V

"So I uncover the land, which of old time I hid in the west,As the sculptor uncovers his statue, when he has wrought his best."

"So I uncover the land, which of old time I hid in the west,

As the sculptor uncovers his statue, when he has wrought his best."

Yet grand as this country has grown to be, "the eagle of liberty can never reach the pinion heights its wings were made to measure," while the shell of wasted resources to which I have referred bows low its head. Money won't save us. Babylon had her gold standard; her images were made of gold. Media, Persia, had her free silver standard; her images were made of silver. Rome had her gold, her silver, brass and iron; yet they were all dashed to pieces on the world's highway. "In the hollow of the hand of God is the destiny of this republic," and we cannot buy Him with money. The wealth thatsatisfies the ruler of nations is character.

Some one said a few years ago, and it went the rounds of the press: "The question during the Civil War was, shall we have two governments or one; now the question is, shall we have any?" I quote to you with as much confidence as any mortal ever proclaimed a truth: "This republic will never fail or fall until God deserts it, and God will not desert it until we desert Him."

"Come the world in arms,We'll defeat, and then pursue;Nothing can our flag destroy,While to God and self we're true."

"Come the world in arms,

We'll defeat, and then pursue;

Nothing can our flag destroy,

While to God and self we're true."

I am not one of those who believe our war with Spain was an accident. For Dewey to cross that dead line at midnight; when morning dawned to find mines of death behind him, an enemy's fleet of eleven ships before him, these supported by shores belted with batteries; and yet within six hours sink or disable every ship in the fleet, silence the forts, lift the star spangled banner in triumph to wave, and not have a warship sunk, nor a sailor killed, means more than the mere skill of a Commodore. Some one may saywe had a better navy. Spain didn't think so. Before the war the Spanish papers said: "The United States is bluffing. She can't go to war with us. She has only twenty-five thousand soldiers, and they are kept out west to control cowboys and Indians. Then the South is waiting for an opportunity to break out in rebellion." Columbus discovered America in 1492; Spain didn't discover the United States until 1898.

Do you ask what we are to do with the Philippine Islands? I cannot tell you what is best, but I do know we didn't want them. The day Dewey sailed from Hong Kong to Manila Bay, if Spain had said to the United States: "Here are the Philippine Islands, we would like to make you a present of them," the United States would have replied, "We thank you, but decline the offer." Not one man in ten in this country would have voted to take them. But the next day we had them, had fought to get them; and I believe the same superhuman power that took from Spain, the Netherlands, Flanders, Malacca, Ceylon, Java, Portugal, Holland, San Domingo, Louisiana, Florida, Trinidad, Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia, Ecuador,Peru, Bolivia, Chili, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Patagonia, Guatemala, Honduras, San Salvador, Nicaragua, Porto Rico, Cuba, and "then some," took away from Spain the Philippine Islands and gave them to us, that the home, the church and the school might be established in the Islands.

Perhaps some of you think I am getting off my subject. I am not; I am talking now about theold man, Uncle Sam, and his mission in the world.

It is the opinion of many that we are under no obligation to the islands of the sea, but these conservative souls should not forget that we are not only citizens of the United States, but of the globe on which we dwell and of the universe of God. The world in which we live, lives because of the light and heat it receives from other worlds. If the rolling sun in the heavens is under obligation to furnish light for our pathway, heat for our soil and warmth for our blood, are we not under obligation to carry the light of civilization to the people whose shores and ours are washed by the same waters? If the full orbed moon is under obligation to pour its silver into our nights, and liftthe tides until our rivers are full, are not we under obligation to lift the tide of hope in the heart of oppressed humanity, and pour the light of intelligence into the night of ignorance? Did God give us this grand country, with its boundless resources, for us to draw our ocean skirts about our greatness and pass by our bruised and bleeding neighbor, lying half dead on life's Jericho road? If so, then call back our proud eagle of liberty from its pinion flight through the skies of national achievement, and make our national emblem the barnyard fowl that crows in the day dawn as if creating light instead of noise, and then runs for his roost when the shadows fall.

The Bible says we are fellow workers with God. What does this fellowship imply? It means there are some things we can't do, which God must do for us, and some things we can do He won't do for us. He puts the coal in the earth; we must dig and blast it out. He puts oil beneath the soil; we must bore into its wells and pump it out. He gives us the earth and "the fullness thereof;" we must do the sowing and reaping. He puts electricity in the air; we must bridle,saddle and harness it. He empties the clouds into the basins of the earth and gives us oceans, gulfs and lakes; but we must build boats to ride them. He puts humanity on the earth and bids us love our neighbor as ourselves.

Who is my neighbor? Some seem to think only those who live in our immediate community. I read of a minister of a city church who called upon one of his country members for a contribution for foreign missionary work. The country brother said: "I don't believe in foreign missions, and I must say, 'No'."

