffered so iiineh for their faith in England became persecutors in the communities v\;hich they .founded on the American Continent. By the laws of Massachusetts a Quaker upon first conviction had an ear cut i oft', and a second conviction was punished by the other ear being severed. The penalty for a third offence was to bore through the tongue with a hot iron. These measures failing, men and women belonging to the Society of Friends were hung, until even that not very exemplary King Charles the Second was aroused to action on behalf of these persecuted subjects and put an end to the brutal colonial statutes which were being enforced against them.

Perhaps one must not be surprised that the outcome of strong conviction is a determination to use force against those who resist moral suasion. We must also remember that human nature is more or less the same in all generations, and self-righteousness did not become extinct with the disappearance of the Scribes and Pharisees of Xew Testament times.

In addition to the surviving love of personal freedom and the right of private judgment in the Home Churches they are undoubtedly influenced by an intelligent recognition of the total inefficacy of coercion as a reformatory agent, and especially, when applied to a practice in which large numbers of free born people can perceive no moral wrong. It was alike amusing and instructive to listen to the outcry which arose from the Prohibitionists when it was proposed to enforce the city by-law against street meetings. How many martyrs offered themselves as willing candidates for Mount Eden gaol rather than submit to this tyrannical law! Does it not occur to some of these gentlemen that the sane passion of resistance arises in the breasts of many people who do not care twopence about alcohol, but who see in the spirit of intolerance which animates this movement an offensive and dangerous interference •with personal liberty.

We have before us a copy of "The Methodist Beeordeiy' one of the oldest and most representative Methodist newspapers in Britain, in which the editor reviews at considerable length Messrs Eonntree's and Shenvn.ll's recent moimraental work on the temperance problem and social reform. The authors of this book nre no friends of the liquor traffic, but they deal with "it as General Booth did, as a practical question which cannot be disposed of so summarily as the' Prohibitionists would have us believe. As the "Recorder" states, "Crossing the seas, they have searched the experiments tried by other nations and by English Colonial Governments and municipalities. Prohibition, State Monopoly. High License, Local Option in various forms, and Municipal Con--trol are reviewed. The writers have been anxious to discover facts and to arrive at the truth. In a final chapter the fruit of so much labour is pre-

sented in a proposal which, it is hoped, | may unite all reasonable men in one sunreme effort to solve the problem, and to remove one of the greatest f T1 hindrances to social reform The writers are not 'cranks ; they are under no illusions; they warn us against the fallacy that drink is the only source of crime and sorrow in • y ' ~ , , the country, or that temperance reform is'the only remedy for existing evils. Nor do they attach undue importauce to the statistical facts marshailed in formidable array." Such is the "Recorder's" description of the authors of this book, whose remedy is State control, or a modification of the Scandinavian plan, popularly known as the Gothenburg system. As to the effect of Prohibition, these careful observers find that "Prohibition has been fairly successful in rural districts, but has failed in,towns and cities," -where they demonstrate from a mass of evidence, "it intensifies drunkenness and is productive of serious and widespread demoralisation." But for .the fact that the book strongly condemns private monopoly and the political influence of. the trade.. we should fully- expect to hear Messrs Rou.atreeanriSherwell denounced from Prohibitionist platforms as "publicans' pups." "subsidised liars," and such o+her elegant epithets as find favour in those so-called temperance quarters. The Rev. Hugh Price Hughes and many other leading ministers of the Wesleyan Church, however, ■ are disposed with "The Methodist Recorder " to consider their work in a very different spirit, and we have no doubt many other true friends of temperance will do the same