Grappling with the Monster eBook

Timothy Shay Arthur
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 245 pages of information about Grappling with the Monster.

Grappling with the Monster eBook

Timothy Shay Arthur
This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 245 pages of information about Grappling with the Monster.
The superintendent is Dr. Albert Day.  In 1863, another institution of this character came into existence in the city of Chicago.  This is also called the “Washingtonian Home.”  It is situated in West Madison Street, opposite Union Park.  The building is large and handsomely fitted up, and has accommodations for over one hundred inmates.  Prof.  D. Wilkins is the superintendent.  In 1872 “The Franklin Reformatory Home,” of Philadelphia, was established.  It is located at Nos. 911, 913 and 915 Locust Street, in a well-arranged and thoroughly-furnished building, in which all the comforts of a home may be found, and can accommodate over seventy persons.  Mr. John Graff is the superintendent.

As we have said, the name of these institutions indicates their character.  They are not so much hospitals for the cure of a disease, as homes of refuge and safety, into which the poor inebriate, who has lost or destroyed his own home, with all its good and saving influences, may come and make a new effort, under the most favoring influences, to recover himself.

The success which, has attended the work of the three institutions named above, has been of the most gratifying character.  In the

WASHINGTONIAN HOME AT BOSTON,

drunkenness has been regarded as a malady, which may be cured through the application of remedial agencies that can be successfully employed only under certain conditions; and these are sought to be secured for the patient.  The home and the hospital are, in a certain sense, united.  “While we are treating inebriety as a disease, or a pathological condition,” says the superintendent, in his last report, “there are those who regard it as a species of wickedness or diabolism, to be removed only by moral agencies.  Both of these propositions are true in a certain sense.  There is a difference between sin and evil, but the line of demarkation is, as yet, obscure, as much so as the line between the responsibility and irresponsibility of the inebriate.”

Doubtless, the good work done in this excellent institution is due, in a large measure, to the moral and religious influences under which the inmates are brought.  Nature is quick to repair physical waste and deterioration, when the exciting causes of disease are removed.  The diseased body of the drunkard, as soon as it is relieved from the poisoning influence of alcohol, is restored, in a measure, to health.  The brain is clear once more, and the moral faculties again able to act with reason and conscience.  And here comes in the true work of the Home, which is the restoration of the man to a state of rational self-control; the quickening in his heart of old affections, and the revival of old and better desires and principles.

BENEFICIAL RESULTS.

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Grappling with the Monster from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.