"Brother," the pastor said, "the Bible says you should love your neighbor as yourself."

"I do love my neighbors."

"Who are your neighbors?"

"Those whose farms adjoin mine, and perhaps, those whose farms adjoin theirs."

"How far do you own eastward?"

"To the third fence yonder."

"How far do you own toward the west?"

"About a half mile?"

"How deep do you own into the earth?"

"Well, I never thought of that, but about half-way, I guess."

"Well, my brother, I am asking you to help your neighbor China, who joins your line below."

I have a friend with plenty of this world's goods, and not a child. When approached by the ladies of the Foreign Mission Society he said: "I do not give to foreign missions; when you want anything for home missions I'll help you." Perhaps he would; but many of that class are represented by a colored man of whom I heard a Methodist bishop tell. He said to a friend: "Dat wife of mine is got money on de brain; it's money, money all the time. I can't go whar she is, but she's axing me for money. She's jest sho'ly gwine to run me to the lunatic 'sylum ef she don't quit her beggin' me for money."

The friend asked: "What does she do with so much money?"

The colored brother hesitated a minute, and said: "She don't do nuffin wid it, caze I ain't nevergiveher none yet."

My friend who opposes foreign missions said: "So much you give never gets there." Yes; and so many seed the farmer puts into the ground never grow, and so the farmer says,

"Put five grains in every hill:One for the cut-worm, one for the crow,One to blight, and two to grow."

"Put five grains in every hill:

One for the cut-worm, one for the crow,

One to blight, and two to grow."

And you cannot tell which will grow. A weed grew by the wayside in the old world. All it did was to furnish seed for the wind, and worry for the farmer. But one blustering day, the wind carried a seed from the wayside weed into a florist's garden; it sprouted, rooted and bloomed. The gardener was impressed by the beautiful coloring of the blossom, so he nurtured, transplanted and cultivated it into a beautiful flower. It was from this bush, once a weed, Queen Victoria selected the flower she carried when she entered the Crystal Palace to meet the world's representatives.

When Delia Laughlin went astray, her father drove her from his door. She was of that temperament that must either go to the heights or to the depths, and to the depths she went. Down the rapids of a sinful life her steps were swift. Along the Bowery she made her way to Five Points, where thieves and drunkards dwelt. It was said she could drink deeper, curse louder, and fight fiercer than any inmate of the most wicked spot inNew York City. Mrs. Whittemore went one day on her mission of mercy through the slums. She sought some one to accompany her who knew the deepest haunts of the wicked. Delia Laughlin was recommended to her. Mrs. Whittemore, with her Bible in one hand and a fragrant rose in the other, made her rounds. She was deeply impressed with the intellect and culture, as well as the beauty of the wayward girl who had been her guide through the slums. "Dear girl," she said; "you are too bright and beautiful to be down here. I wish you would come to see me at the Door of Hope Mission," and slipping a coin and the white rose into the soiled fingers she said, "Good-bye."

The girl loved flowers, so she took the white rose to her room and put it in water. Then with the coin she went to drown her misery in drink. Forty-eight hours later she had slept off the debauch, and taking the flower from the vase she said: "Ah! that represents my life. Once I was as pure as the rose when the good woman gave it to me. Those withered petals represent the withered graces of my life." From out that little flower an arrow went to the heart of Delia Laughlin. She tookthe street car and went to the Door of Hope Mission. Mrs. Whittemore met her and they talked together. While the girl wept Mrs. Whittemore prayed; she said: "O God, this poor girl has no other friend than you. Her father's home is closed against her. You have promised, when father and mother forsake, you will take the deserted one. Won't you take her now?" And God did take her; from that hour she was safe in the cleft of the Rock of Ages. When she addressed twelve hundred inmates of Auburn prison, a reporter said: "Never did John Wesley, John Knox, or Martin Luther do greater work for the Master." When laid in her casket in the Door of Hope Mission a few years later, a New York paper said: "Never did a fairer face or more eloquent tongue do work in slum life than Delia Laughlin."

"The stone o'er which you trample,May be a diamond in the rough.It may never never sparkle,Though made of diamond stuff."Because someone must find it,If it's ever found;And then someone must grind it,If it's ever ground."But when it's found, and when it's ground,And when it's burnished bright;Then henceforth a diamond crowned'Twill shine with lustrous light."

"The stone o'er which you trample,May be a diamond in the rough.It may never never sparkle,Though made of diamond stuff.

"The stone o'er which you trample,

May be a diamond in the rough.

It may never never sparkle,

Though made of diamond stuff.

"Because someone must find it,If it's ever found;And then someone must grind it,If it's ever ground.

