The physiological opinion opposed to those arguments is, that while alcohol, like other similar substances, has in large quantities a narcotic, a devitalizing effect, it has in small quantities a stimulating effect, between which and narcotism there is a difference, not of degree, but of kind. The stimulating effect is precisely the same with that of highly-nutritious and easily digested food; as regards the vital functions, it differs from the effect of ordinary food only in rapidity of production. It does not substitute an abnormal for the normal action of the bodily organs; it restores their natural functions; and it is capable of rectifying either deficient or redundant functional action. The only positive difference of effect between ordinary food and alcoholic stimulation is, that the latter does not, to any great extent, add to the bulk of the body. There is no recoil or reaction after it, except that, as in the case of ordinary food, the effect is exhausted after a time. There is nothing to support the belief in a reaction, except the depression involved in the gradual recovery trom the narcotic effect of a large quantity of alcohol; but between the narcotic effect of a large, and the stimulating effect of a small, quantity, there is, as already said, a difference of kind—their connection is merely accidental. And the experience of mankind—the fact that moderate drinking does not usually pass into excessive drinking—sufficiently shows that it is not found necessary to increase the quantity used for stimulation. Since stimulation restores the natural functions, it, of course, is capable of removing the consequences of functions being perverted. Thus, it is maintained that, among other things, it gives relief from pain and muscular spasms, reduces the circulation when too rapid, produces healthy sleep, and removes general debility, as well as the fatigue of special organs. Whether it, to an important extent, affects the waste of tissue, or keeps waste matters in the blood, is at present undeter mined; however this may be, there is no justification for holding that life is to be meas ured by the aggregation of tissue, or the rapidity of bodily changes. The notion that alcohol checks the burning of tissue by taking up the oxygen received by the lungs, originated when it was believed, upon the authority of Liebig (it was so believed until ft few years ago, but the contrary is generally held now), that alcohol was altogether decomposed in the body. If these views are correct, it follows that alcohol, taken cau tiously and in small quantities—the quantities varying with the circumstances and with the constitution of the individual—may be used not only with safety but with advan tage.
Under the third head teetotalers, of course, maintain that total abstinence is highly favorable to health. They-adduce their personal experience; the mortality statistics of one or two regiments and of ships' crews mainly,, or entirely, made up of abstainers; the evidence of arctic voyagers on the one hand, and of travelers in tropical regions on the other, to prove that in every climate health can be maintained, and is most likely to be maintained, when no use is made of alcoholic drinks. On the other side, the fact that men of all races use alcoholic beverages is held to show that men, living as men must usually do, find those beverages useful, if not necessary. It is not disputed that many persons live in health without them—that persons having an abundance of wholesome food, not over-worked, living in well-constructed houses, and in wholesome air, can usually dispense with them, But when some, or all, of those conditions are wanting— which in towns, at any rate, happens in all but exceptional cases—it is alleged that a nearer approach to health is made when a moderate use is made of alcohol.
The social arguments in favor of total abstinence, though very weighty and earnestly insisted upon, can be indicated iu a few sentences. It is affirmed that the use of alco holic drinks is at the root of all the misfortunes of the poorest and most numerous class, that it is the chief cause of pauperism, the chief cause of crime, a frequent occasion of immorality; that it lowers the health and shortens the life of the great mass of artisans and laborers, makes their homes wretched, and exposes them and their families to the evils and temptations of chronic destitution. Then, such are the seductive influences of drink and good-fellowship, that moderate drinkers are in danger of becoming drunkards; thus the use of liquors effects the ruin of a considerable percentage of the middle and upper classes. Total abstinence is demanded as a measure of personal precaution, be cause no one who drinks at all is safe against falling into drunkenness; as a patriotic duty, incumbent upon those who desire the improvement of the poorer classes; as a duty of example which every man owes to his neighbor, and which, involving self-denial, must have a favorable reflex influence upon character. On the other side, it is not denied that drinking is closely connected with, or that it exasperates, the misery under gone by the poor; but it is denied that it is the cause of the misery. It is maintained that drinking must be regarded as an effect of the bad conditions inherited by the poor, and under which they live. Persons born in close alleys, and brought up in foul air, living always from hand to mouth, often upon insufficient or unwholesome food, feel (it is said) a need of stimulants to support vitality. It is affirmed that the fluctuations of crime (properly so called) do not depend upon the amount of drinking, but—so far as they can be traced to one circumstance—upon variations in wages; that it is destitution, not drunkenness, that contributes most largely to the production of crime. The drun
kenness, the crime, the pauperism, it is maintained, cannot be permanently reduced except through a material and moral improvement being effected among the poor. Then it is denied that moderate drinkers, in general, are in any danger of becoming drunkards; it is persons wanting in prudence, and of intemperate constitution, who are exposed to that danger.
