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

T'/c Liqz'or Traffic aced lfrZteiiiraizce. 1I39
energetic endeavor to grapple with the difficulties of the
situation. The slave-trade had developed into a great
comimercial interest, and had gained new vigor from the
slave-systems it had implanted in our colonial possessions; but what it was, and threatened to become, was
felt to be a spur to the philanthropic labors of the men
who sought its suppression by the agency of law. In regard to another and different question, the police arrangements of the country, it was lamented by successive generations of statesmen, that the so-called police-system of
our greatest towns was a national disgrace; and it is but
of late years that we have endeavored to supply the lack
of public service, injuriously prevalent for centuries, in
this respect. I
In relation to trades of every kind, it may be laid down,
as a rule without exception, that they are tolerated and
protected solely with a view to the good of society; and
no small part of the modern legislation on which we
justly pride ourselves has sought to put a stop to incidental and collateral evils arising out of industrial pursuits. Even where those evils do not affect society, or
the locality generally, but only persons who are employed
in the trades themselves, the law has beneficially interfered to check such forms and degrees of activity as tend
to injure health and shorten life. The reason why such
trades are not entirely suppressed, is because they are
believed to yield an overwhelming balance of benefit,
and because it is believed that the abuses complained of
are removable without a suspension of the works carried
on. The Ediznbutrgh Review has put the varied relation of
law to pernicious trade in so pertinent a shape, that its
words well merit citation: "There are some trades to
which the State applies, not restriction merely, but prohibition. Thus the business of coining money is utterly
suppressed by the laws of all civilized States; thus the
opening of lotteries is a conmercial speculation forbidden