drunkard!"_ is as plainly to be read as though a printed label was posted there! Need I warn--need I exhort--the young to avoid the habit of intemperance. Perhaps there is not a youth present, who is not ready to say, "To me this exhortation is needless. I have not the slightest expectation of becoming a drunkard!" Of course not. There never was a man who desired, or expected, to become a victim to intemperance. The great danger of this habit is, that it creeps stealthily and imperceptibly upon the unwary. It does its work gradually. The most besotted inebriate cannot tell you the day, nor the month, when he became a confirmed drunkard. It is in the nature of this habit, that those who expose themselves at all to its assaults, become its victims, while they are entirely unaware of it. The only safeguard and security, against this scourge of man, is _total abstinence from all intoxicating drinks_!! Here is the true, the safe ground for the young. There is no other condition of entire security. No man who drinks, however sparingly, has assurance of a sober life. He needlessly, and foolishly, places himself in danger--turns his footsteps into the only path that can possibly lead to the drunkard's ruin and the drunkard's grave! Drink the _first drop_ that can intoxicate, and your feet stand at the very brink of the ocean of intemperance. Its briny waters are composed of human tears. Its winds, the sighs of those made poor and wretched by the inebriation of husbands, fathers, sons. Its billows, ever tossing, are overhung with black and lowering clouds, and illuminated only by the lightning's vivid flash, while hoarse thunders reverberate over the wide and desolate waste. Engulphed in this dreary ocean, the wretched drunkard is buffeted hither and thither, at the mercy of its angry waves--now dashed on jagged rocks, bruised and bleeding--then engulphed in raging whirlpools to suffocating depths--anon, like a worthless weed, cast high into the darkened heavens by the wild water-spout, only to fall again into the surging deep, to be tossed to and fro on waters which cannot rest! Rash youth! Would you launch away on this sea of death? Quaff of the intoxicating bowl, and soon its hungry waves will be around you. Would you avoid a fate so direful? Seal your lips to the _first drop_, and the drear prospect will sink forever from your vision! Young men who would guard themselves against the baleful habit of intemperance, should shun all resorts where intoxicating drinks are vended. They should avoid throwing themselves in the way of temptation. "Lead us not into temptation," should be the constant prayer of the young. When by any combination of circumstances, they find themselves in the company of those who quaff of the poisoned bowl, whether in public or private, they should exercise a manly pride in firmly refusing to participate in their potations. This is a legitimate and commendable pride, of which the young cannot have too much. Let them place themselves on the high rock of principle,