Show A TESIPEBANCE PREDICTION FKAXCES E WILLAUD president of the National Womans Christian Temperance union in forecasting what will be accomplished accom-plished in the cause of temperance in the last decade of the nineteenth century makes some rather bold predictions Would that we could as firmly believe her prophecies pro-phecies as we could wish to see them come to pass Belief however will not take hold of us The estimable lady says The last decade of 800 can be confidently expected ex-pected put upon the statute book of every state the scientific instruction ructlon laws already secured se-cured by the Womans Christian Temperance union in all the territories and in every state but ten This will provide for the twelve mil lion of children in our land foreign as well as of native parentage schools in which they will learn thus saith Reason thus saith Naturethus saith chemistry physiology and hygiene in favor of total abstinence from alcohol tobacco and all other narcotics Nor is this all The enthusiastic lady says that Expositions and fairs in English speaking lands at least will decline to exhibit the products prod-ucts of the distillery and brewery and Sunday closing within their borders will bE universalS universal-S S National prohibition will be the most I vital among living issues national enactments I will divorce the government from any relation I pS with the rum power that shall yield revenue to the one or protection to the other Nor does the lady confine her predictions strictly to temperance She ventures a prediction relation to religion CultiST has been she says The sermon on the Mountas an applied force will draw the wageworker back to the church in large measure and the women who publish the tidings will pe a great host All this and more in ten years GOD grant it 1 But we fear we utter a hopeless prayer unless indeed we can believe that the last decade of the eighteenth century may usher in the millennium when Satan shall be bound and have no more power to tempt the nationsan event scarcely probable prob-able It is not that the evils of intemperance are not known to the world that this king of evils stalks unchecked among the nations For ages thus saith Reason thus saith Nature thus saith chemistry physiology physi-ology and hygiene and add to that thus saith the voice of experience and the voice of GOD total abstinence from alcohol tobacco and narcotics is a good thing And yet the use of all these steadily increases with every decade The use of intoxicants stands strongly intrenched behind social custom and it will take longer than ten years to dislodge it Miss WILLAUD herself her-self seems to recognize that fact for haviug reaa her predictions she wisely adds the proverbial womans postscriptMay these things be in twent years if not in tenTis Tis said that coming events cast their shadows before and it would be interesting interest-ing to know what particular shadows have inspired Miss WILLAUUS soul to predict such progress for the temperance cause within the next ten years Surely she cannot can-not see them in tho evident backset which that cause received in the lato general election elec-tion The Womans Christian Temperance union has won many victories in the past in individual cases it has snatched many n man from the misery wrought by the rum demon it has prevented many others from plunging into the awful gulf and it will doubtless continue the good work but to do what Miss WILL vito predicts is beyond I its power within ten or even twenty years |