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A SCRAP.

EVERY man has his God; and and whatever IT be, IT is worshipped on the Sabbath,and in the sanctuary. While the Christian adores his Maker, the man of the world After world is paying homage to Mammon; the sluggard to Ease; the voluptuary to Pleasure; and the ambitious man to Honor. Thus, in various ways, the grand adversary of souls, catches away the word of life, and secures to himself the faithful service of thoughtless mortals.

was this, Looking diligently leat any man fail of the grace of God. The text itself had a powerful effect on his mind, He went home without any hope. He continued a few days in great distress of mind, and appeared to be convinced of sin. After this, he obtained a hope in quite a new way, by becoming reconciled, as he thought, to God and his laws, and by discovering a glorious beauty in the Savior, and the way of life by him. He has never since entertained any idea that his former experiences were of any worth. I have particularized this case, because I think that such are among the most marvellous displays of Divine grace. Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit, there is more hope of a fool than of him. The young persons who obtained hopes, and made a profession, have appeared ever since to be seriously disposed. Their eyes appear to be turned off from beholding vanity. They frequent ly meet together for religious improvement. But there is a decline of that zeal in the cause of God, which appeared in that time of Divine mercy, of which I have been giving you some account. If this short sketch should be judged by you and others to be calculated to bring any glory to God, and any comfort to his people in their way to glory, you may make such use of it as you please. I hope that while you give thanks to God for his mercy to us, you will pray that he would return and revive us again, that we may rejoice in Him. May the Spirit every where be shed down! May Zion's waste places be built up. Believe me to be your friend,&c."

FLATTERY.

Few things are more universally condemned than flattery; yet there are few men,who are above its influence, and still fewer, who have courage sufficient to repel it with a faithful rebuke. The following anecdote is recommended, as affording a specimen of a good answer to flatterers. A certain clergyman in New England, eminent both for talents and humility, was one day accosted by a parishioner, who highly commended some of his performances, of which the clergyman, himself had a very low opinion. After patiently hearing him a few moments, the clergyman replied; "My Friend, all that you say gives me no bet ter opinion of myself than I had before, but gives me a much worse opinion of you."

PRAYER.

A MAN once complained to his minister, that he had prayed for a whole year, that he might en

joy the comforts of religion; but found no answer to his prayers. His minister replied, "go home now and pray, Father, glorify

ON THE

thyself." Reader, are you one of those who find no profit in calling upon God? Ask yourself, if your prayers are not all selfish.

MISCELLANEOUS.

For the Panoplist.

RUINOUS EFFECTS OF ARDENT SPIRITS.

Strong drink is raging.----SOLOMON.

No I.

THE friends of religion and humanity throughout our country, have long seen, and deeply lamented, the intemperate use of intoxicating liquors. They have, also, long been convinced, that something ought to be done to effect a reformation;-to cure, if possible, such as are already infected, and, if not, at least to prevent the further spread of the deadly contagion. Nor have the wise and good, in time past, altogether contented themselves, with unavailing regrets and good wishes. A kind of desultory warfare has been carried on against the common enemy, with various success.

Legislators have interposed their authority, to arrest the triumphant and desolating progress, of the evil in question. Laws against tippling and drunkenness, armed with severe penalties, have been enacted, in, perhaps, every state of the Union. Informing officers have been appointed, occasional presentments have been made, and the laws have sometimes been executed. Ministers of the Gos

pel, in the mean time, have not been wholly inactive. They have attacked the foe, with the weapons of their warfare, which, when skilfully used, are mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds. Here and there a church, also, has done something to resist the progress of intemperance; while here and there an individual has attacked it, with a resolution, which cannot be too highly commended, or too generally emulated.

