Page:The collected works of Theodore Parker volume 7.djvu/53

Rh but they did. I think the conscience of New England did not trust the reformed men; that also is a pity. They seem now to have relaxed their efforts in a great measure, perhaps discouraged at the coldness with which they have in some quarters been treated. I know not why it is, but they do not continue so ably the work they once begun. Besides, the State, it was thought, favoured intemperance. It was for a long time doubted if the licence-laws were constitutional; so they were openly set at nought, for wicked men seize on doubtful opportunities. Then, too, temperance had gone, a few years ago, as far as it could be expected to go until certain great obstacles were removed. Many leading men in the land were practically hostile to temperance, and, with some remarkable exceptions, still are. The sons of the pilgrims, last Forefathers’ day, could not honour the self-denial of the Puritans without wine! The Alumni of Harvard University could never, till this season, keep their holidays without strong drink. If rich men continue to drink without need, the poor will long continue to be drunk. Vices, like decayed furniture, go down. They keep their shape, but become more frightful. In this way the refined man who often drinks, but is never drunk, corrupts hundreds of men whom he never saw, and, without intending it, becomes a foe to society.

Then, too, some of our influential temperance men aid us no longer. Beecher is not here; Channing and Ware have gone to their reward. That other man, benevolent and indefatigable, where is he? He trod the worm of the still under his feet, but the worm of the pulpit stung him, and he too is gone; that champion of temperance, that old man eloquent, driven out of Boston. Why should I not tell an open secret?—driven out by rum and the Unitarian clergy of Boston. Whatsoever the causes may be, I think you see proofs enough of the fact, that drunkenness has increased within the last few years. You see it in the men drunken in the streets, in the numerous shops built to gratify the intemperate man. Some of these are elegant and costly, only