never so little and the torrent will force its way through and drown every worthy resolution.  Its tide is next to resistless.  Days of drunkenness succeed, months of self-denial are lost, and deplorable results follow everywhere.  Wives are driven to desperation, mothers to despair, children to want.  Demoralization, starvation, damnation follow.  Friends are separated, homes are desolated, and souls are driven to hell itself, and yet people will talk lightly, and even jokingly of the very thing which leads to these terrible losses and sufferings—­out on a spree.

Debauches not only destroy all capacity for usefulness while they last, but they demand the vital strength which has wisely been gathered in the system for days of possible need, when sickness and natural infirmities will lay hands on the mind or body.  The debauch of to-day will borrow from to-morrow or from next week, or month, or year, that which can not be restored.  The bloated face, the dull, glassy eye, the furtive glance of fear and shame, the trembling gait, all speak of ravages produced by other causes than those of time.  Indeed, the flight of years can produce no such effects, for inexorable and wearing as fleeting days and months are, their natural results differ very widely from those which are caused by an abuse of the powers of nature.  Besides this, many men who are shattered wrecks are still young in years, and the dew of youth but for dissipation might yet have glistened on their foreheads.

It was at this period that the appetite burst forth in a fearful flame which scorched life itself, and burnt every energy of my being.  It was fast getting to be a consuming, craving, devouring passion, subjecting my very soul to its dreadful tyranny.  My spells increased in frequency, and their duration was more and more prolonged.  I would remain drunk from eight to ten days, until I got so nervous that I could not sleep, and night after night I would be counting the hours and longing for morning, which, when it came with its blessed light, gradually revealing the pattern of the paper on the walls, caused me to hide my face in the bedclothes and wish for black and never-ending night to come and hide me from the world and my misery.  From such vigils, feverish and unrefreshed, it may easily be supposed that I sought the open window in anguish, and bathed my aching, throbbing forehead in the cool, pure air.  At last my condition became so deplorable that my friends sent my father word to come and take me home, which he did.  While at Connersville, in all my dark and desolate trials, William Beck was my friend and helper.  He never then forsook me, and he never since has forsaken me, but still remains my faithful and sympathizing friend—­a friend whose valuation is beyond gold, and for whom I entertain the deepest feelings of gratitude.  I returned home with my father and remained several months, keeping sober all the while.  During most of the time I applied myself vigorously to the study of the law, making rapid progress.