276

ber.

CRYSTAL FOUNT AND RECHABITE RECORDER.

were

we may ask the question, were the wine drinkers also ?— believe we may answer, No. So far as we have traced them, on the lees was known to the Jews. The particular process, as it is now practised in the island of Cypris, is described in Mariti's Travels, and which, no doubt, was the customary obser- and through all the changes of their life, they seem still to have vance of the Jews. The vintage in Syria commences about the retained the rule of life before observed. When, therefore, the middle of September, and continues till the middle of Novem- coming of Titus to Jerusalem again obliged them to flee the But grapes in Palestine, we are informed, were ripe as plains, they as usual sought refuge in the city. But the total The Hebrews, according overthrow of that devoted place soon following, their fate became closely linked with that of the Jews. Some of them early as the month of June or July. ed in the borders of Palestine, or penetrated farther into Arato command, were obliged to leave grapes on the vines for the bia. After the lapse of a few generations, a new state of things poor, so that every one seemed to regaid vine culture as one of were carried into captivity, but the bulk of them either remainthe constituent elements of life. The season of vintage was a With shoutings on all sides, the grapes were most joyful one. plucked off and carried to the wine-press, which usually stood in took place. New empires were founded, and others homes in Churisan, Lusiana, and other fertile plains of Petrea, the vine-yard. The presses consisted of two receptacles, which crushed and tumbled into ruins, The Rechabites, freed from were either built of stones, and covered with plaster, or hewn their state of dependence, convened together, and planted their out of a large rock. The upper receptacle, (as it is constructed at the present day, in Persia,) is nearly eight feet square, where, until this day, they thrive and prosper in the full meanand four feet deep. Into this the grapes are thrown, and trod-ing of the terms, and enjoy the appellation of the most temperFor more than thirty three hundred years, the Rechabite adThe juice flows out into the lower receptacle, ate people on the face of the globe. den out by men. hered to the principles of total abstinence; and even when through a grated aperture, which is made at the side near the The treading of the wine-press was bottom of the upper one. power of the tempter-he resisted the enticement, and laborious, and not very favorable to cleanliness. The garments tempted in the temple of God-thrown, as he was, into the The triumphed in the might of tha moral rule, over every obstacle of the persons thus employed were stained with the red juice; and yet the employment was considered a pleasant one. labor was accompanied with music, both vocal and instrumen- that opposed its sway. We have no record of their ever hav tal, and with joyous shoutings from the treaders. The must ing indulged in the use of intoxicating liquors; indeed, the wine, as it is customary in the east at the present day, very nature of their pursuits, as well as singularity of their While some dwelt in tents, many betook themselves to caves was preserved in large firkins, which were buried in the national position, rendered it unlikely for them even so to do. earth. When deposited in these the firkins were times covered with clay, and at other times left standing upon and excavations, and their means of subsistence were derived it. Their vaults were constructed on the earth, and not, like from the extensive forests around them, and the streams that ours, subteraneous, or under the ground. Sometimes the must supplied them with fish. They followed no general trade or wine, or new wine, was boiled into syrup, which is comprehen- business, but spent the early parts of their lives in sports and ded under the term, (devash, Heb.) "honey." Dried grapes pastimes. The chase and the field gave them enough of enwere frequently pressed a second time, and produced what was joyment, and their state, doubtless, was more happy than that called "sweet," or "new wine," (gleukos, Gr.) and their hulls of the Jews themselves.

raisons.

some

In the primitive ages of the world, no drug or other ingredient was permitted to mingle with the pure juice of the grape; but, in more modern eras, it became a practice to press with it pungent and powerful spices, which took the name of "drinkoffering," or "mixed-wines." (mimsadh, Heb.) These drugs were honey, defrutum, (or wine boiled down to an inspissated state,) myrrh, mandragora, &c. &c. Thus the drunkard is properly described as seeking for "mixed wine." "Spiced wine" is supposed to be similar in composition and taste to that made still later by the Romans; and we learn that the only material difference was that the Romans lined their vessels with an odorous gum, which gave the wine a warm, aromatic taste. The "wine of Hebron" was an excellent kind of wine, known to the ancients by the name of chalibonium viuum: it was made at Damascus. Wine was also used in the libations of the Hebrews, in their sacrifices, and on festival occasions; and the custom descended to both Greeks and Latins. Thus Dido, heginning to sacrifice, pours wine between the horns of the vic-driven. From them, then, we can derive no more information, tim:

