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 sons; a  brute  is  a  creature  that  follows  his  appetites, but never  to  excess;  a  tree  is  an  ornament  of  the earth and  useful  to  man;  but  the  drunkard,  what  is he? The drunkard  is  only  a  drunkard,  with  nothing like him  in  all  God's  creation. He is  not  preparing himself for  the  angels'  heaven;  instead  of  reasoning like a  man  he  has  buried  his  rational  soul  in  his  flesh, and his  very  flesh  he  has  sunk  lower  than  the  brutes, so as  to  become  a  useless,  unsightly,  dangerous  monster. Hence it  is  that  some  one  has  very  well  said that mankind  may  be  divided  into  three  classes: men, women,  and  beasts. This accounts,  too,  for  the strange pictures  of  the  wine-god,  Bacchus,  which the genius  of  ancient  Greece  and  Rome  has  handed down to  us. They represent  him  as  an  unhealthy-looking,  bloated  youth,  bearing  aloft  the  winegoblet,  seated  on  a  car  drawn  by  wild  beasts,  while round about  him  frantic  men  and  lewd  women  and monstrous satyrs  wrestle  and  sing  and  caper  in shameful  abandon. Oh, those  ancient  poets  well knew that  sobriety  is  wisdom,  and  the  companions  of drunkenness,  vice,  and  every  kind  of  folly. This same idea  which  they  tried  to  picture  a  later  poet attempted to  express  when  he  exclaimed:  "Oh, thou  invisible  spirit  of  wine,  if  thou  hast  no  other name  by  which  thou  mayest  be  known  let  us  call thee  Devil."

Brethren, you  will  tell  me  that  all  this,  instead  of being  a  sound  argument  for  total  abstinence,  is mere  high-sounding  exaggeration. Is not,  you  ask, the moderate  drinker  who  never  goes  to  excess  a