During all this time, however, the great destroyer has been steadily gaining ground. Every grog-shop is at once an achiev er, and a monument of its victories. Our taverns, and our grave-yards, are filled with its trophies. Not content with extending its ravages, and multiplying its triumphs, among the refuse of society, it has invaded all ranks, and made awful havoc of property, genius, learning, reputation, and happiness. It is an enemy, which sparing neither high nor low, seems in this country, to be waging a war of extermination. Thousands of husbands has it already torn from the bosom of their families; thousands of sons from the embraces of their parents. Like the the "croaking plagues of Egypt," it has found its way, into the very bed chambers of the rich and the poor, the pub

lic officer and the private citi

zen.

Even magistrates themselves, the appointed guardians of the laws, have not always escaped. Nay more, this audacious and deadly foe to the bodies and souls of men, has leaped over the pale of the church, polluted the sanctuary, and, (how shall it be spoken?) has numbered among its victims ministers of the Gospel. To change the figure, intemperance, which was scarcely known in this country, till long after its settlement by our ancestors, has within the last twenty or thirty years swollen to a mighty flood, not confined, like our great rivers, to a particular channel, but spreading over the face of the whole country, threatening to sweep away, in its course the strongest bulwarks of religion and government, together with the sentinels that should guard, and the arms that should defend them; and bearing on its fiery surges, a huge and frightful mass of wreck and desolation. So wide and impetuous has this over flowing scourge at length become, that almost every body is retreating before it. Even the most courageous are astonished and dismayed at its progress. They not only hear its portentous roar; but witness and tremble at its deadly ravages.

Intemperance is certainly, at the present time, one of the most

The word intemperance is no more applicable to the abuse of ar dent spirits, than to many other vices. The fact, therefore, that our countrymen generally, both in writing and conversation, designate this abuse by the word intemperance, is proof, of the most striking and de

demoralizing, loathsome, heaven-provoking abominations of this country. Every body who has either eyes, or ears, must admit that here, at least, strong drink is raging. The experi ence of thousands proves, that it is like a fire shut up in the bones. It allows its votaries no ease. It consumes the best estates, often with a rapidity resembling that of a conflagration. It rages like a burning fever in the body, like a fallen spirit in the head, like a wild beast in the family, and like a sweeping pestilence in the community. Profaneness, gambling, lewdness, poverty, disgrace, lawsuits, brutal stu pidity, raving distraction, des pair, murder, and suicide, march in its train. Many years ago, an eminent physician of Philadelphia gave it as his opinion, that more than four thousandt of our citizens were annually hurried to an untimely grave, by the hand of this ruthless destroyer. That the evil has increased, instead of diminishing, since that time, there can be no doub'. Already, there is good reason to believe, have intoxicating liquors cost the United States more lives than their independence; demoralized more persons, broken more hearts, beggared more families, and sent more souls to perdition than any other single vicc.

Strong drink may be denominated the grand Moloch of this proud republic. If children are

monstrative kind, that the intemper ate use of ardent spirits is a great, extensive, pre eminent, and national vice. ED.

†This computation is probably too small at present by more than one half. ED.

not caused to pass through the fire, they are reduced to rags and starvation. If its devotees are not crushed to death by the wheels of a stupendous car, they are consumed by the slow flames which it kindles in their vitals. If it is not worshipped on every high hill, and under every green tree, it has its shrines on the banks of almost every brook, in the midst of every village, and by the side of every road. Think of four thousand self-devoted human victims, immolated every Where, in year upon its altars. this wide world, is there a graven image, or any false god, that demands more? Melancholy as is the accouut given by Dr. Bu chanan of the sanguinary rites at Juggernaut, and the vast adjacent plain, paved with human bones, it does not appear, that four thousand lives are sacrificed there, within the short perion of a single year. While, therefore, every benevolent heart is wishing and praying for the emancipation of the infatuated Hindoos from that abominable idolatry, it surely becomes every one to deplore the tyrannical sway of this monstrous vice, in this Christian land; and, if possible, to devise ways and > means for overthrowing its empire.

