Temperance pledge

“ The need of something more reliable than a simple pledge has led to other means of reform and cure, each taking character and shape from the peculiar views of those who have adopted them. Inebriate Asylums and Reformatory Homes have been established in various parts of the country, and through their agency many who were once enslaved by drink are being restored to society and good citizenship. In what is popularly known as the "Gospel Temperance" movement, the weakness of the pledge, in itself, is recognized, and, "God being my helper," is declared to be the ultimate and only sure dependence. ”

“ I am temperate because intemperance is sin. For men who have abused their freedom, and so far lost all rational control over themselves that they cannot resist the insane spirit of intemperance, the pledge is all important. ”

“ There are innumerable such tests which we have to stand; and nothing is more unfortunate than to fancy and to say, 'We have signed the pledge, and we shall be sound.' It is not the pledge that saves life. It is the life that saves the pledge-— saves it from dishonour or disrepute. See to it, then, that the pledge you take and the life you live are not in disharmony with each other. It is the life that must be the guarantee for the pledge, not the pledge that can stand security for the life. ”

“ Who shall prevent them from again breaking loose? Where is the power capable of restraining them? Who will be answerable to us for their future loyalty and submission? Their own goodwill is the sole pledge we have. ”

“ From a long personal acquaintance, and a knowledge of the inflexible, godlike integrity which has characterized your adherence to, and your support of, our murdered Prophet; with the utmost confidence we pledge ourselves to uphold, and, as much as lies in our power, to assist you in resuscitating and re-establishing those glorious principles, while we live; and when we die, we bequeath this pledge as a sacred legacy to our children. As we have inherited the spirit of liberty and the fire of patriotism from our fathers, so let them descend unadulterated to our posterity. ”

“ I don’t think Pledge is the proper man. (Cheers.) I don’t like him myself— (loud cheers) —and I don’t think I’m very fastidious. (Great applause from the Den.) We want an honest, reliable man— (hear, hear) —who’ll keep our scores without fear or favour. ”

“ It is as though a commander should plant powerful batteries about his own fortress, preparing them to be used by the enemy. Thus learning from our past, we know how to guard ourselves for the future. Present faithfulness is the pledge, and the only pledge, of future security. ”

“ Do you attribute any more meaning to those words than a pledge to human beings around you?—I attach no more meaning to those words than I do to a pledge to human beings authorised by law to take such a pledge from me under similar solemn circumstances. ”

“ But he reflects that what is beyond HIS control is not beyond all control. This law of calamity obeys the rule of One who has given the most solemn and awful pledge that He loves me as a friend and treats me as a child. ”

“ They betray. They break at first uneasily, later easily, and at last unconsciously, the word which each of us has passed before He was born in Paradise. All men and all women are conscious of that word, for though their lips cannot frame it here, and though the terms of the pledge are forgotten, the memory of its obligation fills the mind. ”

“ A broken pledge is hateful to me. I should regard it myself as a form of suicide. There are principles which civilized men must contend for. Our social fabric is based on them. As my word stands for me, I hold others to theirs. ”

“ But it is a question, after one has deliberated, and conscientiously entered a community in the exercise of his constitutional and religious rights, whether he should give a pledge, under the influence of a love of life, never to return. ”

“ Is it not also becoming clearer every day that they will continue to rage more and more fiercely—that there can be no rest or peace possible for mankind—until all things are subdued to him, and brought into harmony with his life?
It is to this work that all churches and sects, that all the leading nations of the world, known collectively as Christendom, are pledged: and the time for redeeming that pledge is running out rapidly, as the distress and perplexity, the threatening disruption and anarchy of Christendom too clearly show. ”

“ Thou didst once a wretch behold, In rebellion blindly bold, Scorn Thy grace, Thy power defy: That poor rebel, Lord, was I. Once a sinner, near despair, Sought Thy mercy seat by prayer; Mercy heard, and set him free: Lord, that mercy came to me. Many days have passed since then, Many changes I have seen; Yet have been upheld till now; Who could hold me up but Thou? Thou hast helped in every need; This emboldens me to plead: After so much mercy past, Canst Thou let me sink at last? No, I must maintain my hold; ’Tis Thy goodness makes me bold; I can no denial take, When I plead for Jesus’ sake. ”

