Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife by Marietta Holley (life changing books TXT) đ
- Author: Marietta Holley
Book online «Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife by Marietta Holley (life changing books TXT) đ». Author Marietta Holley
âRobert knows that I would almost rather have that volcano burst forth its burning lava and wash her away on its bosom than to have her engulfed in that terrible state of matrimony from which I and mine have suffered so horribly.â
âWell,â sez I, âI canât speak for you and yourn, but for me and ourn,â sez I, âno state under the heavens would be agreeable for me to live in if my beloved pardner wuznât in it too.â
116âOh, well,â sez she, âexceptions prove the rule; your husband is congenial and good to you.â
âOh, well,â sez I, âas to the daily acts and queer moves of pardners the least said the soonest mended, but Love is the great ruler; where he rules any state is blest, be it torrid or frigid.â
That eveninâ Arvilly and Elder Wessel had a argument about votinâ and other things. I knew I ort to be in my room packinâ my satchel bag, for we expected to be gone a week or ten days, but I did kinder want to hear how their talk come out. He said he didnât vote; he said he thought it wuz a clergymanâs duty to set and judge of the right and wrong of actions, not take part in âem.
And Arvilly says, âI always spozed the Almighty did that; I didnât know as human men wuz obleeged to. I know he cursed them that dealt in strong drink, and blest them that gin even a cup of cold water to the little ones, which I spoze meant help to the poorest and lowest. And I guess that whatever your idees are about it, when you come to the judgment day you wonât set up there on the throne judginâ, but youâll be down with the rest on us givinâ an account of how youâve used your talents, your influence, and if youâve wropped your mantilly of protection around thieves and murderers that you know the whiskey trade is made of; youâll find that it will drop off there, and you will be judged accordinâ to your works. But mebby youâll be made to see before you git there that youâre in the wrong onât upholdinâ this evil.â
Arvillyâs axent wuz as sharp as any simeter, and it seemed to go right through Elder Wesselâs robe of complacency and self-esteem and rend it. He looked dretful bad, and I spoke up, meaninâ to pour a little ile on his woonds, and sayinâ what I thought, too. Sez I:
âFolks hainât so guilty often as they are thoughtless; ministers and church people who donât use their influence aginst this evil donât realize what theyâre doinâââthey donât think.â
117âTheyâre guilty if they donât think,â sez Arvilly, âif they are blest with common sense. If I wuz walkinâ by a deep pond in broad daylight, and see a dozen little children sinking that I might save by a little effort, I wonder how many would believe me when I said that I see âem drowndinâ but didnât try to save âem because I didnât think. If I had ears and eyes and common sense, and could save âem and didnât, I wuz guilty of murder, and so the Lord would look at it and everybody else that knew anything.â And she looked at me some as if I didnât know anything, jest because I intimated that ministers and church members didnât want to do such wickedness, but didnât thinkââArvilly is hash. But I had to admit that she had some common sense on her side. Sez she agin:
âThe Church of Christ could do anything it wanted to if it jined its forces, took holt as if it meant to do sunthinâ, but as it is indifference folds its hands, self interest murders humanity, greed upholds intemperance, and all about us in Church and State are drink makers and drink takers, and heaven knows which of âem will git to hell first!â Arvilly is dretful hash; when she gits rousted up her indignation is like lightninâ, and she donât care where it strikes or who. It struck Elder Wessel hard.
âI should be afraid!â sez he, and his voice fairly trembled with indignation, âI should be afraid to talk of the Church of Christ as you do!â
âLet it behave itself then!â sez Arvilly, âbe converted and come out on the Lordâs side to the help of the weak aginst the mighty!â
âThe saloon,â sez Elder Wessel dogmatically, âis the Poor Manâs Club.â He wuz all rousted up by her hash talk and come out plainer than he had come. âThe rich man has his club, and the saloon is the Poor Manâs Club. He has a right to go there for a little recreation.â
âRe-creation!â sez Arvilly. âIf you think drinkinâ pizen whiskey is re-creatinâ a man, youâre different from me.â
118âAnd me, too,â sez I. âIf you call it re-creatinâ to go to the Poor Manâs Club sober and sane,â sez Arvilly, âand stagger home at midnight crazy drunk, I say he hainât no right to re-create himself that way; he re-creates himself from a good man and worthy member of society into a fiend, a burden and terror to his family and community. Now Elder Whiteâs idee of re-creatinâ men is different; he believes in takinâ bad men and re-creatinâ âem into good ones, and I wish that every minister on earth would go and do likewise.â
âI know nothinâ about Elder White,â sez Elder Wessel hautily.
âHeâs our minister in Loontown,â sez Arvilly. âHe has his church open every night in the week for re-creatinâ in the right way.â
âI donât approve of that,â sez Elder Wessel. âThe church of the Most High is too sacred to use for such purposes.â
âA minister said that once to Elder White,â sez Arvilly, âand he answered âem with that warm meller smile of hisen, âWhere are my boys and girls more welcome and safe than at home, and this is their Fatherâs house,ââ sez he.
âUsing that holy place for recreation is very wrong,â sez Elder Wessel.