If nothing more were neces sary, than a general statement of the evils of intemperance and the importance of a reformation, the preceding remarks might suffice. But it would be doing the subject great injustice to dismiss it here, especially as in that case, many would, probably, look upon the foregoing dreadful picture, as very much overdrawn. The writer is confident, VOL. V. New Series.

that every thing which has been advanced can be more than supported, without a very extensive or minute investigation. To this end he solicits a candid hearing, while he proceeds very briefly to specify more particu larly some of the legion of evils, which are produced by ardent spirits in this country.

1. Look at their deadly effects upon the bodies of their infatuated victims. Physicians all agree, that intemperance has a to destroy direct tendency health, and shorten life. In a vast multitude of instances, it is the legitimate parent of fevers, dropsies, consumption, gout, palArdent sy, and appoplexy. spirits," says Dr. Rush, (and so says almost every other physi cian,) "dispose the body to acute diseases in every form, and excite fevers in persons predispos ed to them from other causes. Thus, when yellow fevers have visited the cities of the United States, hard drinkers have seldom escaped, and rarely recov ered."

The same remark has been the most made concerning alarming and fatal diseases, which have, within a few years past, prevailed in different parts of the country. The writer has been assured, that hard drinkers have been remarkably singled out by the destroying angel; and that, in some places, not an individual of this class has recover. ed from an attack. Go then to the bedside of a neighbor or a friend, who has long been laying up, in his system, the fuel of ardent spirits to feed the fever that now consumes him.

Perhaps

he was never called a drunkard. It may be that he was never 53

completely intoxicated. But he drank regularly and freely. Now behold him on the brink of eternity. His tongue is parched. His brain is disordered. His disease, which he might have escaped by temperance, or which, had he been temperate, would have yielded to the power of medicine, is now incurable. His eye grows dim; he struggles; he gasps; he expires; and in him you behold the fate of vast numbers, who follow the same course.

mixed wine.

Hard drinking is

the parent of almost every crime that can be named, and exposes its votaries to dangers and deaths wherever they go. How many have been dragged from the grogshop to prison, and from prison to the gallows? How ma hy in fits of drunkenness, have had their limbs broken, and been miserably crippled for life! How many, in attempting to return from the tavern, have reeled from their horses into eternity! How often, how very often, is the drunkard found stretched by the way side on the cold and damp earth; exposed to the wheels of the hasty traveller; wet with the dew of heaven; shivering under the piercing blasts of winter, or, perhaps, lying stiff in the iron slumber of death! It is needless to enlarge. Every reader must be convinced, by his own observations, and a little reflection, that ardent spirits are making terrible havoc in our country.

Shall we proceed further, and point you to ten thousand shadows of human existence in the last stages of various other discases brought on by excessive drinking? Shall we undertake to count the miserable creatures, who, in one place and another, are every year tortured to death by this Promethean vulture? Shall we press physicians to tell us how many names, on our annual bills of mortality, are in scribed there by the hand of this fell destroyer? Shall we go from grave to grave, in the fields of the dead, and ask tomb-stones how many victims of ardent spir- MASSACHUSETTS its lie beneath them? Ah! if tomb-stones night tell the truth, how affecting would be their report!

Let us take another view of this subject. It will not be questioned, that health and life are often destroyed by strong drink, in many ways which have not yet been mentioned. Who, saith the royal preacher, hath woe? Who hath sorrow? Who hath contentions? Who hath babe bling? Who hath wounds with out cause? Who hath redness of eyes? They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek

Z. X. Y.

SOCIETY FOR SUPPRESSING INTEMPERANCE.

A Society with the above designation was formed in Boston on the 5th instant. A meeting was held for the my Room in the New State House purpose on the 4th and at the Acadeon the 5th, when the following preamble and articles were adopted as

the

CONSTITUTION.

THE excessive use of ardent spirits, in our country, cannot fail to be deeply deplored by every friend to the true interests of mankind. It may be assumed, upon a very moderate

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