Here, then, we will take our leave of the ancient Rechabite, and believing him fully represented in the habits of his imitaWine-drinking in that day-considering the harmless qualitors, pursue the general thread of our discourse. ties the drinks possessed-can scarcely be called an evil; and, as an excuse, we may again cite or instance the influence of the climate over the physical constitution of man, rendering it sometimes necessary to partake of stimulants to sustain the functions of nature under its depressing influence. But brevity requiring us to pass lightly over this point, we will leave the actual cause of the use of wine, as a drink, to others equally After the final overthrow of the Hebrews, and they were interested, and trace its history to a more modern day. scattered far and wide over the vast and fertile plains around them, (once their own, but now under the rule of a stranger,) and groaning under the weight of the oppressor's arm, the privileges and customs of their forefathers degenerated into those of the habits of the country's into which they were

Ipsa tenens dextra pateram pulcherima Dido,
Candentsi vaccæ media inter cornua fudit.
"The Queen before the snowy heifer stands,'
Amid the shrines-a goblet in her hands;
Between the horns she sheds the sacred wine,
And pays due homage to the powers divine."
So far, then, we have the history of wine-making, and the
extent to which it was carried. Its different kinds come to us

under appropriate names, and all more or less satisfactory in
the sense they are to be taken. Although it was drank, and
even bargained for, care was taken that the proper kind for
drink was had, and not "mixed wines," unless obtained to be
It can, therefore,
used upon occasions expressive of its name.
be no excuse for the tippler to turn attention to by-gone ages.
and point to the records of that day, in his behalf; for, if he
will but question the substance of the meaning of wine," under
its appropriate heads, he will find enough to confound and un-
deceive him.

Now, then, to return to the history of the Rechabites,

and consequently it is to the Romans and Egyptians that we
must now chiefly confine ourselves. How long before this
period wine making existed in Egypt. I am unable to say; for,
although it was in general use in the time of the first Pharaoh,
the custom may nevertheless have been brought from Judea.-
But, to come down to a later day, it was perhaps in the reign
of Darius that it was first engaged in as a traffic. After him,
Cambyses indulged its manufacture to a state of excess; and
wine the more baneful drugs of intoxication. The Romans
he, doubtless, was the first monarch who introduced into pure
borrowed much of their extravagance from the Egyptians and
Persians, and it may be that in either one of the two countries
the habit of wine-traffic took its rise. Always bent upon new
discoveries, their ingenuity was set at work; and not only were
wines completely amalgamated, and rendered injurious in the
extreme by new modes of preparation, but other liquors also
were the product. With the Romans, then, habitual drunken-
ness may be said to have originated. From them other nations
for the first time, flapped its folds over the temple of youth,
caught the infection, and the gory pennant of the demon king,
and sapped the energies of mind.

As civilization advanced, and other nations were being added to the social world, wine making was not only understood in almost every branch of its preparation, and extensively engaged in at home, but it was made an article of traffic and barter with foreign dealers, and thus secured a footing even then as destructive as it was fatal. And fatal it certainly was-in more senses than one. Its terrible influence swept, in one century, over the greater portions of the globe, and was the cause of more misery and desolation to mankind, than all its effects combined throughout a period of twenty-two hundred years before. So much for wine and its additional discoveries!