“ Pledges and associations, while sanctioned by her, are regarded as mere adminicula, tending to bring the sinner to the use of confession, the performance of enjoined penance, and the worthy reception of the Blessed Sacrament. Abstinence, whether for a time or for life, she looks upon as a work of perfection, of remedy, or of penance for the individual. The pledge, as administered by her, is neither oath nor vow, but either a resolution taken by one’s self in the presence of another, or at the utmost a solemn promise made to man. ”

“ In a simple pledge there is no element of self-control. If honor, self-respect or conscience, rallying to its support in the hour of temptation, be not stronger than appetite, it will be of no avail. And it too often happens that, with the poor inebriate, these have become blunted, or well-nigh extinguished. The consequence has been that where the pledge has been solely relied upon, the percentage of reform has been very small. ”

“ For such benefits, for such an arresting and majestic vindication of the undefeatable powers inherent in our precious Faith, we can but bow our heads in humility, awe and thanksgiving, renew our pledge of fealty to it, and, each covenanting in his own heart, resolve to prove faithful to that pledge, and persevere to the very end, until our earthly share of servitude to so transcendent and priceless a Cause has been totally and completely fulfilled. ”

“ The courage of the warrior is that quality which preserves a right opinion about dangers in spite of pleasures and pains. The wisdom of the counsellor is that small part of the soul which has authority and reason. The virtue of temperance is the friendship of the ruling and the subject principles, both in the State and in the individual. Of justice we have already spoken; and the notion already given of it may be confirmed by common instances. Will the just state or the just individual steal, lie, commit adultery, or be guilty of impiety to gods and men? ”

“ There is diversity of opinion as to the value of pledges. It would seem unwise, however, when a man has broken a pledge, to encourage him to renew it. Let him try a promise to himself, and prove that he can be a man without artificial props. ”

“ So, what with the self-seeking, and sloth, and jealousy of La Trémouille; what with the worldly policy of the Archbishop of Reims, crying Peace, where there was no peace, the Maid and the captains were not listened to, or, if they were heard, their plans were wrought out with a faint heart, so that, at last, if it is lawful to say so, the will of men prevailed over the will of Heaven. ”

“ If God counts it a dishonorable and wrong thing for a man to repudiate a pledge given to his fellow-man, what will he think of those who repudiate a solemn public pledge made to him? If God honors the integrity of the man who keeps his word when his interests seem to call upon him to violate it, what will he say of those who violate their word when all their interests, both temporal and eternal, call upon them to keep it?
3. When the young people connected with the Church are drawn into frivolous diversions, it is a sorrow of heart to the pastor and to all devoted Christians. ”

“ From all this, and also from what I say in my former work on Insanity, as well as in Allen v. Dutton, it will be seen that I have been induced to give pledge after pledge so repeatedly, that it becomes a serious matter, “partaking of the nature of a solemn obligation;” if, therefore, I fail to exert myself to redeem these pledges, I cannot have the excuse of p. vithose who promise without even intending to perform. ”

“ This is the noble temper with which the apostle designed to inspire his brethren at Corinth—a kind of independence of all temporal things.—Not despising the good things of the world, but putting a due estimate upon them, using them in their proper place—not seeking happiness in them, but in the only living and true God. This is the temper that becomes us as dying men diligently to cultivate. ”

“ For fear the hour begin its flight,
While Right and Duty plead in vain.”
And now it is I bid thee pause,
Nor let this Tempter bend thy will:
There are diviner, truer laws
That teach a nobler lesson still.
Learn that each duty makes its claim
Upon one soul: not each on all.
How, if God speaks thy Brother’s name,
Dare thou make answer to the call?
The greater peril in the strife,
The less this evil should be done;
For as in battle, so in life,
Danger and honour still are one. ”

