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When in Worcester, England, twenty-six years ago, I was the guest of a
gentleman, a member of Parliament, who resided just opposite the city,
on the bank of the river,--a delightful place.
I was at that time a smoker, and although I had never smoked in a
gentleman’s house without an invitation, I deemed it necessary to have
my smoke after dinner, if I could get it without annoying others.
So, after dinner, I strolled down to the riverside, out of sight of the
house, took out my cigars and matches and proceeded to light a cigar.
The wind blew out the match. Another was tried, and another. I took
off my hat to shield it from the wind. It was of no avail. I got some
brimstone down my throat, or something as bad; but the cigar would not
ignite.
Then I kneeled down close to the rock by the path, at the side of the
river, and with my hat off, endeavored to secure the object. Now, I
never go on my knees but I am reminded of prayer, and the thought
came:--
“If anyone should see me, he would probably think that some man had
sought that retired spot for devotion, and that he was saying his
prayers; and what am _I_ doing?--I am sucking away at a cigar, hoping
to obtain fire enough from the match to get a smoke. What would the
audience say, who heard me last night, if they should see me?”
The inconsistency of my practise with my profession struck me so
forcibly that I said, “_I’ll have no more of it._”
I rose from my knees, took the cigars and the matches from my pockets,
and threw them into the river, and I never touched a cigar to smoke for
eighteen years.
* * * * *
The reformed drunkard, John B. Gough, who became the great evangelist
of temperance, kept his freedom from drink at the cost of occasional
terrible torture. To its awful intensity, an old friend, with whom
he made his home whenever he visited Chicago, bears witness. The
story contains not only a vivid warning against drink, but a hopeful
illustration of the victories that, with God’s help, may be won.
“One day I found Mrs. Gough sitting by the window, holding her
newspaper upside down. Mr. Gough was lying on the lounge on the other
side of the room, with his face to the wall.
“‘What is the matter?’ I asked in alarm.
“‘What makes you think anything is the matter?’ Mrs. Gough asked.
“With a gesture, I indicated the newspaper.
“‘Oh, there _is_ matter!’ she cried. ‘Go to John!’
“I sat down by him, and began to talk to him in a low voice, while I
smoothed his hair, as he loved to have me do because it soothed him. I
reminded him of the good he was doing, of the thousands he had redeemed
from drink, and of the families that he had made happy.
“All at once he turned over and looked at me. I hardly knew him! His
eyes were sunken, his skin was ghastly gray. Then he said with the deep
voice that so thrilled his audiences:--
“‘Do you believe I love that woman over there by the window?’
“‘I have never doubted it,’ I replied.
“‘Do you believe I love you?’ he asked.
“‘It is one of the chief joys of my life to know that you do,’ I said,
with a lump in my throat.
“‘Then if you want to know how I feel,’ he cried, ‘It is this way: as
if I’d be willing to see you both in hell, if it would only be right
for me to take just one drink!’
“To such an extremity as this can the morbid craving for drink reduce
even a good man. The temptation came upon him now and then with awful
force. It was heart-breaking to see him. At such times he never dared
to be left alone. Once when he was thus attacked by temptation at a
hotel away from his friends, he locked the door of his room and threw
the key out over the transom.
“‘Once the devil gets a clutch on you, he never lets go,’ he said. ‘God
save our young people from thinking that the habit is only a little
thing!’”