Its pestiferous influence was everywhere felt, and its deleteri
ous effects everywhere manifested. No voice was raised in
behalf of suffering humanity--no arm extended to pluck down'
this ensign of death. Like an exulting conqueror, it spread
its pennant to the breeze, and triumphed in the majesty of its
might. Rapine, plunder, murder and suicide, crowded to its
standard, and were marshalled as satellites of its will. A gala
day was that on which the drunkard's incoherent curse first
sounded on the winds of Palestine! And these, the victims of
Alcohol's first onset upon the world, who were they? The
poor and unfortunate ?-the mean and lowly?-the meek and
haughty? Not one of these classes alone-but all. Its advo-
cates took their stand at the side of power, and its votaries
were found in the palaces of kings. Death was the issue
to its enemies. Marble fanes were reared to its name,
and temples opened for its worshippers. It was the luxury of
luxuries, and the sweet of all sweets. These were the conse
quences of its first introduction-these the fatal achievements
of a power more devastating than even pestilence itself.
Instead, then, of meeting with oppositlon, Alcohol was met
with passive overtures and good will. With this friendly re-
ception, it may not be surprising that it took possession of the
hearts of mankind without a struggle. It is more surprising
that it was as sparingly used as history shows it to have been.
But, at best, it was the worst evil that the invention of the mind
ever conceived, and has went further toward the total destruc-
tion of social happiness than any other, or all other, causes
combined.

Without permitting ourselves to trace the havoc tippling carried with it through a period of sixteen centuries, we will take a glimpse at it again as it existed at a period within the recollection of many persons now living. In the beginning of the nineteenth century, rum traffic had arrived at the acme of its strength and power. Even infidelity-the next most hideous deformity of vice-had given way to the march of this mon ster. It had arrived at a stage of such alarming habit and propensity, as doubtless to have caused the reflecting parent to sigh over the birth of an offspring, instead of welcoming it with a father's blessing. The dark ages, when war and carnage submerged the world in blood, and scarce a ray of Christianity burst through the pall of night that had settled over the land, were nothing to be compared to this. Then empires were the throw of the dice of battles, and men fought with a thing of parts and being. But now, an early grave was but the wager at best, and the antagonist a thing void of form and intelligence. Then mankind were led to strife by creatures like themselves, but now the leader was a pestilence, at whose order, the fated victim still approached nearer to the death that awaited him. Then escape from the murderous sword might ensue, in the chances of destiny; but now there were none.— No avenue of flight opened to his senses-no medium grounds whereon to pause and contemplate horror in the distance. None! One awful chasm was the terminating ordeal, and behind him-at every stride-the ponderous jaws of time swallowed up hope. There was no receding-no partition lands to challenge at will. The same ignus fatuus that tempted him to the lists, now mocked him in his unequal strife, and beckoned him to his grave.