"Because someone must find it,

If it's ever found;

And then someone must grind it,

If it's ever ground.

"But when it's found, and when it's ground,And when it's burnished bright;Then henceforth a diamond crowned'Twill shine with lustrous light."

"But when it's found, and when it's ground,

And when it's burnished bright;

Then henceforth a diamond crowned

'Twill shine with lustrous light."

You can't tell what seed will grow.

After the Civil War I lived for two years in Richmond, Kentucky. During that time the Klu Klux movement broke out in fury. Men were hanged, others whipped and driven from the county. On my way to market one morning I saw a man hanging from a limb of a tree in the court-house yard. On his sleeve was pinned a piece of paper, on which was written, "Let no one touch this body until the sun goes down." All day that body hung there and not an officer of the law dared to cut the rope. Such was the reign of terror no one offered a protest. One Saturday night a young man named Byron was hanged in the same court-house yard. He was the only son of a widowed mother, and he begged the mob to let him live for his mother's sake. Sunday morning several empty bottles lay about thetree, indicating that the men were drinking who did the deed. The evening after the hanging I gave an address in the Methodist Church for the Good Templars. I had no thought of referring to the hanging of young Byron, but in showing up the evils of drink, those empty bottles came to my mind, and I could imagine the old mother then weeping over her dead boy. Without considering the consequences I denounced the Klu Klux and the cowardice that permitted such lawlessness. After the lecture a young man of influence advised me to leave at once and not dare spend the night in the town. I felt sure the Klan could not be called together that night, so I ventured to spend the night at home. About eleven o'clock that night the front gate was opened, and tramp, tramp, tramp, came the sound of feet toward the cottage, which was about forty feet from the street. It seemed as if all was over with me, when the "pluck" of a string introduced a serenade from the string band of the little city. Since the daughters of Judah hung their harps upon the willows, no sweeter music has ever fallen upon mortal ears than I heard that night from the string band of Richmond,Kentucky.

I do not know how much my speaking out against Klu Klux had to do with arresting the outlawry that made the roads rattle with the clatter of the hoofs of horses at midnight raids, but I do know young Byron was the last man hanged by the Klu Klux in Madison county, and may I not hope the unpremeditated protest made in that Sunday evening address, helped in some measure to bring about the transformation, and contribute a mite to the public sentiment that has made Richmond a saloonless place in which to live.

You cannot tell what seed will grow. Already out of the new woman movement has come a host led by such women as Frances E. Willard, Mary A. Livermore, Clara Hoffman, Dr. Anna Shaw, Jane Addams, Maude Ballington Booth, Susan B. Anthony, and in our own state, Frances E. Beauchamp. These and many more have been springing the bolts that have barred woman from spheres of great usefulness.

Allow me to say, I have no patience with the mannish woman (and about as little use for a feminine man); but if this old world is ever to be redeemed it is becauseHe who sitteth on the throne has said: "Behold I make all things new."

Oh! for a new man, who will stop the waste of wealth and destruction of morals to which I have referred. Oh! for the day when "each sex will be the equal of the other in the average, each above the other in specialties; when each can see in the other a source of inspiration," and both worthy to have been created in the beginning a "little lower than the angels" and in the end to be crowned with glory and honor.

I do not assert that everyone who drinks intoxicating liquor as a beverage will become a drunkard, but I do come before this audience to hold up total-abstinence as safer and better for practice. Drunkards are made of moderate drinkers; drunkards are never made of total abstainers. Onemaydrink and never get drunk; one cannot get drunk who never drinks. Take away every drunkard from the earth today and moderate drinking will soon create another supply; but sweep all drunkenness from the world, let total-abstinence be the absolute rule and the last drunkard will have debased his body, ruined his character, and doomed his soul.

Since running the risk of being a moderate drinker is so great, I commend to the young people before me the caution of the Scotch minister, who, when called upon tomarry a couple, said: "My young friends, marriage is a blessing to a great many persons; it's a curse to some; it's a risk for everybody; will you take the venture?" I presume they did. I do not believe the use of intoxicating liquor as a beverage is a benefit to anyone, yet for argument's sake I will permit one who drinks to say: "Moderate drinking is a benefit to a few persons; it's a curse to a great many; it's a risk for everybody; let's take a drink!" Against this I affirm that total abstinence is a blessing to millions; it's a curse to nobody; it's safe and right for everybody; then let's take the pledge and God helping us, let's keep it.

A very comforting reply to the infidel who claims there will be no hereafter is the inscription on the tomb of a faithful Christian:

"If there's another world, he's in bliss;If not, he's made the best of this."

"If there's another world, he's in bliss;

If not, he's made the best of this."

