It is important that the sense of society should be in some way strongly and decidedly expressed against this vice. It has been considered too lightly and as of too little consequence. And although it is undoubtedly a fact, that it has become disreputable among the better order of society, has become unfashionable and disgraceful, and of course less common, yet among the lower and labouring classes this is not the case, little account is made of it, and it is thought, and spoken of as a light and venial offence.

An effectual method of rousing the public to some attention to this subject is by making and presenting to them strong representations of the great political evil which intemperance inflicts upon the community, of the immense burden which it really though insensibly imposes upon society, of the prodigious tax which it actually levies. Nothing is more true than that our poor laws, and our institutions for the relief of the miseries of poverty, are in fact so many ways of levying a tax upon the country for the support of intemperance, they operate as premiums upon this vice, and it is not too much to say that were it once banished, three quarters of the poverty of the community would be banished with it, and therefore three quarters of what is now expended in its relief virtually saved. Now this is a point upon which men can be made to see and feel. Let them be convinced that paupers are made by the cheapness of ardent spirits, and they would soon be willing to submit to laws, and encourage their enactment which should lessen this cheapness, and make indulgence in intemperance a more difficult matter than it now is.

The measures which have been adopted to exert a moral influence in the suppression of intemperance, seem to have been too much directed towards those who are already intemperate, instead of the large class of those who are standing on the brink of the danger and are about becoming its victims. It is seldom, very seldom indeed that an intemperate man is reclaimed. It is only by the strong effort of a strong mind, under the influence of religious principle, that this can ever be effected. All the powers of persuasion and argument are spent upon him in vain. He is deaf alike to the voice of reason, of interest, of character, of religion, and no motives, whether founded upon a consideration of his temporal or eternal condition have power to Our efforts should be directed towards those, in whom exists rather a propensity to the habit than the babit itself. To all, in fact, who are accustomed to the regular use of ardent spirits, even if it be done with temperance and moderation, for all such are in danger either in themselves, or those whom their

move.

example and practice may influence. The father may be moderate, but if the son when a boy is allowed to indulge even to that moderate extent, how shall he be sure that when a man he will not exceed it-is it not even probable that he will?

No man uses ardent spirit to support him in his daily labour with the expectation that he will be thereby induced to become intemperate. There are few who would not, and could not refrain from it, from the very first, if they were convinced that this would be the consequence. Over the intermediate steps they pass blindly, they are only made sensible when past recovery. Intemperance actually formed, should then only be held up as the beacon to avoid, as the horrid consummation of unlimited indulgence. The voice of admonition should be raisedthe warning finger pointed, at the first steps which are taken. In short, where there exists such a facility of attaining the means of indulgence, it seems that no middle course can be successful. We must teach, not alone that the intemperate use of ardent spirits is to be avoided, but that their use even in moderation is dangerous, and pernicious. Our grand object should be a thorough one-to discourage and destroy their use in any shape or for any pretence. Let us endeavour to prevent drinking at all, not merely drinking to excess. There are no doubt many who are in no danger from a moderate indulgence; but there are too many others who cannot be moderate, to whom to taste is death; and for the sake of the weaker brother we must endeavour to make the influence universal, that he may not suffer by the example of the stronger.

Nothing indeed can be more clearly proved than that any use of ardent spirits is not only unnecessary, but even pernicious. Not that a moderate indulgence, even habitually, is always followed by bad effects, but that so far as they have any effect, it is a bad one. Few men will go through life in such a use of them, who will not be worse in bodily health at fifty or sixty years of age, than if they had entirely avoided them, and few who will not bear in their constitutions and in their diseases, marks of the kind of influence which they have exerted. The only way in which they can possibly have, in their use, a beneficial effect, is when employed as medicines, and it is to be recollected, that by using them freely when in health, we destroy the susceptibility to their stimulus upon which depends their efficacy as medicines. It is as if opium were daily used to procure prolonged and more quiet slumbers than the natural, thereby, rendering the system unfit to be influenced by it as a medicine in sickness.