After this, there followed other drinks even more poisonous and destructive than the first. Among these were gin, brandy, whiskey, and rum-from the latter of which, in consequence of its disgusting qualities, dram-drinking took its name. At first these drinks caused a misery almost indescribable. Kings, princes, nobles, and even the church of Rome itself, fell under the dominion of Alcohol. It was found occupying a place where grave legislators had convened in their deliberations over the destiny of a nation, and frequently was the seal to matters of diplomacy. It became the boon companion of the minister of state, and the monarch on his throne. It stood at the elbow of the priest of Christian profession, and mingled in affairs of the gravest importance. It was no longer the sweet and harm less liquor of the grape, unalloyed with sickly drugs and poisonous spies. It was no longer the product of mirth and happy sociability, where youth congregated together to while away the tedium of an hour. Nor was it the time of older days, when ministers of heaven offered it up in holiness, and deemed it the type of that blood since shed for our salvation, on the very plains where now its terrible influence was working decay and death. No-it was not these; but a bane of most potent charns, and a monster of inconceivable power. The primitive observances of their forefathers were forgotten, and instead of the wine-press, the seething cauldrons were set to work. The vapor from unseen fires-for the first time pregnant with the fumes of alcohol-now settled round the horizon of Palestine, and clouded the purer atmosphere of four thousand years. Ships, laden with its casks, were now wafted over the same waters that once bore to Judea the sacred vessels for the house of God; and the winds, that carried to the ears of the parent the merry song of the ancient vine-gatherer, nowover the same unhappy land-wafted the hoarse and melancholy echo of the inebriate. Where once the clustering vine clung for support to the sturdy palm-fragrant and nutritiousand watered by the hand of the gardener, there were now erected palaces of ruin, where seldom the bubbling boilers were permitted to cool. Where busy imagination had conjured up the pastimes of primitive innocence, there was nothing now to welcome back these reminiscences. Where altars of worship had been erected, and shrines, at which the Jewess knelt in the purity of holiness, nothing now met the eye in their stead, but temples dedicated to Bacchus and to heathen gods. And though tippling cannot be considered as the cause of this desolation, it nevertheless always has its throne amid the relics of greatness. Its empire was established, and behold its results! It was the deity to whom Paganism paid homage, and the arbiter of life and death. The song of the shepherd was hushed. and the symphonies of the water-girl silenced. Alcohol was In the nineteenth century rum's ensign floated over the ramthe umpire of love. The troubadour declared its merits in his parts of our homes and desecrated the sanctity of our family evening serenade, and likened it to the streams that watered hearths. In the still and solemn silence of the night the the grottoes of Parnassus. It accompanied the chieftain on his inebriates have rent the air with its doleful cadence; in the remarches to conquest, and mingled with the song of his welcome|ligious calm of a Sabbath day, the drundard's brutal laugh rang home. In every street of the then proud cities of the world, loudest near the house of God. Our streets were the theatres its votaries had hung its flag, and worshipped it as the object on which were displayed scenes revolting to the soul of virtue of their supreme devotion. It stirred vengeance in pur- and saddening to the eye of philanthropy. Our family circles suit of its object-ambition to frightful strides-and intrigue were often broken in upon, and the quietness of our homes and treachery to desperate ends. Youth, in armies, rushed to desecrated with the boisterous merriment of obscene ribaldry its fountains, and drank to excess and debauchery. Premature and jest. Walk forth where you might, and the reeling tippler decay of mind and body followed. Filth and wretchedness met your view; retire to your pillow when you pleased, and his were permitted to fester in their thoroughfares uncared for, and wan and bloated visage disturbed the harmony of your slumdisease to contaminate and rot unattended to. Fierce and un-bers, and rendered abortive the pleasing issues of your dreams. governable in its demands, it was not content with the destruction of one generation. No; its slimy poison had even to nip the tender and the young in their advancement to maturity,

And what were the consequences of this state of things? Our greveyards were fast filling up with tho dead; earth's verdure was not permitted to take root ere it required to be removed to

make way for the relics of morality. The at-
mosphere of our homes was rendered strange; for
the sudden absence of many of their members
chilled and threw a damp over the bouyancy of
earlier years,
Turn our eyes to the citadels of
the dead and what a picture was there! Moth-
ers watering with tears the rose-trees that bloom-
ed over the ashes of a hapless child, or bent, in
the attitude of prayer, over one as dead-brethren,
over a drunkard's grave! There, another, and a
wife, a solemn model of grief, pausing at the grave-
side of an inebriate husband, while she a widow,
young and crushed in spirit, was left to pine in
solitude over the breath that swept away her joys.
A season of time passed, and a new star lit the
cerulean of heaven-a new sphere was added to
time's constellation. Weak as a taper at first, its
benignant ray was unfelt; but its growth and viv-
ifying influence ere long extended from sea to sea;
and the glad welcome it met with circled, like in-
cense to heaven. That star was Temperance! A
reformation of appetites was the object, and health
was the promised reward. Man paused in his first
stride to ruin the film of ages was removed from
his eyes; and the riches of hope, like luminaries
life, sat smiling within his reach. For once the
demon of alcohol had found an obdurate foe; but
like a wounded beast, it returned to the fight with
increased might-but still in vain. The shafts,
with which temperance fought its battles were
shod with truth; and before this enemy to vice,
the red monster himself turned pale-and the vic-
tory was ours!

fare of mankind, die a death as natural as their existence was brief. But this view of our character and intentions is easily accounted for. The obtruder never troubles himself with an investigation o. our actions, but is willing to content himself with idle conjecture. Because others have failed in their efforts to disseminate the useful and beneficial dictates of morality and total abstinence, does it follow that we, too, should fail? I hope not!-nay, so well assured am I to the contrary that, were it required of me, I would feel no hesitation in embarking my hopes of happiness and property on the issue. The very nature of our fabric is of a material too firm to be effected by the ordinary vicissitudes of time andd change; and its foundations rest upon the very rock of omnipotence itself. God's word is the star that directs our course, and, strictly adhered to, it will never lead us astray.

