projects; a sum so vast, that if saved annually, for seven years, would blot out the national debt!” Another writer says, “that in the year 1865, over L6,000,000, or a tenth part of the whole national revenue, was required to support her paupers.”  Dr. Lees, of London, in speaking of Ireland, says:  “Ireland has been a poor nation from want of capital, and has wanted capital chiefly because the people have preferred swallowing it to saving it.”  The Rev. G. Holt, chaplain of the Birmingham Workhouse, says:  “From my own experience, I am convinced of the accuracy of a statement made by the late governor, that of every one hundred persons admitted, ninety-nine were reduced to this state of humiliation and dependence, either directly or indirectly, through the prevalent and ruinous drinking usages.”

[Illustration:  Heaping burdens upon poverty.]

Mr. Charles Buxton, M.P., in his pamphlet, “How to Stop Drunkenness,” says:  “It would not be too much to say that if all drinking of fermented liquors could be done away, crime of every kind would fall to a fourth of its present amount, and the whole tone of moral feeling in the lower order might be indefinitely raised.  Not only does this vice produce all kinds of wanton mischief, but it has also a negative effect of great importance.  It is the mightiest of all the forces that clog the progress of good. * * * The struggle of the school, the library and the church, all united against the beer-shop and the gin-palace, is but one development of the war between Heaven and hell.  It is, in short, intoxication that fills our jails; it is intoxication that fills our lunatic asylums; it is intoxication that fills our work-houses with poor.  Were it not for this one cause, pauperism would be nearly extinguished in England.”

THE BLIGHT EVERYWHERE.

We could go on and fill pages with corroborative facts and figures, drawn from the most reliable sources.  But these are amply sufficient to show the extent and magnitude of the curse which the liquor traffic has laid upon our people.  Its blight is everywhere—­on our industries, on our social life; on our politics, and even on our religion.

And, now, let us take the individual man himself, and see in what manner this treacherous enemy deals with him when he gets him into his power.

CHAPTER II.

It curses the body.

First as to the body.  One would suppose, from the marred and scarred, and sometimes awfully disfigured forms and faces of men who have indulged in intoxicating drinks, which are to be seen everywhere and among all classes of society, that there would be no need of other testimony to show that alcohol is an enemy to the body.  And yet, strange to say, men of good sense, clear judgment and quick perception in all moral questions and in the general affairs of life, are often so blind, or infatuated here, as to affirm that this substance, alcohol, which they use under the various forms of wine, brandy, whisky, gin, ale or beer, is not only harmless, when taken in moderation—­each being his own judge as to what “moderation” means—­but actually useful and nutritious!