Page 2 Advertisements Column 2

Wellington Independent, Volume XXVIII, Issue 3922, 9 October 1873, Page 2

[ADVERTISEMENT.] REPLY TO "MORAL SUASION." « In the Independent of the 6th instant a correspondent, who signs as "Moral' Suasion," criticises Mr Fox's letter which appeared in our columns, explanatory of the recently-enacted Permissive Bill. Thfc critic manifests the confusion of ideas usually exhibited by persons who. have not studied, or who do not understand the liquor traffic question. He jumbles up teetotalism and prohibition, and confounds drunkenness and drinking habits. He evidently conceives that it is only the reformation of the out-and-out drunkard* that the advocates of the Permissive Bill propose ; and not the suppression of those fuddling habits which are the ruin of bur social system, and of which drunkenness is only the extreme development. -But the aim of his letter, so far as he can ; ba said to have any aim, beyond censuring Mr Fox, is to establish that moral suasion „ and not prohibition is the real remedy. fop < the evil. That ia the gist of his lettey.y If that is really all he has to say, he might, in our opinion, as well have left it unsaid. It has been often said before, and nothing came of it. '\. "•■■-- ■' ' /'' '\,:-.i The whole foundation of the argument ~ in favor of prohibition, whether, permis- \ v sive or absolute, is that moral suasion, after a protracted trial of fifty yealNi|t|fi&l|| failed to cure the drinking habits :oi;sbjf*| -• ■- -'."•■ '; • >■""" ; "" ••"■'.'- vi^SS^SfeS