This question was asked by a man who knew more than any one else, and he
knew very well what the answer would be. We should suspect a man of
insanity who looked for grapes on a thorn bush. And yet we see numbers
of both men and women looking for happiness and comfort in the Public
House, and judging from their appearance afterwards, we feel sure they
went for grapes and found festering thorns!
It was our duty, some time ago, to be part of a deputation to support a
memorial to the Magistrates at what is called "The Brewster Sessions."
There was a number of Ministers and others who represent the Temperance
movement, with some ladies like-minded, and we took our places in the
same court where the publicans and their friends were. Some of these had
come to transfer licenses, others to seek to have in-beershops, and power
to sell other kinds of drink. The Magistrates, however, refused both of
the applications for new licenses, nor did we wonder, when we saw those
who were waiting to be punished or pardoned, as the case might be.
In the gallery were a number of the friends of those who were waiting to
have their names called upon, and then to appear in the dock. Besides
these, were the usual loafers, many of whom have found, or will find work
for the police, after going to seek grapes where thorns grow: and then
others, like the writer, who were on the lookout for a profitable way to
spend an hour or two. It was a most instructive time, and one wonders
how it is that long-headed Englishmen can, after seeing the results of
visiting the publichouse, ever be persuaded that grapes are to be got
there without trouble.
The mistake many good people make is looking on drinking as a failing,
and not as a crime. It must be a sin for any one to make himself
eligible for doing all sorts of mischief and wrong, as men do who take,
as they say, "a sup of drink." It is this sup of drink that gives them
the impetus towards cruelty and lust, and we must insist upon it that for
a man to prepare himself for wickedness is a sin against himself and his
God. If this be so, the social element in drinking makes it all the more
dangerous. Men and women drink often because it is considered a kind and
hospitable thing to offer it, and an ungenerous and churlish thing to
refuse it. What is this but calling a thorn a vine?
While we were in the court, several cases came before the
Magistrates--"Drunk and Disorderly," varied by obscenity and quarrelling.
One woman told the Bench that she had been teetotal for five and a half
years, till she came into the town to pay a debt, and then she had a
glass, "and it will be twenty years before I have any more." "Ah!" said
"His Worship,"
"LISTEN TO NO FRIEND THAT WANTS YOU TO TAKE DRINK."
Another poor wretch was "Drunk and Incapable." She told the Magistrates
that she had come to get a situation, that her box was at the station.
She had evidently seen better days. The Chairman said how sorry he was
to see a woman like her, evidently a superior person, in such a case, and
she gladly promised to be a better woman, but she had been more than once
to the thorn for grapes, and we fear will go again. There was a young
fellow brought up for drunkenness and obscenity, whose fine was paid by
his mother. She looked a decent but poor woman, and one could not but
wonder what she had parted with to raise the money, to keep what one of
the Magistrates called a blackguard, out of prison. But what will not a
mother's love do! These are a few of the cases which made us wonder that
in our town we have so many places, licensed by the same Magistrates, to
sell that which fits men and women to appear in the court to be punished.
We wonder how long it will take to make the English people see that so
long as we allow drinking shops to abound, there will be a necessity for
police and lock-ups, and that it is as easy to gather grapes of thorns as
to expect peace and quietness and facilities for drinking to exist
together?
GOD'S ANGER IS A FIRE THAT
IS AS DIFFICULT
TO STOP AS TO START.