Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER HI THE MORAL ISSUE The Immorality of Intemperance is the most pronounced outstanding menace that confronts civilization to-day. The ravages of intemperance exceed those of war, pestilence, and famine combined. That was Gladstone's testimony. The moral devastation exceeds all the others. Other moral evils, such as slavery, war, tyranny, injustice, oppression, and gambling, have afflicted the human race in nearly all ages and countries; but intemperance, like licentiousness, stands apart from these by the unique fact that indulgence in drink immediately and most seriously affects the one who uses it. These effects are physical, mental, and moral. The physical and some other effects will be considered more fully in the chapter upon the scientific phase of the question. Attention is here directed to the moral effect upon the drinker. There are certain well-pronounced results following indulgence in strong drink which manifest themselves in the moral nature of the person himself, and among them these chiefly: 1. Drink stupefies the intellect. The brain is the organ of the mind, perhaps the very seat of the soul, the center of personality. Alcohol seeks the brain, for which it seems to have an especial affinity. Quite a large portion of the alcohol taken into the system is carried by the circulation into the brain. There it works its havoc and does its paralyzing hurt upon the most important and delicate organ of the human anatomy. When this special organ of the soul is assailed by an agent capable of producing the physical wreck that alcohol does upon the delicate structure of the human brain, should it create surprise that one's moral energies instantly become obscure or utterly vanish? This is the first, most direct, and most pronounced effect of alcohol upon the human...