TOTAL ABSTINENCE STATISTICS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1158, 7 February 1874, Page 2

TOTAL ABSTINENCE STATISTICS.

There never was an association which rested more upon figures for their arguments than the Total Abstainers. A perusal of a report of their meetings gives us something like the same feeling as the perusal of a financial budget. We may take it for granted that the argument from figures has now been placed in almost every conceivable light. The total number of gallons, pints, hogsheads ; the total number of abstainers, drunkards, and moderates ; the total number of square, cubical, and lineal feet drunk — have we not found them all written down in the annual speeches of the advocates of the Permissive Bill? It is almost impossible to contrive a new method of presenting alcoholic statistics. So ingenious have been the methods devised by which to popularise the subject, and so persistent have been the efforts to drive the matter into the public brain, that we may fairly consider the subject as fully presented. Mr Dawson Burns, writing to the London Times not long ago, repeated the statistics with which most of us are more or less familiar, and assured the world that Great Britain in 1872 had spent upon drink the sum of almost one hundred and twenty millions of pounds. The fact that notwithstanding all the efforts of the various abstaining bodies this amount was something like a million more than had been spent in 1871, is the first fact worth noting. To less determined spirits (if we may call them so without offence) this would suggest a doubt whether their method of diminishing the consumption of alcohol was the best, whether indeed it was worth persisting in. Making every allowance for the increase in general prosperity, which was beyond all doubt the immediate cause of the increased expenditure upon drink, it is a remarkable fact that all the lodges of the United Kingdom have not succeeded in keeping the amount of drink consumed at a stationary point If we are to judge by the usual practical test of success, we must say that the abstainers have entirely failed in their purpose. We are far from saying that such an argument is good for much. It must be remembered, however, that it is one which as time goes by will become more and more powerful. It may be quite true to say if it was not for the number ot total abstainers the statistics of total consumption would be far more amazing ; it may be also true to say that the proportion consumed per head would become terrific. At the same time, using the figures given by Mr Buiins against the cause he represents, there is even now much to be said against his friends and their method. They give up aa enQrißQiw total of expenditure,

f and contrast the amount thus spent ■with that upon such articles as tea, bread, or butcher's meat. That is, they represent the drink money as more or less waste money by comparison. It is true that the whole sum comes to only 2d per head per day of the population; but many drink nothing. llt seems, therefore, that abstinence, as a theory — a creed — succeeds in making moderate men abstinent rather than in making drunkards either moderate or abstinent. Mr Burns as good as admits this. Being taunted by the fact that some 2d per head was not much for daily consumption, he says that many drink nothing 1 , and that "it may be fairly assumed that any increase in the annual consumption of liquor mainly arises from the increased drinking of those who have been previously among the largest consumers." If this be so — and we have no reason to doubt the fact — the answer is very plain. So long as increased consumption arises from the larger demands of alreadylarge consumers, the conclusion is obvious that abstinence is succeeding where it is not wanted (unless all drinking is admitted to be bad, however moderate), and is failing just where it is really wanted, viz., as a check to an immoderate consumption. Such a result tallies with the experience of most of us. When temperance advocates lay themselves out for a good self-glorification, we are told in that style of language which Mr Tkollope condemned, that the lodges are so many members, so many, etc., tfce. Such self-laudation is perfectly consistent and in harmony with the profession of those who hold that a moderate drinker is likely to grow into a drunkard, and that any consumption of strong drink is a mistake or even a sin. To that very large portion of the public who despise and loathe drunkenness, but have no objection whatever to moderate drinking 1 , the proof from the numbers of abstainers is without any force. The question is this :— ls the teaching the spread of total abstinence likely to put a stop to the crime of drunkenness ; if it is, many will look with a kindly eye upon its persistent efforts. If, however, men are only brought to take the pledge who would spend no more than their 2d per diem at any rate, then the society is really doing nothing, is worth nothing to the world. If, as is probably the case, there are nins men oub of every ten in a Good Templars' Lodge, who, if it had never been created, would have drunk moderately, and only one rescued drunkard, then we begin to ask : Is the machinery the best for its professed end? This is, indeed, the real issue which is becoming more and more apparent every day. Is it better to attempt to persuade the world to abstain entirely, or to show them whereabouts to' stop 1 Is the impression made by abstainers upon the drunkenness of a country sufficient to justify their expenditure of time and trouble, and money 1 We are presented ad nauseam with figures which show that so many are drunkards, so many are abstainers, so much is spent on drink, and so much on cotton. We seldom, or never, see reliable statistics showing that the drunkenness in such a community amounted to so much, and that when a Good Templars' Lodge was started it decreased by so much per cent. The impression left upon our minds by a perusal of the statistics paraded is that " the pledge" is helpless before the evil with which it contends. We are not surprised that such is the case, inasmuch as the principle ot abstinence has been tried a hundred times in respect of other passions, and been found wanting. Its success, as is proved by the number of its disciples, is owing to the fact that there are a great many people who don't like alcohol in any shape, and have therefore no objection to pledging themselves not to drink it ; many more who are so indifferent about whether they drink or do not drink it, as to be quite Avilling to join themselves to the army of orusaders who declare thnt they are going to give the death blow to a crying iniquity. When we read the facts and figures of intemperance, we are impressed above all things by the truth that the abstainers have really checked it in an injinitwimal degree, if &t all,