Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/31

 ONE ASPECT OF VICE 1 7

search for unearned pleasure, for to search for it is the earnest of its due. Another says, "Men drink because they are tired," overlooking the fact that the normal restorer of exhausted cells is always more easily purchased and more agreeable. But if special warrant for this treatment be demanded, it will be found in a table of "Means Suggested to Lessen the Consumption of Intoxicating Liquors among the People," appearing in the Twelfth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor, entitled Economic Aspects of the Liquor Problem. The opinions are col- lected from proprietors and managers of various establishments employing labor, and present an interesting expression of the trend of public opinion upon this question.

In speaking of scientists' abstaining from metaphysical ques- tions, Huxley once said: "Those who lay down the law seem to forget that a wise legislator will consider, not merely whether his proposed enactment is desirable, but whether obedience to it is possible. For if the latter question be answered negatively, the former is hardly worth debate." Now, it is interesting to note that out of a total of 4,914 responses received, 1,103 advocate prohibition, 769 urge that drinking men be refused employment, 445 point to high license, 1 80 speak of education, 159 demand the abolition of the saloons, while 136 see relief in moral and religious training, etc. Out of a total of 4,914 replies only 316 are for education as a cure. Now, it is the therapeutic value of this statement that it shows the futility of setting up a fixed condition outside men, and hoping by its presence to reform them. It is opportunity for expression of human energy which is demanded, and nothing short of this will effect a cure. Men are so poor in nothing as in the poverty of thought. It is an enlargement of interests with opportunities for their expression which must be offered them.

The contention is not that men must drink, but that human beings who are not by nature slaves not even slaves to habit but have within them the god-like potency of self-determination, are being used by the world, and not using it. Human life is at bottom an activity which must go on, and does go on. If per- chance more valuable forms of stimuli have not been organized