“ Although men of piety have prayed, and incessant, fervent, importunate petitions have gone forth from thousands of hearts, yet the awful Sovereign still holds in his hands the two divisions of our once happy union, and dashes them against each other like two vessels of the potter, breaking them into shivers. Is God our enemy? Does he muster the hosts for the battle? And is he unwilling to be at peace with us? ”

“ The patriot is kept in his line of march by the pledge; the business man makes a pledge when he signs a note; and the Christian takes pledges when he joins the Church. We should be willing to take any pledge that will make life better. If eating meat cause my brother to stumble and offend, then I will not eat meat. I will sacrifice myself always to that which will help the world and honor God. ”

“ What have we done to be treated as the faithful never were treated before? When has a definition de fide been a luxury of devotion and not a stern, painful necessity? Why should an aggressive, insolent faction be allowed to ‘make the heart of the just sad, whom the Lord hath not made sorrowful’? Why cannot we be let alone when we have pursued peace and thought no evil? ”

“ She preached that stern and lofty courage of soul which shrinks neither from war nor from any other form of suffering and hardship and danger if it is only thereby that justice can be served. She embodied that trait more essential than any other in the make-up of the men and women of this Republic—the valor of righteousness. ”

“ Neither do we fear the foul aspersions of rebellion, combination or what else our adversaries from their craft and malice would put upon us, seeing what we do is so well warranted, and ariseth from an unfeigned desire to maintain the true worship of God, the majesty of our King, and the peace of the kingdom for the common happiness of ourselves and posterity. ”

“ Indeed, to whatever we are elect—whether national, or ecclesiastical, or personal privileges—the temptation dogs us to rest on our inherited merits and have no open ear to the guiding voice of God, as it calls us to fresh ventures and renewed sacrifices, like those which laid the basis of the position of which we now make our empty or insolent boast. ”

“ A more dangerous symptom of rebellion was a pledge signed by the magnates, agreeing that all priests should be allowed to preach freely the truths of Scripture, that no bishop should be permitted to interfere with them unless they taught errors, and that no excommunications or interdicts from abroad should be received or observed. ”

“ Many a cultivated and comfortable man must have wished that reasonable peace to last for ever. The civilised world was bathed in the element of calm, the element of gentle acquiescence. All looked so quiet, so imperturbable; and yet all the time the little catfish of Christianity (or the little leaven, if you will) was at its work, irritating, disturbing, stimulating with salutary energy to upheaval, to rebellion, to the soul's activity that saves from bland and reasonable despair. ”

“ For all who [Pg 84] come from your province do make one reservation in the extremely high praise which they bestow on your virtue, integrity, and kindness—it is that of sharpness of temper. That is a fault which, even in our private and everyday life, seems to indicate want of solidity and strength of mind; but nothing, surely, can be more improper than to combine harshness of temper with the exercise of supreme power. ”

“ A vulgar ambition contents itself with power to command obedience, but the more exalted and refined ambition aims at domination over the mind. Hence the leaders of a sect, or even those who have powers to awake the dying embers of pious fervour, sway the hearts of their followers in a manner far more gratifying to them than any enjoyment to be derived from temporal power. ”

“ Ambition, cruelty, and callous hardness, trampled under foot all the finer feelings of the heart and mind,—hypocrisy and treachery invaded the most sacred ties of home and blood-relationship, the desire of worldly power, and holding their neighbours in the yoke of bondage, was the prevalent feeling, to which all others were sacrificed, and the opposing factions met each other on the field of battle, and fought for the governing power at the sword's point, with the sacrifice of myriads of human lives. ”

“ Jesus said, "A branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine;" nor can you do anything without obedience, for the moment you, rebel you are in this position.
If we, as a little company gathered together on the tops of these mountains, in possession of the great and glorious privileges that we enjoy,—if we cannot magnify our calling and honour the Priesthood conferred upon us, how do we expect salvation to flow to the world? How can we expect men to do what we do not do?—to listen to and obey us, if we do not obey our superior officers? ”