Sez Arvilly, âI told you that he used it to re-create anew to goodness and strength. He has music, good books, innocent games of all kinds, bright light, warmth, cheerful society, good lectures, and an atmosphere of good helpful influences surroundinâ âem, and he has sandwiches and coffee served in what wuz the pastorâs study, and which he uses now, Heaven knows, to study the big problem how a minister of the Most High can do the most good to his people.â
âCoffee,â sez Elder Wessel, âis all right in its place, but the common workman hankers after something stronger; he wants his beer or toddy, the glass that makes him forget his trouble for a time, and lifts him into another world.â
119âWell, I spoze the opium eater and cocaine fiend hanker after the fool paradise these drugs take âem into, but thatâs no sign that they ort to destroy themselves with âem.â
âCoffee, too, is deleterious,â sez Elder Wessel. âSome say that it is worse than whiskey.â
I spoke up then; I am a good coffee maker, everybody admits, and I couldnât bear to hear Ernest White talked aginst, and I sez: âI never hearn of a workman drinkinâ so much coffee that he wuz a danger to his family and the community, or so carried away with it that he spent his hull wages on it. Such talk is foolish and only meant to blind the eyes of justice and common sense. Elder Whiteâs Mutual Help Club, as he calls it, for he makes these folks think they help him, and mebby they do, is doinâ sights of good, sights of it. Young folks who wuz well started towards the drunkardâs path have been turned right round by it, and they save their wages and look like different men since they have left the Poor Manâs Club, as you call it, and patronize hisen.â
âAnd Elder White has showed,â sez Arvilly, âby his example just what the Church of Christ could do if it wanted to, to save men from the evil of this present time and git âem headed towards the Celestial City.â
âOh!â sez Elder Wessel, âI would no more use the church dedicated to the Most High in the way you speak of than I would use the communion cup to pass water in.â
âIf a man wuz dyinâ of thirst, and that cup could be used to save him, donât you spoze the Lord would want it used for that, Elder Wessel?â sez Arvilly.
âOh, no! oh, no!â sez he: âgive not that which is holy unto dogs; cast not your pearls before swine.â
âThat is jest what I have been preachinâ to you,â sez Arvilly. âGive not that which is holy, the best nater, and goodness of boys and men to the dogs, the brutes that lay in wait for âem in whiskey laws. The God in man is murdered 120 every âlection day by professors of religion and ministers.â
âWhyââwhyee,â sez Elder Wessel, sinkinâ back in his chair.
âYes,â sez the dantless Arvilly, âI mean jest what I say; them that refuse to vote and help in the matter are jest as guilty as license voters; they are consentinâ to the crucifixion of Christ in man. And the poor drunkards are not the only ones they help nail to the cross. The innocent life and happiness of wimmen and children these wicked laws lift up on the cross of agony, and their heartsâ blood cries to heaven for judgment on them that might have helped âem and would not. The Church of Christ is responsible for this crime,â sez Arvilly, âfor there is not an evil on earth that could stand before the combined strength of a united church.â
Sez Elder Wessel, gittinâ back considerable dignity (her hash talk madded him awfully), sez he, âI simply see things in another light from what you do.â
âHe that is not for me is against me,â sez Arvilly.
Sez the Elder in a dogmatic axent, real doggy it wuz, âI say again, the saloon is the Poor Manâs Club.â
And I sez dreamily, âTalkinâ of a club as a club, a club in the hands of a drunken man, strikinâ at and destroyinâ all the safety and happiness of a home, yes,â sez I, âit is such a club.â
âYes,â sez Arvilly, âif poundinâ his wife to jelly, and his children to deformity and death, is a Poor Manâs Club, the saloon is one.â
Sez he agin, âRich men have their clubs to which they may go, and drink all they chooseââcarouse, do as they please, and why not poor men, too?â he added.
And I sez, âGrantinâ that rich men do drink and carouse at their clubs, as I donât know whether they do or not, two wrongs never made one right, and the liquor couldnât hurt âem so much, for they can buy it pure, and the poor manâs 121 drink is pizen by adulteration, makinâ a more dangerous drunk, ruininâ their health and makinâ âem spilinâ for fights and bloodshed. The rich man can stay all night at his club, or if he goes home the decorous butler or vally can tend to him and protect his family if need be; he wonât stagger in at midnight to a comfortless room, where his wife and little ones are herded in cold and starvation and are alone and at his mercy, and the rich manâs carouse at his club wonât keep his wife and children hungry for a week.â
Beinâ driv out of that position Elder Wessel tried a new tact: âThe poor man has just as much right to the social enjoyment they git out of their saloon as you have, madam, to your afternoon teas and church socials.â
âWhat hinders the poor man from âtendinâ socials?â sez Arvilly, spiritedly. âThey are always beinâ teased to, and anyway I never knew tea to make anybody crazy drunk.â
âThe poor man,â sez Elder Wessel in his most dictorial way, all of Arvillyâs talk havinâ slipped offen him like rain water offen a brass horn, âthe poor man, after he has worked hard all day, and has nothing to go home to but a room full of cryinâ children, discomfort, squalor and a complaining wife, is justified in my opinion to go to the only bright, happy place he knows of, the saloon.â
But I sez, beinâ such a case for justice, âHow is it with the wife who has worked hard all day in the home of discomfort and squalor, her work being rendered ten times harder and more nerve destroying than her husbandâs by the care of the cryinâ children, how would it be for them, who are equally responsible for the marriage and the children, to take holt
Comments (0)