If there is no hereafter, to say the least the Christian is even with the infidel, while if there is a hereafter it's bad for the infidel. If a moderate drinker has sufficient self-control to escape being a drunkard, the total abstainer is equally safe; but if the moderate drinker loses hisself-control and becomes a drunkard his doom is sealed. The safe definition of temperance is: "Moderation in regard to things useful and right, total-abstinence in regard to things hurtful and wrong." Is alcoholic liquor as a beverage hurtful and wrong? It's the source of more misery, cruelty and crime than any other evil of the world!

Some years ago after a lecture along this line, a doubting Thomas said to me: "What answer have you for the scholar who claims your very word 'temperance' is the offspring of a word that signifies moderation?" I said: "The same I would give to a Darwinian if he were to tell me I am a descendant of the ape; and that is, I rejoice to know I'm an improvement on my ancestor. To one who charges me with being a distant relative of the chimpanzee, I give the reply of Henry Ward Beecher: 'I don't care howfar distant.'" I acknowledge my ignorance of the derivation of the word temperance, but I do know drunkenness comes from drinking intoxicating liquor, therefore I favor total-abstinence and recommend it as the safe side of life for young men.

While, by quoting isolated passages of the Bible, advocates of moderation have succeeded in filling the air with dust of doubt about the teaching of the Scriptures on the wine question, there is one thing about which there is no question, and that is the consent of the Bible to total-abstinence for anyone who desires and "dares to be a Daniel." I would rather search my Bible for permission to give up that over which my brother may stumble into ruin, than to see how far I can go in the use of it without committing sin. Marriage feasts in Cana of Galilee two thousand years ago do not concern me so much as the social feasts of the present age where "wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging," and many are "deceived thereby."

A noted Bible scholar says: "The Bible is not simply a schedule of sins and duties catalogued and labeled, but a revelation of immutable principles, in the application of which God tests the sincerity of our profession." To drink intoxicating liquor in this enlightened age, with all the woes of intemperance about us and responsibilities of life upon us, is a violation of every immutable principle laid down in the Bible. First, it's against the law ofprudence, which says of two possible paths one should take the safer. Which is the safer, moderation or total-abstinence? Next, it's against the law of humility, which teaches where mightier than we have fallen, we must distrust ourselves. Have mightier than we fallen through strong drink? Next, it's against the law of human brotherhood, which makes it imperative upon the strong to bear the infirmities of the weak. Is the drinker weak? Next, it's against the law of expediency; "it is good neither to eat flesh nor drink wine nor anything whereby thy brother stumbleth." Do our brothers stumble over strong drink? Last, it's against the law of self-denial; "if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend." Does strong drink make our brother to offend? On these immutable principles the cause of sobriety is built, and the gates of the devil of drink shall not prevail against it.

Young man, let me give you a bit of advice and assurance. Never take a drink of intoxicating liquor as a beverage, and when you are as old as I am you will not regret it. You cannot find me in all theworld, one man between forty and eighty years of age, an abstainer all his life, who would change that record if he could. Boys, that's a very safe rule that has not a single exception. But how many are there who regret they ever put the bottle to their lips? "If I had only let strong drink alone" is the bitter wail of millions of men and women. From pauper poverty and prison cells, electric chairs and dying drunkard's lips comes the cry: "Drink has been my curse!"

Does some young man in this audience say, "I can quit if I please?" Then I beg you toplease, ere you reach the time when you will strive to quit, but in vain. I know you don't intend to go beyond your power of control; neither did the drunkards who have gone before you. Do you suppose Edgar Allen Poe dreamt when he took his first drink in the social gathering of an old Virginia gentleman's home that it would bring from his brilliant brain the weird strain:

"Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

Do you suppose Thomas F. Marshall, our gifted Kentucky orator, dreamt whenhe stood at the foot of the ladder of fame and all Kentucky pointed him to the golden glory of its summit, that his last words would be: "And this is the end. Tom Marshall dying; dying in a borrowed bed, under a borrowed sheet, and without a decent suit of clothes in which to be buried!"

I well remember the first time I saw Thomas Marshall. He had returned from Washington, where he had thrilled Congress by his eloquence. He was announced to speak in Lexington on court day afternoon. I went with my father from our country home to hear the then golden mouthed orator. For nearly two hours he swayed that audience as the storm king sways the mountain pine. On unseen wings of eloquence he soared to heights I had never imagined within the reach of mortal tongue.

I also remember the last time I saw this brilliant Kentuckian. He was standing on a street corner in Lexington, Kentucky. His hair hung a tangled mass about his forehead, his eagle eyes were dimmed by debauch, and a thin, worn coat was buttoned over soiled linen. As he straightened himself and started to the bar-room,I could see traces of greatness lingering about his brow like sheet lightning about the bosom of a summer storm cloud. Not long after he was telling political stories in a drinking tavern. When he tired of the tumult of the bar-room and a sense of his better self came over him, some one said: "Give us another, Tom." Rising to his feet he said: "You remind me of a set of bantam chickens, picking the sore head of an eagle when his wings are broken."

