Part 4

WE BELIEVE there is no evil in our land so great as the use of intoxicating liquors. No evil is causing so much sorrow, so many tears, blighting so many bright hopes and sunny prospects, breaking up so many happy homes. We punish the robber by the law, and no robber can compare with the Robber Intemperance. He robs the home of its sanctity and its joys; it robs the brain of its power and its intelligence; it robs the heart of its love and its emotions; it robs the man of his manliness and reduces him to a level with the brute; it robs youth of its hopes and its prospects; it robs childhood of everything which makes for comfort and happiness. We furnish the murder by law. No murderer is so cold-blooded as is intemperance. It murders one hundred thousand American citizens annually. If an epidemic were to break out, like smallpox, cholera, or yellow fever, which was destroying half as many lives our authorities would quarantine against it very quickly, and would spend millions of dollars, if need be, to stop the devastation, while that which intemperance is making no great notice is taken, for if we do, we will hurt our party, for the whisky element will vote with the other party. Now, gentle reader, isn’t it better to stand for the right, for God and the home, and for the country? even at the risk of being defeated in the election, than to stand for wrong in order to carry the election. Think of gray heads going to their graves in sorrow, because intemperance has ruined their children, and your vote helped to cause that ruin. Think of the men who are now in the various state prisons, and your vote helped to put them there. Think of the oceans of tears that wives and mothers have shed, and your vote helped to cause those tears. Think of the hunger and cold that little innocent children have suffered, and your vote helped to cause that suffering. Look at that little innocent boy and think that maybe that little boy will fill a drunkard’s grave, and my vote will help to cause it so, because of my love for my beloved party. Look at the little innocent girl, and think maybe, that little girl is to be the wife of a drunkard, and that my vote helped to cause it so, for the sake of my party. Dear reader, let me appeal to you: Why should we rate political party above every other consideration? Oh! the cruel monster, intemperance. No pen can ever write the enormity of his crimes. No orator’s tongue can ever tell the magnitude of his guilt. Like a vile serpent, he tightens his slimy coils around everything that is noble and good, of American institutions and American manhood. No place on earth is too sacred for his poisonous fangs. No hopes or prospects are too bright for his blighting and withering influence. Oh! let us arise in our manhood and bury him so deep that there will be no possibility of his resurrection. How I would like to be one of the pall-bearers and help to bear him to his last resting place. Then a shout of joy would go up; a shout such as was never heard on the earth. A shout from the throats of millions of wronged and oppressed mothers and children. A shout of “peace on earth, good will to men!”

A Sad Sight.

DEAR Wife, I’ve seen the saddest sight, I ever yet have seen; A mother begging at a gate. She looked so pale and lean.

She had three children, by her side, Their clothes were old and poor; She said her husband came home drunk, And turned them from the door.

The little children had no shoes, And they were nearly froze. She said: “The trouble I have had There is nobody knows.”

She said: “I work most night and day,” And this, too, is what she said: “Most all my wages go for drink, “And the children cry for bread.”

She said: “I don’t know what to do, “We have no place to go; “I know the children can’t live long “Out in this sleet and snow.”

“I know they are very hungry, “And, I know they are very cold,” She said: “My man drinks all the time, “And all our things are sold.”

“He often cries, and talks to me, “And says it is a shame— “And he tries so hard to quit it, “That I know he is not to blame.”

“I never say a word to him, “It would only make things worse— “The men who vote it in his road, “Are the men I blame the worst.”

The Bright Side.

THE Author of this little book has had a pretty happy life. We have had the same difficulties to contend with that other people have had, but we knew the bright side of things was the best side to look at, and we believe we have been able to see a brighter side to most things than most of the people have. Most everything that comes in our road has a bright side to it, if we are only able to see that bright side. If we are seeking to do right, that fact, of itself, turns the dark side of the picture to the wall, and beautiful fields, singing birds, and blooming flowers are ours. If the readers of our little book would only cast off their unnecessary gloom and forebodings, the world would be brighter and happier and the people would be healthier and happier, and they would live a great deal longer.

Good-Bye.

NOW, Gentle Reader, we bid you good-bye, wishing you much happiness and peace, and hoping you have been interested in reading the little book, and that you have read something in it which will do you good, that you may be the better prepared for the battles of life and for great usefulness to others. That you will pardon whatever mistakes you have found; and that you will retain a kind feeling for the author; that when we meet, we may have a real, warm hand-shake, and that we may thus get better acquainted, and love each other more. Good-bye.

THE AUTHOR.

* * * * *

Transcriber’s Note: To keep the original flavor of this book, no corrections were made to typos or printing errors. All were all retained as originally printed.

“allegance” for “allegiance” “murmer” for “murmur” “scareing” for “scaring” “was” for “were” “ubout” for “about”

End of Project Gutenberg's Pioneer Life in Illinois, by F. M. Perryman