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THE WIDENING HORIZON.

YOU

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FRANCES E. WILLARD.

are told that public opinion seems to demand the saloon. As a White Ribbon I ask, "Whose public opinion? That of the home?" "Oh, no! The home is solidly against it. "Whose public opinion? That of the churches?" "Oh, no! Two-thirds of the church is made up of women.” "Whose public opinion?" That of men who drink and men who sell, and men in professional, business and political life who don't like to get the ill-will of those who drink and sell. Thus, as the outcome of deliberate choice, based upon motives wholly selfish, these men have saddled the liquor traffic on this nation.

We

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Let us be grateful that our horizon is widening. women have learned to reason from effect to cause. considered a fine sign of a thinker to be able to reason from cause to effect. But we, in our onward march, have learned to go from the drunkard in the gutter, who was the objectlesson we first saw, back to the children, back to the idea of preventive, educational, evangelistic, social and legal work for temperance-back to the basis of the saloon itself. We have found that the liquor traffic is joined hand in hand with the very sources of the national government. And we have come to the place where we want prohibition first, last, and all the time! While the brewer talks about his "vested interests," I lend my voice to the motherhood of the nation that has gone down into the valley of unutterable pain and in the shadow of death, with the dews of eternity upon the mother's brow, given birth and being to the sons who are the "vested interests" of America's homes.

We offset the demands of the brewer and the distiller, that you shall protect their ill-gotten gains, with the thought of these most sacred treasures, dear to the hearts that you, our brothers, honor, dear to the hearts that you love best.

I

THE SPIDER AND THE FLY.

KNOW a dingy corner where a wicked spider clings, Where he spins his web round bottles, glasses, jugs, and other things;

And I listened in the shadow, as one day I passed along, And I heard the wicked spider as he sang his cruel song: "Will you take a little cider?

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Will you call while passing by ?"
Said the wicked, crafty spider
To the buzzing little fly.
"Will you take a little lager?
Surely you will not decline
Just to take a drink for friendship;
Say, just sip a little wine.

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"He is coming for his cider,"
Said the wicked, cruel spider;
"He is coming for his wine,
And my cord will round him twine.
While he sits and sips his lager,
I will whet my little dagger,
And when he has drunk his wine
He will find that he is mine!
Ha! the little fool is coming!
I can hear him buzzing, humming!
He who comes to visit me

Vainly struggles to be free.

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"You are welcome to my parlor;
I am glad to see you come.
Do not stay outside the entrance,
Please to make yourself at home.

"Will you take a little lager
While I sharpen up my dagger? .

Will you take a drop of wine?
Then you surely shall be mine.

"I will bind you, I will grind you,
Though you struggle, weep and pray;
I will tie your hands behind you,-
You shall never get away.

I will fight you, I will smite you,
I will stab you, I will bite you;
I will make you poor and needy,
I will make you old and seedy;
I will make you bleared and bloated,
And with rags and tatters coated;
And your hat will look so shocking
That the boys will all be mocking;
I will haunt you till you die,

Then I'll hang you up to dry!'

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O my boy! beware of cider and of lager and of wine;
Then the wicked, cruel spider ne'er shall get a child of mine.
Let us storm his ugly castle; let us tear his web away;
Let us drive away this spider. Heaven in mercy speed the
day!

CONSCIENCE IN POLITICS,

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DR. I. K. FUNK.

UR party has been called in half derision a conscience party. We accept the epithet. Right here is the great foundation-stone, the corner-stone, of the Prohibition party! It is the introduction of the moral element into politics. It is the law of conscience for the individual extended to party. Is it wrong for the individual to steal? It is wrong for him to belong to a party that would steal. Is it wrong for the individual to stuff ballot-boxes, to buy and sell votes? It is wrong for him to belong to a party that

would stuff ballot-boxes or buy and sell votes. Is it wrong for him to oppose the poor by establishing or defending huge, oppressive monopolies? It is wrong for him to belong to and support a party that establishes or defends oppressive monopolies. Is it wrong for the individual to put the bottle to neighbors' lips? It is wrong for him to belong to a party that gives countenance to and makes legal the business of putting bottles to neighbors' lips. That is, the law of conscience out of a party must be the law of conscience in a party. That is what the Prohibition party means-conscience applied to politics.

And why should not conscience be applied to politics? What is a political party other than a combination of citizens for the accomplishment of political purposes. What is there

in the act of combining to release a member of the combination from the law that governs him in his individual capacity? If a man steals through a band of robbers, is he less guilty than if he steals on his own hook?

There are two mighty reasons why politics should be revolutionized and conscience made the law of party, as it is now the law of the individual.

First, under our republican form of government nothing is so educative as are politics. The whole nation of voters go to school every year. Everywhere the dominant question is discussed. If politics are on a low plane the education is downward; if on a high plane the education is upward. This tremendous educational agency must be brought over to the right side. It will be of unmeasured advantage to compel the masses to discuss and take sides on moral questions. It is the mission of the Prohibition party to compel this.

Secondly, under this Government for the people all great reforms are wrought through the Government. It is the most potent engine the world has ever seen for weal or woe. It must be gotten and kept on the right side. This blind Samson, with eyesight restored, must be enlisted on the right side and help to speed the race upward.

The question remains, which political party is the one

What chance is

fitted to bring conscience into politics? there for one of the old parties to become a conscience party? Not the shade of a shadow of a chance. The Democratic party a conscience party? At the suggestion a laugh goes up all over the North. The Republican party a conscience party? The whole South breaks out in a guffaw at the thought. The old parties are busy conserving what they have. They have no time for new things, new ideas. There is no hope

at all along the lines of the old parties.

The Prohibition party is fittest in every way for the reform the times call for the introduction of conscience into politics. It has been organized for this very purpose. The vicious element have no fellowship with it. No saloonkeeper will ever apply for admission into its ranks. The party is a national party. The best citizens of both sections are entering it. It is rooting itself as firmly in Southern soil as in Northern, on the western slope of the Rockies as on the eastern slope of the Alleghenies. The recruits are coming more and more rapidly-300,000 strong; 600,000 strong; millions are coming. There is electricity in the air, and that everywhere.

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