with the drunkards, to be distinguished from them only as their
abettors and supporters; and from you will every virtuous and patriotic
man turn away in disgust, as enemies to himself, his children, and his
country. Think not that all this is imagination: look up, and you will
see the cloud blackening, and the lightning beginning to play, and hear
the thunder roaring. But it is not yet too late to escape from the fury
of the storm.

Finally, I would entreat these men _as a Christian_. Some of them
profess a personal and experimental knowledge of vital Christianity, and
are members of the visible church. What, can it be that a real Christian
should, at this day, be concerned in the manufacture of ardent spirits
for general use? When I think of the light that now illuminates every
man's path on this subject so clearly, and think how the horrors of
intemperance must flash in his face at every step, I confess I feel
disposed indignantly to reply, No; this man cannot be a Christian. But
then I recollect David, the adulterer; Peter, the denier of his master,
profanely cursing and swearing; and John Newton, a genuine convert to
Christianity, yet for a long time violating every dictate of conscience
and of right; and I check my hasty judgment, and leave the secret
character of the manufacturer of ardent spirits to a higher and more
impartial tribunal. But if such a man be really a Christian, that is, if
he do really love God supremely and his neighbor as himself, in what a
state of awful alienation and stupidity must he be living! Remaining in
such a state, that is, while persevering in so unchristian an
employment, can he have any evidence himself, or afford any evidence to
others, of possessing a Christian character?

I would not apply these remarks in their unqualified severity to every
professor of religion who supplies the distillery with materials, or who
vends or uses wine or ardent spirits; for we shall find some of this
description who really suppose that, instead of being condemned for such
conduct in the Bible, they are rather supported by some parts of it:
they not only find Christ converting water into wine at a marriage, and
Paul directing Timothy to use a little wine for his health, but that, in
one case, the Jews had liberty to convert a certain tithe into money,
and bring it to Jerusalem and bestow it for what their _soul lusted
after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or strong drink_, and _they
were to e