Of late years total abstainers—in unison with others who, though not themselves abstainers, are axious to promote public sobriety—have exerted themselves to obtain, in one shape or another, a legislative prohibition of the trade in drink. This movement was set on foot in Great Britain in 1853, by an organization called "the United Kingdom alliance," on account of the success which had crowned the exertions of teetotallers in Maine and many other of the United States. In Maine the liquor traffic was suppressed in 18413; the law was made more stringent by a provision for confiscating all alcoholic drinks in 1851; and though in 1856 the existing laws were repealed, and it became lawful to distill spirits, to sell spirits, and to have spirits in possession, drinking houses continued to be prohibited. The " alliance" soon found that there was no possi bility of carrying a Maine liquor-law through the British parliament; and they have accordingly confined themselves to asking for a permissive bill, enabling the ratepayers of a parish, if a majority of two-thirds of them should think fit, to suppress all public houses within the parish. Hitherto they have been unsuccessful. They support the bill upon the merits by a variety of arguments. Alcohol, they say, being a poison, its sale ought. to be subject to the same restrictions as that of other poisons.' The legisla ture has admitted the exceptional and dangerous nature of the liquor trade, by putting it under strict regulation; in consistency, it should suppress it as a trade altogether. They allege that the amount of drinking in a place always varies directly with the num ber of public-houses; and then that the amount of crime and of pauperism varies directly with the amount of drinking. In 1857 Dr. Lees calculated the expense of the use of liquors to this country at 120 millions a year—the cost of the liquor being put at 6C millions, and the remainder of the amount made up by allowing for the crime and pau perism caused by drinking, the loss of time in drinking, and, through disease induced by drinking, the waste of life consequent upon it and many minor items. This money, it is said, if not spent upon drink, would have a marvelous effect in improving the con dition of the poor. On the other side, it is maintained, in limine, that the subject-matter of this bill is so very important, and so full of difficulty, that parliament should not delegate Its functions in respect of it to the ratepayers; also, that to do so would be to plant, in every parish in the country, the seeds of perpetual strife. Upon the merits it is said that a prohibitory law could not be carried out—at any rate, in large towns where the worst evils connected with drinking are found; and that systematic attempts at evasion would be made, which would demoralize the people, and put them in chronic antagonism to the law. Besides the arguments already stated upon this side, it is urged that—excepting the case of poisonous substances—it is no part of the duty of a govern ing body to say to its people: You shall not spend your money upon this or that; that it is unreasonable, in a fiscal point of view, to speak of the national resources being wasted upon liquors any more than upon tea or beef, or other substances that perish with the using; and that the power of procuring articles which arc desired is what men work for—the great motive of industry. It is also maintained that compulsory abstin ence from drink would not produce the same results as voluntary abstinence; that men would seek indemnifications, resorting, it might be, to other and more injurious narcotics than alcohol, and to vices which might be even more injurious than drinking. It is said th9,t, abstinence, to be valuable, must be a sign of a moral improvement; and that it is safest we should leave the poor to face the temptations of their situation, trying to for tify them against these temptations by education, by giving them just, moral, and relig ious views; at Mie same time holding before them the spectacle of temperance and its results in the case of the more comfortable classes.
The following are the leading organizations in Great Britain that, with various modi fications of creed, carry on the temperance agitation. They can claim as directors and advocates men of acknowledged position and ability; and the aggregate sum of money spent annually is very great. The National temperance league, London (organ, the Weekly Record); the United Kingdom alliance, Manchester, with numerous branches (organ, the Alliance .Yews); the church of England and Ireland temperance society, Lon don (organ, the Church, of England Temperance Magazine); the Scottish temperance league, Glasgow (organ, the League Journal); the National band of hope union, London (organ, Band of Ilope Review). Besides these, the Roman Catholic and Methodist branches of the temperance society form distinct organizations, while the order of Good Templars has its organs in the United States, aid in England, Scotland, and Ire land.