Diligence and promptitude in alleviating distress, watchfulness in our selections of candidates, and dignity and decorum in the maintenance of our purposes and intentions, will always establish for us a foothold among the just and truly good of our land. Let the Rebhabite, then, not pause in his career of usefulness because the passer-by points the finger of distrust, and questions the strength of that fabric on which his hopes of usefulness are built. Let him not weary because he does not reap his harvest ere the seeds have taken root.The race is not always to the fast of foot, nor the victory to the man of strength. The bay-tree, planted in its scion-state, requires the lapse of cenWho, then, shall say it is a chimera?-that tem-turies to bring it to perfection. And yet, while perance is but a flicker, ready to die away at the first breath of chance? Go to the young mother, who has before her the prospect of a numerous family, and ask of her; go to the aged and decrepid, whose best years have been spent in tutoring her young to cling to it as the pass-word of their existence, and ask of her; or to the aged father, who has seen the desolation of past generations, lost in the tide of progress, and a new song given birth to cheer his departing days, and ask of him. And though the cauldron is still at work-and the chalice still sparkles with the poison we war against-that day is not far distant when the healthful influence of temperance will be fully felt, and parents will no longer mourn over the ruin of rum's creating,

around it springs up forests of another species, and their kind requiring but a few years to perfect their growth, where will you find greater encouragement than God's own allusion to the comparison. He forgets not though generations pass away.He cherishes its tardy growth, though thousands of other trees take root in the interim, and tower in supreme majesty above it. But when these firm monuments have given way to time's decay, and their trunks scathed, blighted, and fallen, where is the green bay-tree? Where the modest and slowgrowing shoot that bid fair to die before it budded?

It is there, brethren, we see the beauty of perfection's slow strides. The bay-tree has not fallen, nor yet decayed. It is there-but not the weak sapling. Its mighty branches expand over A few words more, and then I am done. In the area where its once haughty compeers have the formation of a body like this, what, may be disappeared; and among its boughs the fowls of asked, are its chief aims? The reply is furnish- heaven take shelter and rest. Under its broad ed in few words-"Reformation of man's social and ever-verdant branches, brute and kine take condition, and the inculcation of truth, justice, their repose; and at noon-day, its shades veil the temperance, mercy, and morality." To the su- quiet slumber of the weary pilgrim. I draw the perficial our order appears void of interest; and metaphor for your encouragement. Slow beginthe uninitiated regard it only as one of the many nings have greater ends, and you work for posterorganized bodies that start up for a day, and, with-ity. It is for succeeding generations you erect out achieving anything likely to enhance the wel- this structure-for your children's children you

plant in the soil of your fatherland the seed that is to spring forth a crop of priceless worth. And when this thought fills your. mind-when this consoling reflection takes precedent and dominion. over the vexations and cares some of you may experience in the world, while exercising this right of rectitude-you will have this soothing Mr. Simonson, of Westbury, was found dead consolation to cheer your dying moments-that on the Williamsburgh road, near Master's Toll you are the adopted son of Jonadab, the son of Gate, on Wednesday night. He was thrown from Rechab. his wagon.

The Lowell Factory Girls are now visiting their friends in the country, by way of relaxa ion. this country. The Railroad Companies think much of their fair.

The Broadway Journal has not been discontinued, but only suspended.

The morning News is to be enlarged on the 21st of August. Mr. Langley has sold out his interest in the paper to Mr. J. T. Crowell.

On Thursday next the Philadelphians recommence their expeditions to our Bay and Harbor. The steamer Transport is to be employed for