TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Evening Post, Volume LV, Issue 125, 28 May 1898, Page 4 (Supplement)

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

£The matter for this column is supplied by a representative of the local Temperance bodies, who alone is responsible for the opinions expressed in it.] THE MORAL ASPECT OF THE BUSINESS. The Yen. Archdeacon Madden declares that 'the cant and hypocrisy of "the trade " is nauseating. It talks philanthropy, it subscribes to festivities for the poor and degraded (mostly victims of drink) and it solemnly declares it has no interest in manufacturing drunkards, and yot as soon as anyone suggests some scheme to reduce the " frightful temptations " con- | nected with the sale of intoxicants, the whole trade is up in arms. Why ? Because they fear that any reform in the drinking habits of the people will reduce the quantity of liquors sold, and so reduce thoir profits. The moral well-being of their fellow •citizens concerns them very little; what concerns them is their dividends. They have deolared that their "trade is their politics," and, in many oases, we may assume from thoir conduct that their trade is their religion. We have had several illustrations of this lately in the city of Liverpool. Moral considerations were nothing to them. But if these men will not face the moral quostions connected with the sale of intoxicants, it is the duty of tho Church of God to force them to think of the moral ajpeot of their business, and to tell them in plain and unmistakable language that riches gained through, the degradation of their fellows aro ill-gotten and must carry with them the ourso of God. It is for the Church to tell men that aftor the fortune thus made comes death, and after death the judgment. It is for the Church to teaoh men to look upon themselves as they will be looked upon in the searching light of the great white throne. It is for the clergy of the Church in all charity, but in faithfulness, to exhort and to rebuke men on this subject of drunkenness and the drink traffic'