The bases of the temperance reform: an exposition and appeal./ With replies to numerous objections. By Rev. Dawson Burns.

Cliaracer, of" fTe Plcdf'c."
applied as was the action of Xerxes in casting fetters into
the sea to curb its fury. WVhat the total abstainer asserts, and what we have endeavored in this work to sustain, is that intoxicating drink is intrinsically different
from other articles in dietetic use, because unadapted to
man's real wants, and because calculated to do him physical injury, and, by creating an unnatural and terrible
appetite, to plunge him into evil of every kind; this
being so, the abstainer urges that no man has the right to
expose himself or others to the danger which the use of
such an article carries with it; and that, if hle does use it,
he is both exposing himself to needless temptation and
tempting Providence to leave him to the folly of his
ways. The primary question, then, is one of fact; and no
Christian man admitting the fact could for an instant
accuse the abstainer of either cowardice or a depreciation
of divine grace. Nothing is more strongly enjoined in
Scripture than the avoidance of needless temptation; and
he who, under the pretence of honoring divine grace,
subjects himself to such temptation, shows conclusively
that the grace has not given him understanding or prudence. The Gospel teaches us to shun evil and danger
when they have not to be met and confronted in the dis charge of duty; and the grace which both discerns the
danger and draws the Christian aside is incomparably
more valuable than the rashness which tampers with
temptation, and despises each warning against the evil
that is braved. Better far is the humility that even
overestimates the power of the enemy than "the pride
which goeth before a fall."
6. It is said, " tha zf total abstznezce be iz accordance wit]
Scrz'ture, the same cannot be said of the.fledIge, which bhznds
thAc consczience, and whzicA seems to i~mniy a deficziency izn that
Cliristzan oblzgatzion which vows of Christzan baptsm and
zmembersh<z involve." But " the pledge," whether regard ed as a personal declaration or a bond of association, is
13 5