Intemperance a Fruitful Cause.

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the present day. Parental control is seldom or ever hinted at. Boys and girls, long before they have reached what used to be called the years of discretion,' now throw off all authority; and from this contempt of parental, or, indeed, of any control, come forth irreverence, self-will, insolence, and vice.

In the lower ranks of society, parents unfortunately are not often found able to train up their children in the fear and love of God, and in the way they ought to walk. This duty is left, in their case, to the schoolmaster and the pastor. Among the middle class, a perverse theory of governing by love, has been taken up, to the ruin of many children, who when grown up have shown nothing but the evils which ought in childhood to have been checked. Were it, in truth, a system of love it might be commended, but it is only a counterfeit and a system of easy indulgence on the part of parents. The highest and purest love sees that correction is sometimes imperative for the good of the human being; and this duty being left unperformed, the disappointed parents are often the first to suffer from the waywardness of both sons and daughters. Another vicious fashion is the practice of dressing up young girls-mere children, we may say-in the fantastic manner now in vogue, and parading them about the streets, as if each mother were bent on outdoing her neighbour in the matter of feathers, hoops, long flowing hair, and gay colours. In what is this vain show to end? Do mothers ever think to what this fostering of vanity and love of dress may lead? this inordinate desire for finery?

In manufacturing towns, where girls are largely employed in factories, the lack of proper superintendence is another fertile source of evil. This is now being attended to, and in some of our large mills educated women are earnestly active in looking after the morals, and aiding the young women under their care, to acquire habits conducive in various ways to their well-doing. It is scarcely necessary to point to intemperance as another fruitful cause, for although few girls take first to drinking and then to an impure life, yet nine out of ten of the corrupted maintain, as we have already observed, that without stimulants it would be impossible to carry on their wretched calling; indeed, these women are seldom thoroughly sober; and in an incredibly short space of time an ungovernable fondness for this fire-poison seizes hold of them, and hence the great difficulty of permanent reform. Nearly all who have been rescued have been so saved at an early stage of their downward course. Lastly, there are the wiles of the seducer, who, the better to succeed in his vile lies, employs intoxicating draughts, with which he plies his victim. One writer on this subject is of opinion that seduction, in nearly every case, has more or less to do with the first departure from virtue,' and in this opinion we agree. Seduction

Seduction is practised in a multiplicity of forms by all ranks and in all classes; practised even in quarters where one would least expect it, and positive encouragement held out to vice, while the inexorably virtuous young girl has been put to a kind of work, at which, with the utmost exertion, but inadequate wages are earned. These are sad facts, but true as sad, and vouched for by men whose business it has been to investigate these matters, and bring forward such dark doings to the light of day.

As prevention is better than cure-especially when cures are of rare occurrence, and when the convict or penitent costs the country or the philanthropist sums so vast-the author of the volume at the head of this article urges the attention of the legislature, the clergy, and the social reformer, to use all means, moral and legal, to obtain this desired end.

The pulpit is called upon to reprove, rebuke, and exhort; the social and moral reformer to provide proper amusements for the people, more ample and suitable accommodation for the poor by improved dwellings, and likewise instruction to parents and children on their duties to each other and to society. The aid of the State is demanded to alter and amend laws whereby temptations may be removed, before which the thoughtless perish. Ginpalaces, beer-houses, dancing-saloons, bagnios, &c. &c., are spoken of as they can only be spoken of by every one who anxiously seeks to avert judgment and retribution for this colossal vice, which, as another writer says, devours almost undisturbed the flower and hope of mankind.'

It is suggested that greater facilities should be given for the purpose of marriage both in the army and navy. Colonization in India, and purchase of waste lands, on which only married men should be employed.

Female emigration is another remedy which may be mentioned: hitherto it has been but little attended to, and side by side with it is the extension of employments for those large numbers of women who must work or starve.

Something is now being done by the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, and by the Society for the Employment of Women, towards the instruction of young women and girls in certain branches of trade, hitherto closed against them. It were much to be desired that greater publicity were given to these movements, and the public thoroughly awakened to the necessity of an improved education, tending to diminish that love of display and idle attraction, such fertile causes of mischief, as well as to increase a desire for honest self-dependence, and greater self-respect.

The immense sums spent in efforts to reclaim the vicious would go far to prepare numbers of young women for honest trades, or

even to give small portions to the deserving as capital wherewith to commence business.

The refuges now existing, and others proposed, for female destitute children, will likewise be a means of diminishing this evil, provided these children are properly educated and trained to work. But habits of industry and self-control must be formed in them, before they are let loose, at comparatively early years, to encounter the temptations sure to meet them, when beyond the sheltering walls of school or of refuge.

Sanitary measures, as commended by Dr. Acton, would likewise aid in checking some of the hideous features of this gigantic vice. Into these we shall not enter. Those of our readers who, in the spirit of charity, seek fuller information than is needful to be given in this article, can consult the works we have mentioned, and various others by medical men, who have of late directed their attention to the subject.

Evil of any kind, it may be granted, is not to be put down by legislation; but if legislation declines to interfere at all, it assuredly indirectly connives at it. In the case of the greater number, unless they are reformed within a very few years, nay, it may be said months, reformation is scarcely within their power; while, even if penitent and morally improved, the disordered state of their nervous system, and the great diminution of their muscular power, render them a mere wreck of their former selves. This holds good in the case of men as well as of women who forsake to any extent the healthful paths of virtue.

