“I have had little or no faith in any of the efforts which have been made to reform drunkenness, for none of them, in my view, went down to the core of the matter.  I know enough of human nature and its depravity, of the power of sensual allurement and corporeal appetite, to be very sure that pledges, and the work usually done for inebriates in the asylums established for their benefit, cannot, except in a few cases, be of any permanent good.  No man who has once been enslaved by any inordinate appetite can, in my view, ever get beyond the danger of re-enslavement unless through a change wrought in him by God, and this can only take place after a prayerful submission of himself to God and obedience to his divine laws so far as lies in his power.  In other words, Mrs. Birtwell, the Church must come to his aid.  It is for this reason that I have never had much faith in temperance societies as agents of personal reformation.  To lift up from any evil is the work of the Church, and in her lies the only true power of salvation.”

“But,” said Mrs. Birtwell, “is not all work which has for its end the saving of man from evil God’s work?  It is surely not the work of an enemy.”

“God forbid that I should say so.  Every saving effort, no matter how or when made, is work for God and humanity.  Do not misunderstand me.  I say nothing against temperance societies.  They have done and are still doing much good, and I honor the men who organize and work through them.  Their beneficent power is seen in a changed and changing public sentiment, in efforts to reach the sources of a great and destructive evil, and especially in their conservative and restraining influence.  But when a man is overcome of the terrible vice against which they stand in battle array, when he is struck down by the enemy and taken prisoner, a stronger hand than theirs is needed to rescue him, even the hand of God; and this is why I hold that, except in the Church, there is little or no hope for the drunkard.”

“But we cannot bring these poor fallen creatures into the Church,” answered Mrs. Birtwell.  “They shun its doors.  They stand afar off.”

“The Church must go to them,” said Mr. Elliott—­“go as Christ, the great Head of the Church, himself went to the lowest and the vilest, and lift them up, and not only lift them up, but encompass them round with its saving influences.”

“How is this to be done?” asked Mrs. Birtwell.

“That has been our great and difficult problem; but, thank God! it is, I verily believe, now being solved.”

“How?  Where?” eagerly asked Mrs. Birtwell.  “What Church has undertaken the work?”

“A Church not organized for worship and spiritual culture, but with a single purpose to go into the wilderness and desert places in search of lost sheep, and bring them, if possible, back to the fold of God.  I heard of it only to-day, though for more than a year it has been at work in our midst.  Men and women of nearly every denomination have joined in the organization of this church, and are working together in love and unity.  Methodists, Episcopalians, Baptists, Presbyterians, Swedenborgians, Congregationalists, Universalists and Unitarians, so called, here clasp hands in a common Christian brotherhood, and give themselves to the work of saving the lost and lifting up the fallen.”