"
Let no one tempt you out of your sobriety. I have seen respectable
young men of the best families drunk on New Year's day. The excuse
they gave for the inebriation was that the _ladies_ insisted on their
taking it. There have been instances where the delicate hand of woman
hath kindled a young man's taste for strong drink, who after many
years, when the attractions of that holiday scene were all forgotten,
crouched in her rags, and her desolation, and her woe under the
uplifted hand of the drunken monster who, on that Christmas morning
so long ago, took the glass from her hand. And so, the woman stands on
the abutment of the bridge, on the moon-lit night, wondering if, down
under the water, there is not some quiet place for a broken heart. She
takes one wild leap,--and all is over!
Ah! mingle not with the harmless beverage of your festive scene this
poison of adders! Mix not with the white sugar of the cup the snow
of this awful leprosy! Mar not the clatter of cutlery at the holiday
feast with the clank of a madman's chain!
Stop and look into the window of that pawnbroker's shop.
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