Why He Did Not Drink

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · May 4, 1905

Why He Did Not Drink

I READ the other day of four young men riding in a Pullman car, chatting merrily together. At last one of them said:—

“Boys, I think it’s time for drinks.”

Two of them consented; the other shook his head, and said: “No, I thank you.”

“What!” exclaimed his companion, “have you become pious? Do you think you will become a missionary?”

“No, fellows,” he replied, “I am not specially pious, and I may not become a missionary; but I have determined not to drink another drop, and I will tell you why; I had some business in Chicago with an old pawnbroker, and as I stood before his counter talking about it, there came in a young man about my age, and threw down upon the counter a little bundle. When the pawnbroker opened it, he found it was a pair of baby shoes, with the buttons a trifle worn. The old pawnbroker seemed to have some heart left in him, and he said:—

“Look here, you ought not to sell your baby’s shoes for drink.”

“Never mind, Cohen; baby is at home dead, and does not need the shoes. Give me ten cents for a drink.”

“Now, fellows, I have a wife and baby at home myself; and when I saw what liquor could do in degrading that husband and father, I made up my mind that, God helping me, not a drop of that stuff would ever pass my lips again.”

— Herald and Presbyter.