At one time in a temperance revival in Washington he took the pledge and kept it for months. During this time in a temperance meeting he was called upon to speak. The following brief extract shows the charm of his eloquence:

"I would not exchange my conscious being as a strictly sober man, the glad play with which my pulse now beats healthful music through my veins, the bounding vivacity with which my life blood courses its exultant way through every fiber of my frame, the communion high which my now healthful eye and ear hold with the universe around me, the splendors of the morning, the softness of the evening sky, the beauty, the verdure of the earth, the music of winds and waters. No, sir! withall these grand associations of external nature re-opened to the avenues of sense, though poverty dogged me, though scorn pointed its slow finger at me as I passed, though want, destitution and every element of early misery, save only crime, met my waking eye from day to day: Not for the brightest wreath that ever encircled a statesman's brow; not if some angel commissioned by heaven, or rather some demon sent from hell to test the resisting power of my virtuous resolution, were to tempt me back to the blighting bowl; not for the honors a world could bestow, would I cast from me this pledge of a liberated mind, this talisman against temptation, and plunge again into the horrors that once beset my path. So help me Heaven, I would spurn beneath my feet all the gifts a universe could offer, and live and die as I am—poor but sober."

Drinking young man, Thomas F. Marshall once stood where you now stand. He said then what you say now, yet after that beautiful tribute to sobriety and the pledge of total-abstinence, he stood at a blacksmith shop door, and as the smith drew the red hot iron from the forge, Mr. Marshall said to some friends: "Gentlemen, Iwould seize that rod of heated iron and hold it in my hand till it cools, if it would cure me of my terrible appetite for strong drink." This is but one of the many fallen stars the demon of drink has snatched from the galaxy of Kentucky's greatness and hurled into the darkness of eternal night.

A man who could drink and not get drunk said to me: "I have no patience with, nor sympathy for a drunkard. If I couldn't eat what I want and quit when I choose, I wouldn't claim to be a man." Whether he could or not, depends on conditions. Let my arm represent the scale of life, with will on one side and appetite on the other. When a man is healthy his will stands at eighty, his appetite at fifty. That man eats when he likes, or lets it alone as he chooses. But let this healthy, strong man take typhoid fever, and after six or eight weeks be reduced to almost a skeleton. At this stage, the fever having subsided, let the doctor say to the once strong man: "The fever is broken; be careful about your diet, no solid food, only chicken broth and gruel." Place by the bed of this once strong man a table and on this table a roast turkey, stuffedwith oysters. On the floor place a coffin and say to the patient: "You see that turkey and that coffin. If you eat the turkey today, you'll be in the coffin tomorrow." Go out and leave the man alone with the turkey. Will he eat it? I don't care if he's a preacher or a doctor he will, regardless of the advice of doctor or terror of the waiting coffin. Why will he eat when he knows it means death? Because his will has gone down to twenty and his appetite up to one hundred.

My father had typhoid fever and when the time of convalescing came my mother left him alone while she was in the yard with her flowers. I went into the house and found father had left his bed, crawled to the cupboard and had hold of what was left of a chicken. I called to mother; she came running, and taking the chicken from him said: "Don't you know to eat solid food will kill you?" Father replied: "I know if you hadn't come in I would have had one square meal."

Did I say too much when I said the preacher would eat the turkey? Years ago Saint John's pulpit in Louisville, Kentucky, was filled by a preacher so gifted that strangers in the city were attractedby his fame as an orator. He had an invalid mother, who in her wheel chair would attend every service, and was made happy in her affliction by the sermons of her eloquent son. He married a wealthy widow and had everything wealth and refinement could suggest. He saw no wrong in the wine glass and kept a supply in his cellar. Gradually appetite demanded stronger drinks and one morning his wife said: "Husband, you were drunk last night." A few months later he resigned his position and went west, hoping to break the spell of his habit. But no mountain was high enough, nor cavern dark enough for him to hide from his mad pursuer. He returned to Louisville and gave himself up to the maddening bowl. His wife left him and went to a country home which she had saved out of her wealth. One night when he was sleeping drunk in one room, his old mother in another said: "Oh God, is my cup of sorrow not yet full?" The pitying angel pushed ajar the golden gates and the broken heart entered into rest.

Time and again this man took the pledge, but only to fail. When the "blue ribbon" wave swept the country he againtook the pledge, and this time went on the platform as a temperance advocate. He drew great audiences, and when he had kept his pledge for months we invited him to Louisville. It was my privilege to introduce him, or rather to present him to the great audience. Before going on the platform he said: "I have made a mistake in coming here. It was here I lost everything a man could ask to make him happy. The memory of my sainted mother comes over me, and my wife is so near and yet so far from me."

