alth, and
provided for my family, and maintained my position in the community. I
felt I had a perfect right to drink liquor just as I had a perfect
right to stop drinking it. I never considered my drinking in any way
immoral.

I was decent, respectable, a gentleman, who drank only with gentlemen
and as a gentleman should drink if he pleases. I didn't care whether
any one else drank--and do not now. I didn't care whether any one else
cared whether I drank--and do not now. I am no reformer, no lecturer,
no preacher. I quit because I wanted to, not because I had to. I didn't
swear off, nor take any vow, nor sign any pledge. I am no moral censor.
It is even possible that I might go out this afternoon and take a
drink. I am quite sure I shall not--but I might. As far as my trip
into Teetotal Land is concerned, it is an individual proposition and
nothing else. I am no example for other men who drink as much as I did,
or more, or less--but I assume my experiences are somewhat typical, for
I am sure my drinking was very typical; and a recital of those
experiences and the conclusions thereon is what is before the house.

I quit drinking because I quit drinking. I had a very fair batting
average in the Booze League--as good as I thought necessary; and I knew
if I stopped when my record was good the situation would be
satisfactory to me, whether it was to any other person or not.
Moreover, I figured it out that the time to stop drinking was when it
wasn't necessary to stop--not when it was necessary. I had been
observing during the twenty years I had been drinking, more or less,
and I had known a good many men who stopped drinking when the doctors
told them to. Furthermore, it had been my observation that when a
doctor tells a man to stop drinking it usually doesn't make much
difference whether he stops or not. In a good many cases he might just
as well keep on and die happily, for he's going to die anyhow; and the
few months he will grab through his abstinence will not amount to
anything when the miseries of that abstinence are duly chalked up in
the debit column.

Therefore, applying the cold, hard logic of the situation to it, I
decided to beat the liquor to it.

That was the reason for stopping--purely selfish, personal, individual,
and not concerned with the welfare of any other person on earth--just
myself. I had taken good care of myself physically and I knew I was
sound everywhere. I wasn't sure how long I could keep