Proud of His Work

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Jun 14, 1883

Proud of His Work.

During a discussion of the temperance question in the Canadian Parliament, Mr. Ford, of Queens County, referred to a member of one of the families in the province, who had not long before been laid in a pauper's grave in consequence of being addicted to intoxicating drink, and remarked that such a circumstance was "a temperance lecture in a nut-shell."

Mr. Pugh, member from Halifax, immediately arose, and in opposition to Mr. Ford stated that he was a liquor-seller, and that the business was just as honorable and legitimate as a carriage builder's.

This remark called up Mr. Ford again, and he said: "I build carriages, and when I turn out a fine wagon, and point to it, rolling along the streets, I say, 'that is my work.' I would ask the honorable member from Halifax, if he is proud of his work when he sees it rolling along the street."

There was no answer to this question; it was a question that answered itself.

The rum-seller can easily find his work. It can be seen in dark alleys, filthy garrets, damp cellars, squalid homes, haunts of vice, dens of infamy, and houses of shame. Want, poverty, sickness, hunger, rags, wretchedness, beggary, insanity, pauperism, violence, crime, murder—all these things may be directly traced to the liquor-seller and his deadly traffic. Reeling inebriates, intoxicated women, fighting, brawling parents, paupers in almshouses, lunatics in asylums, criminals in prison, starved and vicious children, living in wretchedness and growing up for ruin—all these may be pointed out as specimens of the dram-seller's work.

Is the drunkard-maker proud of his work? An honest man is the work of God; a drunkard is the work of the dram-seller. Is he proud of his work? Why not make a model of a completed specimen of the rum-seller's work, put it in a glass case, exhibit it in the drinking saloon, and write over it, "A specimen of my work—I am proud of it"?—The Morning.