It is true that the economic and physiological aspects of
the drink question were not ignored; the total-abstinence men were glad
enough to have this second string to their bow. But the real fight was not
against alcohol as one of many things concerning which the habits of men
are more or less unwise; it was a fight against the Demon Rum, the ally of
all the powers of darkness. The plea of the moderate drinker was rejected
with scorn, not because there was any objection to moderate drinking in
itself, but because total abstinence was the only true preventive of
drunkenness, and drunkenness must be stamped out if mankind was to be
saved. The moderate drinker was censured not because he was wasting his
money, or failing to "conserve his efficiency," but because for the sake
of a trivial self-indulgence he was giving countenance to a practice which
was consigning millions of his fellow men to wretchedness in this world
and to everlasting damnation in the next.
Now this remarkable thing about the present extraordinary manifestation of
growth and strength in the prohibition movement is that it is not in the
least due to a strengthening of this sentiment. On the contrary, it is
safe to say that feeling about drunkenness, about the drink evil in the
sense in which it was understood a generation ago, is far less intense
than it was then.
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