An earnest appeal to the working-men of England against the use of intoxicating drinks and tobacco / [by a Total Abstainer and No Smoker].

  • Total Abstainer and No Smoker.
Date:
[1870?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An earnest appeal to the working-men of England against the use of intoxicating drinks and tobacco / [by a Total Abstainer and No Smoker]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    2/4 (page 2)
    Besides, does not this habit take many of you away from your own families of an evening, and bring yon into bad company ? What kind of people do you find at the public-house ? How do they talk ? How do they sing ? You know. Then why go near them ? Is it not better to keep at home ? And now I come to the most important point of all; and I solemnly ask you if the habit of drinking does not very often lead to downright drunkenness]? 0 working men, think of the drunk¬ enness of the land, what a curse it is ! How many millions have been ruined by drink! How many have become paupers, lunatics, and criminals by drink! What multitudes have lost their lives through accidents occasioned by drink ! How many souls have perished eternally through drink ! Consider these things, and then say if drink is to be trifled with. I know that people talk a great deal about moderation in drink¬ ing, but why touch intoxicating liquors at all ? To take the intoxicating cup into the hand is to run into temptation ; and what countless numbers have yielded to the temptation, although they once fancied that they would never fall! Alas ! how often does the half-pint become a pint, and the pint 2 pints, and so on to complete intoxication ! Then surely it is wiser to put this pernicious drink entirely away, and thus escape from a temptation which has proved too strong for so many. It is the hahit of drinking which is at the root of all the excess in the land, and makes the working-classes so dependent upon others. Then I say, give it up. Give it up at once. Give it up for ever. Believe me, you want neither the pipe nor the glass. You will be better both in mind and body without either of them. I am not asking you to do what I will not do myself. Years ago I gave up all strong drinks, and find myself the better and stronger for so doing. And as for smoking, 1 never did smoke. I never spent a farthing in tobacco in my life, and never will. I should be ashamed to waste my money in that way. But “Oh,” some will say, “you want to deprive the labouring classes of their comforts” But I answer, by no means. Drink¬ ing and smoking are false comforts. They are mockers. They come as friends, but prove themselves enemies, like snakes cher¬ ished in the bosom. We hear how working men have of late years advanced in intelligence, and that consequently, they have become entitled to the elective franchise ; and is it possible that they can call the merriment and the excitement, or the drowsiness and the stupe¬ faction always more or less produced by alcoholic drinks and tobacco, “ comforts” ? Alas! that men who have any respect for themselves should want such comforts ! Do you really mean to say that it is comfortable to be fuddled ? Do not poverty, anger, strife, harsh words, swearing and fighting, often arise from drinking ? These are not comforts.