The impression is to be sure very strong among men who labour hard, and indeed among many who adopt their opinion on the subject, merely because it is the current opinion-that ardent spirits are absolutely necessary to those who have violent bodily exertions to make. They believe that they support the strength and the spirits, that they render them capable of going through with a greater quantity of labour, and of doing it with less fatigue and exhaustion. We believe, as it has been before expressed, that this opinion is totally without foundation. It has been proved to satisfaction, that men who abstain entirely from the use of spirit will labour as long, as cheerfully, with as much strength, and as little subsequent exhaustion, as those who use it. Indeed, it is probable, from what facts are known on this subject, that the advantages of entire abstinence might be stated in still stronger language. During hard labour there is no doubt that men require some refreshment. Muscular exertion of all kinds expends the vital powers, and more particularly the fluids of the system, and therefore creates a demand for more frequent supplies of food and a more copious administration of drink, than under ordinary circumstances. It is not to be denied that at the periods when labourers usually have recourse to ardent spirits, some refreshment is necessary, and that they effect the purpose of immediate excitement far better than anything else. But from what evidence we have been able to collect, we believe that by occasional supplies of very light food, and the frequent drinking of some mild weak and unstimulating beverage, the strength and spirits will be better supported on the whole, the ability to labour hard be greater, and the subsequent fatigue and exhaustion less than when ardent spirits are employed. Men will deceive themselves and attempt to deceive others by asserting the undoubted fact, that if they, by way of trial, leave off the habit of using spirit during their work, they feel bad consequences from it, are more overcome by their labour, and less able to go through with their accustomed task. It is hardly necessary to say that this is no objection to the opinions we have advanced. Those who have been accustomed to a strong stimulus at à particular time, feel very sensibly at first the want of that stimulus, are depressed and disheartened by it. This however is a feeling that leaves them with time, and though affording a very good argument against forming the habit at all, is none against leaving it off.

If any thing is to be done to diminish or to banish the vice of Intemperance, it is conceived that no attempt is likely to be successful which has not at least some regard to the principles which we have alluded to in the course of these remarks.

Any system to be effectual must be thorough, and begin from the very foundation. And in this view something may perhaps be done;

1. By diminishing, if possible the facility with which the means of indulging in intemperance can be obtained.

2. By producing in all classes of society an abhorrence of the crime, and a public and decided expression of that abhor

rence.

3. By directing our efforts more particularly to the young; impressing thein strongly with an opinion of the horrid character of the vice, the insidious nature of its approaches, and the danger arising to them from even a moderate indulgence in spirituous liquors.

4. By producing in all a thorough conviction of the utter uselessness of any recourse to ardent spirits, as a refreshment during labour, and endeavouring in consequence to banish the use of them entirely from civilized society and introducing other mild and innocent substitutes for the use of the labouring classes. 5. By circulating judicious and striking addresses among the labouring poor, containing strong statements of the evil conséquences of intemperance to society and to themselves, of its effect on the respectability of their character, its influence on the character of their children, its necessary tendency to poverty, disease and early death; warning them against the insidious nature of its approaches in themselves, and of the terrible remote consequences which their injudicious indulgence may have upon their children; making estimates to show them how great a saving may be made, by relinquishing the habit of drinking entirely (which is the only safe, and effectual method) how much may be laid up and left to accumulate, or at least how many solid and substantial comforts may be added to their lot, by appropriating to a different use the money now spent in procuring ardent spirits.

6. By attempting to produce a concert among all who are in the habit of employing large numbers of labourers-in manufactories, or farms-in large towns, or at sea, for the purpose of exciting a powerful influence upon those whom they employ, by giving the preference to those, who will abstain from liquors, offering them the value of what they would drink, in money, instructing them how to appropriate their savings from this source, and in general by precept and example discouraging any use of ardent spirits whatever.

POR THE CHRISTIAN DISCIPLE.

VIEWS OF CALVINISM.

[By Professor Norton.]

I regret that the following statements appear, at first view, to have so much of a merely personal bearing. But I think it will be perceived that this is more in appearance, than in reality. A charge of intentional misrepresentation of the doctrines of Calvinism, made against me in the Christian Spectator, a periodical work, published at New Haven, has led me to do what I have long thought might be useful. I have in consequence made a collection of quotations from Calvinistic writers of the first authority, for the purpose of showing what Calvinism really is. An article of this sort, it seems to me, may be useful, because there are, without doubt, many who retain an attachment to the name, who, if they fully understood the subject, would regard the system itself with horror; and because many of the pretended defenders of the system among us have been very ready to disclaim its real doctrines, when fairly stated, and to complain without any reason, that these doctrines have been misrepresented by their opponents. I shall first give the passage in the Spectator, which has afforded occasion for the present controversy; then the copy of a letter, which I addressed in consequence to the Editor of that work; next the notice of this letter, which appeared in the last number of the Spectator (for August,) and finally some remarks of mine upon

this notice.

Extract from a Review of Erskine on the Internal Evidence of Revealed Religion, and of Thoughts on True and False Religion,' published in the Christian Spectator, for May and June 1822, pp. 301, 303.

'If we have reason to complain of the course of argumentation proposed by Mr. N. we have much more reason to disapprove of the manner and the spirit in which he has pursued it. But here it is proper that we should let our readers judge for themselves.

"True religion is an inestimable blessing, because it teaches that God is the everlasting Friend and Father of his creatures; a God of infinite goodness. But what shall we say of a religion, which teaches that he has formed men, so that they are by nature wholly inclined to all moral evil; that he has determined in consequence to inflict upon the greater part of our race the most terrible punishments; and that unless he has seen fit to place us among the small number of those whom he has chosen ou of the common ruin, he will be our eternal enemy and infinite tormentor; that having hated us from our