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Show Wm DR. MIDDLETON'S HOOK. H a MONG other acceptable gifts received on - Christmas by the editor of The Record H was a copy of Dr. Middleton's book, "After H Twenty Years," being a dissertation on the philos- H ophy of life in narrative form. It came at a busy H time, and as it would be folly to undertake to criti- H cise or comment on a work that we had not read, H rt we deferred opinions until we had found time to H read it. H The purpose of the volume, the author states H in the preface, "is to discuss the philosophy of H life in a concrete way, avoiding the tediousness H that must attach to dissertations on honesty and H charity and courage and the many virtues and H vices of society when presented in the abstract. H . "An attempt has been made to weave into the B warp of narrative my woof of philosophy, with H what success I must leave the reader to judge. H "The question naturally arises, Are these real H characters, and the answer is that in the main H they are. I have reserved the right, however, to H vary my colors and to modify my pattern accord- H ing to my own design." B The above gives a very good understanding of H the character of the book, and while it is interest- H ing to follow the narrative, and trace out and M guess at tho identity of the various characters as H they are introduced, the work is chiefly valuable M for its philosophical reasoning r.nd deductions. H As an example of these, we reproduce the follow- B ing excerpt showing the author's version of a B drunkard, and as time passes may make other B quotations from the philosophical pages of the H book, with the consent of the author. In discus- H sing one of the characters of the book the author B! says: H "A drunkard is a worse offender against socie- !A ty.'in my judgment, than a thief. His delinquency jgH is more imminent and far-reaching in its conse- WM quences than the crime of the man we send to jail '&M for petit larceny. The thief does not apprehend Wjjl ' the goods of poor people, because they have no $4$ ' chattels of commercial value to him. He takes JbJ from those who while they may feel the chagrin WM of being defrauded are yet possessed of all the K" , ' necessities of life. But the man who wilfully lflj .-takes the money which is the product of his toil, jB .und which by the laws of God and nature belongs B ( ,to a helploss wife nnd dependent children, nnd K , appropriates it to his own selfish, unrighteous HV: , ' ,'mirpme, to one who, rxb tlw noedy nwl tksf-wuxk) HHK the defenseless. And if we send a thief to the penitentiary for a term of months or years to expiate his crime of misappropriation of the chat tels of other people, we should have some form of punishment for the drunkard that would be pro-poronate pro-poronate to his offense. I believe there was wholesome whole-some discipline in the old time whipping post, barbarous as it seemed, and for the sake of this kind of an offender it is a pity that such a speedy form of retributidn could not be restored. Wlier society collectively makes itself the arbiter of the rights of its units, nnd invokes the traditional laws to adjust differences that arise between them, it exercises a necessary and imperative function, but when society stands by and connive? at this form of robbery, and shuts its eyes t the spectacle of pauperized women and suffering children, it is weak, nny, almost vicious in it? indifference. "When the chance of education, of Christian training, of social recognition, of proper clothing, of quality and quantity of food to eat are all sacrificed sac-rificed to the unreasonable appetite of a human monster who has become lost to all the bettc instincts of life; when the fnmily alter, whic has been consecrated to love and devotion to common com-mon cause, becomes a pandemonium of riot and vice and degeneracy through the selfishness of one individual, then society should step in and show its strong hand and adopt some remedy foi this outrageous perversion. When we recall the fact that the vice of the drunkard does not end with his own life, but that he hands down to posterity the real physical defects that he has brought upon himself; that he often transmit? epilepsy, dipsomania, insanity and a predisposi-Lion predisposi-Lion to crime, the duty of society becomes mor 'mperative than ever." Any person having acquaintance with Dr "Middleton, would naturally expect a good deal of him through the medium of his book, which w ire considering, but we do not believe that aftc reading it critically any will feel in the slightest degree disappointed. m |