To bring him back to himself I said: "These things will help you to give the greatest lecture of your life. Come, a great audience of old friends are waiting."

When introduced he said: "My friends, if I ever did a dishonorable act before I fell from the pulpit through drink, rise and tell me." Soon he had his audience in tears and lifting his eyes heavenward he said: "O my sainted Mother, look down from your home in glory and see your poor drunken boy. He has staggered all the way back, his feet upon the up-hillward way, and will travel it with a martyr's step."

He further said: "Will I ever drink again? No; this brow was not made to wear the brand of a vassal, nor these hands the chains of a drunkard. Here in Louisville, where I fell in my manhood's might, I vow I will never drink again." Manhood's might is too weak to win alone in the battle against sin. Poor J.J. Talbott went down to rise no more, and on his dying bed, when a minister quoted passage after passage of promise from God's word, the answer came: "Not for me! Not for me!" Peace to his ashes.

Young man, will you tamper and trifle with strong drink? Do you say you can drink or let it alone? I admit you can drink but are you sure you can let it alone? If you cannow, are you sure you can two years hence? I saw a giant oak tree lying in the track of the wind. It had been called "the monarch of the Sierras." Under the very nests where tempests hatch out their young, it grew to its greatness. It had seen many a storm, clad in thunder, armed with lightning, leap from its rocky bed and go bellowing down the world. But the storms that shook it only sent its roots down and out that it might fasten itself the more firmly to the earth. For long years this old treestood there, bowing its head in courtesy to the passing storm, while its branches were but harp strings for the music of the winds. One evening as the sun went down over the mountain's brow, not a storm cloud on the sky, a little wind went hurrying round the mountain's base, struck the great oak and down it went with a crash that made the forest ring. Young men, why was it a tree that had withstood the storms of ages, should, before such a little gust of wind bow its head and die? Years before, when in the zenith of its strength and glory, a pioneer with an axe on his shoulder, went blazing his way through the wooded wilderness that he might not be lost on his return. Seeing the great tree he said: "That's a good one to mark," and taking his axe in hand, he sent the blade deep into the oak. Time passed with seemingly no effect from the stroke given by the axeman. But steadily the sun smote the wound, rain soaked into the scar, worms burrowed in the bark around it, birds pecked into the decayed wood and finally foxes made their home in the hollow trunk, and the day came when resisting force had weakened, boasted strength had departed and thegiant monarch of the Sierras stood at the mercy of the winds that have no respect for weakness.

There are young men before me today, who can drink or let it alone. Temptation to them is no more than the gentle breeze in the branches of the oak in the zenith of its strength. True, temptation has been along their way blazing, here a glass of wine, there a glass of beer and yonder a glass of whiskey. They can quit when they please, but the less they please the more they drink, the more they drink the less they please. They don't quit because theycan, if they couldn't quit they would, because they can, they won't. Thus they reason, while appetite eats its way into their wills, birds of ill omen peck into their characters and finally they will go down to drunkards' graves, as thousands before them have gone. Young men, in the morning of life, while the dew of youth is yet upon your brow, I beg you to bind the pledge of total-abstinence as a garland about your character and pray God to keep you away from the tempter's path.

I wonder that young men will trifle with this great "deceiver." I wonder too at so much ignorance on the questionamong intelligent people. Some years ago after a temperance address a gentleman was introduced to me as the finest scholar in the city. Next morning we were on the same train, and referring to the lecture of the evening before, he said: "I heard your address and was pleased with your kindly spirit, but I beg to differ with you, believing as I do, that when properly used, alcoholic liquor as a beverage is good for health and strength." I felt disappointed to hear a great scholar make such a statement, but I ventured the reply:

"If that is true God made a mistake, since He made the whole phenomena of animal life to run by water power. He made it in such abundance it takes oceans to hold it, rivers and rivulets to carry it to man, bird and beast, while in all the wide world He never made a spring of alcohol. If it's good for strength, why not give it to the ox, the mule and the horse?" It takes a good deal of faith to trust a sober mule; I'm sure I wouldn't want to trust a drunken one. There is not a man in my presence who would buy a moderate drinking horse, and no one would wilfully go through a lot where adrunken dog had right of way. Yet we license saloons to turn drunken men loose in the street, some of them as vicious as mad dogs.

