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Show LINCOLN AND TEMPERANCE. The following Is from Collier's Weekly: In early youth. Lincoln, in boyish speeches, flayed tho scourge of drink. Later, when he was thirty-three, thirty-three, this is what ho eald: "The world would be vastly benefited bene-fited by a total and final banishment from It of all intoxicating drinks." He did not lose his reason merely because his conlctlons were Intense: "Too much denunciation against dram-sellers and dram-drinkers was indulged In. it Is not much In the nature na-ture of man to be driven to anything." Observe, Lincoln was pleading for ' "entreaty and persuasion" toward temperance as against "the thundering thunder-ing tones of anathema and denunciation." denuncia-tion." The same belief in the vast harm of drink, tempered, however, by the power to sec all sides of man'a complex nature, existed at the height of his development. Thus wc find him in 1S63: "Intemperance Is one of the greatest, great-est, if not the greatest, of all evils among mankind." He added: "The mode of euro is ono about which there may be differences of opinion." Why Is forgery deemed necessary to the prohibition cause? - The brewers brew-ers circulate a statement against prohibition pro-hibition falsely attributed to Lincoln. Along come the prohibitionists with another, recommending prohibition, also forged. Both desire his assist-" anco; neither can find anything of his extreme enough to suit. If he lived today to-day he would favor no license where public sentiment was strong enough to mako that policy succeed, and he would certainly oppose, an j thing resembling re-sembling national prohibition. The other day we were approached by a man brimful of ardor. "Lincoln," said he, "was a hypocrite. He was a temporizer tem-porizer and coward. In '66 he had a a.t army at command. Why did he not use It to put down drink?'' That man docs more harm to the temperance cause than any other being in the town where he resides, in a book by D. C. Baker, published last year, is this statement: "Mr. Lincoln is quoted as saying: 'If the prohibition of slavery Is good for the black man, the prohibition or the liquor traffic is equally good and constitutional for tho white man.' " Yes. ho Is "quoted" a3 saying It, but never did say It. The prohibitionists prohibition-ists attribute this speech to April 13, 1865, tho last day of Lincoln's life, so It ought to he possible for them to name the letter, or document, or speech. In which the words occurred. Actually, they were invented, just as that stupid proposition about fooling the people was invented also. m-9 m |