Hitherto a few almost unknown and ill-paid missionaries have had to wage war single-handed with this hydra-headed enemy. Lately, others have joined them-Christian men, as well as pious workers of the other sex, who feel that deeds and not words are the best exponents of faith; and now aid is openly asked from all quarters, as it is in vain any longer to deny that our morals are a disgrace to a nation calling itself Christian, and hourly boasting of its greatness. Great it may be in outward seeming, prosperous in merchandise, rich in gold and silver, yet poor in that righteousness which alone can exalt. There is a triad of evils to battle against -luxury, licentiousness, and deception. The time is surely come of which it was said that no man would speak the truth to his neighbour.' Trust and confidence seem alike crushed.

No one can assert that external pressure, or outward remedies, will ever effect a radical cure of moral evil. This can only be done by the power of religion speaking from within the sinner's heart; nevertheless wise laws ought to lend their aid, by removing, as far as possible, temptations from the paths of the thoughtless or unwary, and by bringing the tempter and the fallen within the

reach of that divine influence.

The

The experience of those who for years have persevered in the best attempts in external appliances, testifies to the sad fact that very little has been done in the way of reform; therefore it is that we urge efforts being made rather in the way of prevention.

It is most important that women should take up the cause of their fallen sisters, one which, even in an interested point of view, closely concerns themselves; but it must be taken up in that spirit of humility which sees in the unfortunate one, not so much the dissolute, bold minister of evil-doings, as the miserable victim of certain usages of society, which in a manner demand, or at least betray her into the sacrifice.

While mothers warn the young, or moralize the erring, let them likewise turn to their sons, and teach them some better lesson than they now are taught, that to be manly is synonymous with being the associate of depraved women, and that virtue in men is of no consequence.

6

We are recalled to the opinion so often expressed in regard of the evil in question, that its final extirpation is not to be hoped for.' The same may be said of every sin existing; but the phrase, as applied to this particular vice, is used in a much wider sense than in most of the other cases of guilt, and gives license to this form of disobedience against the divine law to a fearful extent; an extent now bringing its own punishment in the degeneration of the

race.

While sensible that the ignorance and weakness of women are the worst enemies the sex can have, what is to be said, on the other hand, of those who, instead of defending that weakness, take advantage of it for vicious purposes, and in like manner prefer the ignorance that is easily duped? Were the self-respect of women increased, their morals would improve; and were their intelligence cultivated, rather than as now their mere instincts and feelings, the 'social evil' (that name erroneously applied only to the one sex as evil-doers,) would be greatly diminished. And even in the case of those who continued in sin, the same amount of degradation and wretchedness would not be found, forming, as they now do, a miserable contrast to those women of the same stamp in some other countries, who, in the midst of their sad career, preserve, both publicly and privately, a certain decency and regulation of conduct.

They at the same time require from their visitors treatment of a more human fashion, than, we regret to state, is the case with our lowest and most numerous class of unfortunate women, who are the mere slaves of those who frequent their society, as well as of their own intemperate and dissolute habits, where alternate riot, starvation, and intoxication go hand in hand with brutality.

So much is this vice overlooked on the part of men, that it never seems thought of as criminal, either in a religious or moral point

of

Continental Sobriety and Mr. Gladstone's Wine Bill.

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of view. As long as health can be preserved, no restraint appears to be inculcated, and no penalty exacted, either from the seducer or common trader in sensualism. In absence, then, of all principle or moral check, could the usage among the higher classes be made as unfashionable as it now is the reverse, a great step would be gained in the saving of young and beautiful women from destruction; and in respect of the middle class-said to be keenly alive to their pecuniary concerns, as well as their outward respectability-could the sin of seduction be visited with a fine, and partial loss of character, another onward step would be added. As the lower classes look to those above them for example in manners and morals, the improvement so much to be desired would speedily be seen, were purity of life accepted as the proof of nobility and of manliness; and were those (no matter what their rank or position) branded as cowards who seduced or allured the young of either sex into those paths whose end is perdition, our country would soon regain its lost strength, and recover from its present state of moral pros

tration.

ART. VI.-1. Charge of the Recorder of Birmingham to the Grand Jury at Birmingham Sessions, April, 1860.

2. Temperance of Wine Countries. A Letter by E. C. Delavan, Esq. London: Alliance Depôt, 335, Strand.

3. Journals of the Houses of Lords and Commons.

NONE of the measures introduced by the Government during

the present session to the attention of Parliament and the country has elicited so important an expression of public hostility as the Refreshment Houses and Wine Licenses Bill. It has been the fashion, during the discussion, to attribute the opposition which this bill has met with to the unscrupulous efforts of vested interests. Driven by the exigencies of a debate, of which the responsibility rested mainly on himself, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would hardly suffer any unfavourable criticism, without endeavouring to fix upon the critic the stigma of publican association. This cry was certainly a mere sham, but it was not without significance. The greatest amount of opposition, and certainly the weightiest and most reputable, proceeded from the friends of temperance; and it is true that, the bill having been carried, they have been beaten. But if the assumed alliance between the two old antagonists, publican and temperance man, be supposed, the contest has clearly shown the utter weakness of the licensed victuallers,' since, even when associated with moral strength, they have failed; and, on the other hand, we have learned that no term can be applied to a public man so opprobrious as to charge him with acting as the advocate of the publican. Henceforth none can fear

the