The pagan disciples of Aristotle, for instance, did not hesitate to violate the sacred germs of humanity, and thus to blast the souls of multitudes of victims, for the purpose of preventing too great an increase of population. The religion of Christ changed all this, and true Christians have ever heeded the change. But the recent work of Dr. Storer, of Boston, and official legislative reports, demonstrate that this great crime is quite as prevalent in the modern Athens and in the State which contains it, as it was in the worst days of the Roman empire. The influence of this alarmingly prevalent crime of our own day and of our own nation is baneful in the extreme. On strictly sanitary and material grounds, it is to be deprecated as an evil of the greatest magnitude. Among its deleterious results may be recorded diseases of important vital organs, which are in turn reflected to the entire nervous system, and a consequent train of physical and mental disorders, which make life a burden instead of a blessing. Here, then, we see that a truly Christian mode of living is more conducive to health, happiness, and long life than that of the sensual materialist.
Contemplate, again, the world of wealth, fashion, and pleasure. Behold the pomp, the luxury, and the numerous sensual enjoyments which make up so largely its sum of life. Follow the votaries of pleasure in their daily and nightly rounds, sit at their epicurean tables, accompany them to routs, balls, play-houses, and innumerable other places of resort, which temptingly beckon them on every hand. Be with them also in their sleeping, and at their early morning hours, when the inevitable reactions manifest themselves; when pains, lassitude, and nervous and mental depression overtake them. Read their interior convictions, thoughts and regrets for ill-spent time, and for perversions of the higher faculties. Consult the epicure, who "lives to eat" and to stimulate his artificial appetite daily with highly seasoned dishes. He will discourse eloquently upon the pleasures of the table; but he can depict also the horrors of indigestion, hypochondria, and not unfrequently of paralysis, apoplexy, and kindred ailments. Consult the wine-bibber and the whiskey-drinker. They can point to the enormous revenues which the government derives from their patronage; to the innumerable drinking-saloons which cover the land, and which are sustained and enriched by them; to the numerous dens, above-ground and under-ground, where the poor congregate to imbibe fiery poisons that steal away their brains and the bread of their wives and children; to the untold millions which are expended in their traffic by men of all classes and conditions.