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Show ' Timely Topics By C. V. Hansen Woman's mightiest weapon not the vote, nor tne strike, buo prayer. Women, without the aid of the state, through this agency, prayer, cused up saloons, converting them into meetiiig roms for prayer and praist. Tne credit of projecting the plan of the Woman's Cru.saito has been given to Dr. Dio. (Diociation Lewis ui Jboston, wh. in his own father's ncme experienced the miseries wiiich intempeiance bring on the family. His fatner was a drunkard but his mother was a prayerful woman, wnose trials in bringing up her family, and suxleiing the abuses of her husoand. were almost too much fr her endurance. Many a time she went up to the garret to pray, and the children vvuold her ner crying out in agony f spirit, "How long, O Lord! how iong! how long!" When she came down the children wiould notice uhat her eyes were red with weeping, weep-ing, but that her face was shilling Aim light from the other world. Under such influences as these it is not strange that the doctor should seek fr the salvation of men and women from1 the disease and death of drunkenness, which in his boyhood had been such a horror. He learned to pray of his mother, and grew up with a high estimate cf the power and value of such prayers. These views he set forth in public pub-lic lectures in various partsf the West, organized temperance bands, drafted and piesented appeals to the whiskey-sellers. As the result of the first week's work along this line in the town of Dixon, Illinois, thirty-nine dram-sheps were closed, and for a time it was declared that no liquor was sold in the town. 'Though woman's hands are weak to fight, Their voices are strong to pray, And with fingers of faith they'll open the gate To a brighter, better day." |