Good for strength? When Samson had slain the regiment of Philistines and was exhausted and athirst; when in his extremity he cried to the Lord: "Thou hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant, and now shall I die from thirst." What was done to revive him and renew his strength? Was strong drink recommended as a stimulant? The Bible account informs us God "clave an hollow place in the jaw, and water came thereout." Don't you think if alcoholic liquor had been intended as a beverage for mankind, the great Creator would have made a few springs of it somewhere? Bore into the earth you can strike oil, but you can't strike whiskey. You can find sparkling springs of water almost everywhere, but nowhere a beer brewery in nature. It's water, blessed water all the time. On your right it bubbles in the brook; on your left it leaps and laughs in the cascade; above you it rides in rain clouds upon the wings of the wind; beneath you it hangs in diamond dew uponthe bending blade; behind you it comes galloping down the gorge "from out the mountain's broken heart;" before you it goes gliding down the glen, kissing wayside flowers into fragrance and singing, as rippling o'er the rocks it runs: "Men may come and men may go, but I go on forever." Oh, bright beautiful water! may it soon be the beverage of all mankind.

I know some say: "This is a free country; if a man wants to drink and be a brute, let him do so." The trouble about that is, while strong drink will degrade some men to the level of the brute, drunkards are not made of brutes. Some thirty or more years ago a grandson of one of the greatest statesman this country ever produced, was shot in a saloon while intoxicated. While that young man was dying, but a few blocks away a grandson of one of the greatest men that ever honored Kentucky in the Senate of the United States, was in jail to be tried for murder committed while drunk; and in the same city at the same hour in the station-house from drink was a great grandson of the author of "Give me liberty or give me death." Whom did Daniel Webster leavehis seat in the Senate that he might hear his eloquence? S.S. Prentice went down under the cloud of drink. A gifted family gave to a Southern State a gifted son. His state sent him to the halls of national legislation, but drink wrought his ruin. Horace Greeley was his friend, and finding him drunk in a Washington hotel said to him: "Why don't you give up what you know is bringing shame upon you and sorrow to your family?"

He replied: "Mr. Greeley, ask me to take my knife and sever my arm from my shoulder and I can do it, but ask me to give up an appetite that has come down upon me for generations, Ican'tdo it." He threw his cane upon the floor to emphasize his utterance. A few days later in the old Saint Charles Hotel, he pierced his brain with a bullet and was sent home to his family in his coffin.

Bring me the men who are drunkards in this city, strip them of their appetite for strong drink, and they are husbands, brothers, fathers, sons, and as a rule, generous in disposition.

Thank God, while drunkenness will drag down the gifted and noble, temperance will build up the humblest and lowest.Bring me the poorest boy in this audience, let him pledge me he will never take a drink of intoxicating liquor as a beverage, let him keep that pledge, be industrious and honest; my word for it, in twenty years from now he will walk the streets of the city in which he dwells, honored, respected, loved, and the world can't keep him down. I rejoice we live in a land where I can encourage a boy, a land where rank belongs to the boy who earns it, whether he hails from the mansion of a millionaire or the "old log cabin in the lane;" a land where a boy can go from a rail cut, a tan yard, or a toe-path, to the presidency of the United States; a land where I can look the humblest boy in the face and say:

"Never ye mind the crowd, my boy, or think that life won't tell;The work is the work for aye that, to him that doeth it well.Fancy the world a hill, my boy; look where the millions stop;You'll find the crowd at the base, my boy; there's always room at the top."

"Never ye mind the crowd, my boy, or think that life won't tell;

The work is the work for aye that, to him that doeth it well.

Fancy the world a hill, my boy; look where the millions stop;

You'll find the crowd at the base, my boy; there's always room at the top."

Have you a trade? Go learn one. Do you know how to do things? Go try; youmay make mistakes, but do the best you can like the boy who joined the church. At his uncle's table soon after he was asked to say grace. He didn't know what kind of a blessing to ask, but he did know he was very hungry, so bowing his head he said: "Lord, have mercy on these victuals." I have faith in the boy who will try to do a thing. I believe in a boy like that one in a mission Sabbath school in New York, who though he had but little knowledge of the Bible, had a way of reasoning about Bible lessons. The teacher of his class said to him: "James, who was the strongest man of whom we have any account?"

He quickly replied: "Jonah."

"How do you make that out?" said the teacher.

Promptly the answer came: "The whale couldn't hold him after he got him down."

Boys, are you poor? Columbus was a weaver; Arkright was a barber; Esop, a slave; Bloomfield, a shoemaker; Lincoln, a rail-splitter; Garfield tramped a toe-path with no company but an honest mule; and Franklin, whose name will never die while lightning blazes through the clouds, went from the humble position of a printer'sdevil to that height where he looked down upon other men. If you would win in the battle of life, take the right side of life and build a righteous character. The saddest scene on the streets at night is the young man, whose clothes are finest in quality and fittest in fashion, but whose principles sadly need "patching." I dare say there are young men before me now who would not go into refined company indecently dressed for any consideration, but who will rush into the presence of their God before they sleep with a dozen oaths upon their lips. Will Carleton puts it this way:

"Boys flying kites, haul in their white plumed birds;You can't do that when flying words;Thoughts unexpressed, may sometimes fall back dead,But God Himself can't kill them when they're said."

