Page:The Complete Works of Lyof N. Tolstoi - 11 (Crowell, 1899).djvu/144

120 yet these very people are more worthy of censure than the drunkards. The drunkards have become drunkards simply because those that were not drunkards, those that did themselves no harm, taught them to drink wine, tempted them by their example.

Drunkards never would have become drunkards if they had not seen honored men, men respected by every one, drinking wine and offering it to others. A young man who has never taken wine will know the taste and the effect of wine at festivals, at weddings, at the houses of these honored people who are not themselves drunkards, but who drink and set it before their guests on certain occasions.

And so he who drinks wine, no matter how moderately, or offers it in whatever special circumstances, commits a great sin. He tempts those whom he is commanded not to tempt, of whom it is said, Woe to him that tempts one of these little ones.

It is said, "We did not begin it, it is not for us to end it."

It is for us to end it if we only understand that for every one of us the drinking or non-drinking of wine is not a matter of indifference; that with every bottle of wine bought, every glass of wine imbibed, we are serving that terrible devilish deed whereby the best strength of humanity is wasted; but, on the other hand, by refraining from wine for ourselves, and by doing away with the senseless custom of using wine at festivals, weddings, and christenings, we are performing a work of the utmost importance—our soul's work, God's work. As soon as we have understood this, then will drunkenness be stopped by us.

And therefore, my reader, whoever you may be—a young man only just entering upon life, or a grown man who have already established your life, a master of a house or a mistress of a house, or an aged man,—for whom now the time is near for accounting for the deeds you have done, whether you are rich or poor, famous or unknown, whoever you are, it is impossible for you to stand between these two camps; you must infallibly