an eloquent production, and was characterized by great boldness and energy. On the 16th page he says: "Probably this infant country has reached a maturity in this shameful vice which is without a parallel in the history of the world. Probably no nation, ancient or modern, in proportion to its whole population, ever had so many male and female drunkards as this. Certainly in no other have the means of intoxication been procured with so much facility and used with so little restraint by all sorts of people."

The sermon closes with the most pointed and rousing appeals to retailers, magistrates, parents, professors of religion, and the rising generation. In almost every respect, it is fully up to the standard of temperance discourses of the last forty years. Thus did this man of God, standing alone, faithfully warn the people against a great and popular evil. The sermon produced a deep impression on Mr. Porter's congregation, although no temperance association is known to have been organized. But several editions of it were subsequently published, and it became a valuable temperance document in the earlier history of this cause.

In 1811, a very pointed and powerful sermon on the subject of drunkenness was preached, on Long Island, by Rev. N. S. Prime, father of the present editor of the "New York Ob

server."

CHAPTER II.

HA

THE TRUE INSTAURATOR.

AVING traced the progress of intemperance to its culminating point in this country, and the sporadic outcroppings of the sentiment of abstinence during that dark period, the attention of the reader is now invited to the steps which led to the organization of the first permanent moral movements for the removal of this great evil. Patient research has rewarded the endeavor to trace the distinct line of this reform to its prophet and instaurator. All great reforms have their origin in bold, struggling, isolated efforts of individual minds. The first temperance society was not organized until 1808. Prior to that time, for twenty years and more, there were many struggles toward that end; but there is one name that towers above all others, and to whom the organized movements of the later dates may be distinctly traced.

It is but just to the memory of a great and good man, a man of superior scientific attainments, of patient, philosophic research, of rare progressive spirit, a zealous reformer, and a devout Christian, to say that this great movement is indebted for its origin to

DR. BENJAMIN RUSH, OF PHILADELPHIA.

Other men had inculcated temperance, both by precept and example, standing as lights in dark ages; but Dr. Rush resolutely undertook, by extensive efforts, long persevered in, amid the arduous duties of his profession, to withstand this great and desolating evil, both through the press, and by personal influence with the leading men of his time. His antecedents indicate that he was a fit man for such a work. As early as 1774, when a member of the Provincial Assembly of Pennsylvania, he moved the first resolutions in favor of our

national independence; and, on the 23d of June, 1776, when a member of the Continental Congress, he was appointed the Chairman of the Committee on Independence. Such a spirit was not to be appalled in view of the antiquity and magnitude of this terrible scourge.

Two things led to his efforts in this direction-his own observation in a very extensive practice as a physician, and his frequent association with the early Methodist itinerants, Asbury, Dr. Coke, etc., whose societies had been, from the beginning, strictly temperate, excluding those who used ardent spirits as a beverage.

Dr.

It was, to a considerable extent, through the influence of these men, although he was greatly in debt to his Quaker origin, and the temperance principles for which that excellent people have long been noted, that Dr. Rush put forth his earliest efforts against intemperance. It is well known that his house in Philadelphia was a constant home for the early itinerants, toward whom he was very strongly inclined. Coke and Bishops Asbury, Whatcoat, and M'Kendree often enjoyed the hospitality of his house; and it is related that on one occasion, when Bishop Asbury passed the night with him, being ill, on retiring to bed he was recommended by Dr. Rush to take a dram of spirituous liquor, and that the Bishop was so strict in his views that, notwithstanding it was prescribed by an eminent physician, he declined to use it. Frequent intercourse with such men deepened and intensified his temperance convictions, and prepared him for the leading part which he was about to perform in this great moral reform. And how fitting that Dr. Rush, who, while a member of the Provisional Assembly of Pennsylvania, had moved the first resolution in favor of our national independence, should be the prime mover in the great temperance enterprise. In another place we shall show that his celebrated "Essay on the Effects of Ardent Spirits upon the Human Constitution" gave birth to the first temperance organization.

All previous testimonies were without much apparent fruit

The seed which had thus been scattered slumbered long in the soil, waiting for more active and genial influences to cause it to germinate and grow. But that quickening influence was soon to be felt, and a glorious harvest was about to be realized. The Old World had developed the evil; but the New World was to originate a movement for its removal. Unlike the order of nature, the Star of Temperance was to arise in the West, and send its inspiring rays of hope and cheer toward the East. Let us trace its progress as it rises among the mists and gloom, until it shall reach the zenith of its power and glory.

As early as 1785-1787, Dr. Rush published, in the papers of that day, a series of articles on "The Effects of Ardent Spirits on the Human Mind and Body." They attracted considerable attention, and exerted a manifest influence for good; so that, according to Hildreth, (vol. iv, p. 69,) at the celebration of the adoption of the Federal Constitution, in Philadelphia, July 4, 1787, ardent liquors were excluded from the entertainment, American beer and cider being the only liquors used. Nor was this all. He made earnest and repeated efforts, with the leading official ministers and ecclesiastical bodies of that day, to influence them to proper action toward reform, and we find him corresponding with "the elder Adams," of Massachusetts, and Rev. Dr. Belknap, of New Hampshire, on this subject. The following extract from an original autograph letter' from Dr. Rush to Dr. Belknap will show, in his own words, the depth of his interest in this subject, and also present some other interesting facts:

Mr. Hall, the printer, has neglected to republish the "Essay upon Spirits," probably from an opinion that it is less necessary than formerly. Much less rum will be used this year than last in the adjoining States of New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland. From the influence of the Quakers and Methodists in checking this evil, I am disposed to believe that the business must be affected finally by religion alone. Human

1 Dated July 13, 1789, in the possession of the New England Historical Society, Boston.

reason has been employed in vain, and the conduct of New England in Congress has furnished us with a melancholy proof that we have nothing to hope from the influence of law in making men wise and sober. Let these considerations lead us to address the heads and governing bodies of all the Churches in America upon the subject. I have borne a testimony (by particular desire) at a Methodist Conference against the use of ardent spirits, and I hope with effect. I have likewise written to the Roman Catholic Bishop of Maryland, to set an association on foot against them in his society. I have repeatedly insisted upon a public testimony being published against them by the Presbyterian Synod of this city, and have suggested to our good Bishop White the necessity of the Episcopal Church not standing neutral in this interesting business. Go thou, my friend, and in your circle of influence or acquaintance, "Do likewise.”

1

In the "Life of Rev. Jesse Lee," who was a conspicuous actor in Methodist history at that time, and its first American historian, we find the following allusion to the visit of Dr. Rush to the Methodist Conference in 1788:

The celebrated Dr. Rush visited it, and delivered an earnest and animated address on the use of ardent spirits, taking the broad ground then so strongly occupied by the Conference, and since so signally taken and maintained by the temperance reformation. . . . He insisted that allowable cases requiring their use were very few, and seldom occurring, and, when necessary, but very little ought, in any case, to be used; and he besought the Conference to use their influence to stop the use, as well the abuse, of ardent spirits.

The neglect of "Mr. Hall, the printer," referred to in his letter to Dr. Belknap, was to publish his "Essay upon Spirits" in the first edition of his collected works, which were issued early in 1789. But it appears, from Hildreth, that it was republished in the latter part of that year "in almost all the American papers." It appeared in 1794 in the form of a tract. In several editions of his "works" it was published; and in 1804, and for many years afterward, it was repeatedly issued in a tract of thirty-six closely printed pages. It was extensively circulated, being read by tens of thousands of people, and was the great temperance document of that early

1 P. 211.