"Boys flying kites, haul in their white plumed birds;

You can't do that when flying words;

Thoughts unexpressed, may sometimes fall back dead,

But God Himself can't kill them when they're said."

Will Carleton puts it in poetry, let's have it in prose. Boys, pay more attention to your manners than to your moustache; keep your conduct as neat as your neck-tie, polish your language as well as your boots; remember, moustache growsgrey, clothes get seedy, and boots wear out, but honor, virtue and integrity will be as bright and fresh when you totter with old age as when your mother first looked love into your eyes.

Little Lucy Rome was taken up for vagrancy in a great city. When brought before the court an austere judge said: "Who claims this child?"

A boy arose and walking down near the Judge, said: "Please, sir; I do. She's my sister; we are orphans, but I can take care of her if you'll let her go."

"Who are you?" asked the Judge.

"I'm Jimmy Rome, and I have been taking care of my sister; but two weeks ago the man for whom I worked died and while I was out looking for another place, Lucy begged some bread and they took her up. But now I've a good place to work, Judge, and I'm going to put little sister in school. Please let me have her, sir."

The Judge said: "Stand aside. Officer, take the child to the children's home."

The boy with tears streaming down his cheeks, as he heard his sister sobbing, said: "Judge, please don't take her fromme."

The Judge, moved by the pleading of the brother, said: "Well, my boy, if you can find some reliable person to go your security you may have her."

"Judge, I don't know anyone to give you; my good friend is dead, but I told you the truth. I don't drink, nor smoke nor swear oaths; I try to be a good boy; I work hard, but I can't give you any security. Judge, will you please let me kiss my little sister before you take her from me?"

With this the boy put his arms about his weeping sister and printed, as he thought, the last kiss upon her cheek. The Judge, with a lump in his throat, said: "Take her, my boy; I'll go your security. I'll give Lucy to the care of such a brother."

Hand in hand the homeless orphan pair walked out of the court room together, Jimmy Rome to make his mark in the business world and his sister to be the wife of a merchant prince.

Boys, be industrious, be honest, be sober. "I will" fluttered from the worm-eaten ships of Columbus; "I will" blazed upon the banners of Washington andGrant; "I will" stamped the walls of Hudson river tunnel, and dug the canal of Panama. Young man, write "I will" upon your brow, give your heart to God and hope will herald your way to victory as the reward of a well spent life. Keep your eye upon the star of ambition. Don't be like the owl, who when daylight comes hides himself within the shadows of the ivy-bound oak and moans and moans the days of his life away; but rather be like the proud eagle that leaves its craggy summit, starts on its pinion flight through the clouds, rides upon the face of the storm, then on beyond bathes its plumage in the "sunlight of the day god, and laughs in the face of the coming morrow."

Some one said, and trifled with the secret of success and happiness when he said it: "There's only a dollar's difference between the man who works and the man who pays, and the man who pays, gets that." There is an old superstition that somewhere on the earth, under the earth or in the sea, there is a stone called the "philosopher's stone" and whoever finds it will be "chiefest among ten thousand." The same superstition prevails with many today; only the name of the stone is turnedto "luck," and thousands of young men are waiting for luck to come along and turn up something for them. There is a rule of life, young men, more reliable than luck. It is called an ancient law and runs thus: "By the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread." It is the foundation of more sweet bread and pure enjoyment than all your luck. On it the feet of Abraham Lincoln rested, while he wedged his way to the highest office in the gift of the American people. On it Shakespeare stood, driving a shuttle through the warp and woof of a weaver's loom and wove out for himself a name and fame immortal. On it Elihu Burrett wielded a sledge hammer, while developing a mind that mastered many different languages. On it Henry Clay made his way from the mill-sloshes of Virginia to the United States Senate, and on it James A. Garfield tramped his toe-pathway from driving a mule, to presiding over the destinies of seventy-five millions of people.

Boys, don't be idle. I know a man to-day who always looks so lazy it really rests me to look at him. A boy working for a farmer was asked by his employer if he ever saw a snail. The boy answeredthat he had. "You must have met it, for you surely did not overtake it," said the farmer. I know an old man who seems to take pride in saying he never worked. The first time I saw this man was in my youth. While his father was husking corn in a field, he was seated by a fire reading a novel. Often after that, when I would go to the postoffice in the winter, he would be there by the fire. He moved to the city thirty years ago, where he spends his winters sitting around a fire. He doesn't drink or gamble. I don't think he will have many sins of commission for which to answer; he never commits anything; he sits by the fire. When he dies an appropriate epitaph for his tomb will be:

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