THE SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM 171 



condemned, is with us. It rests with us to extract 

 what good we can from the evil. Horrible ! 

 Immoral ! Yes ; but we are faced with two horrors, 

 two immoralities, and we are compelled to make 

 choice. Which is the worse ; that miserable 

 drunkards shall bear wretched children to a fate 

 of starvation and neglect and early death, or of 

 subsequent drunkenness and crime, or that, by our 

 deliberate act, the procreation of children shall be 

 forbidden them ? We are on the horns of a dilemma 

 from which there is no escape. If we do not the 

 work quickly and with mercy. Nature will do it 

 slowly and with cruelty. 



Let me ask my readers which is best : to live 

 safe because strong, or to tremble behind fortifica- 

 tions ; to be temperate by nature or sober by law ? 

 Nature's scheme of Temperance Reform promises 

 immunity from danger. Its success must see every 

 generation increasingly temperate with a sobriety 

 established on a safe and permanent basis. The 

 reformer's scheme promises at best tem- 

 porary resistance followed by ultimate surrender. 

 Even this poor promise cannot be kept. In the 

 complex modern world in which we live, individual 

 freedom is so great that Prohibition and other forms 

 of restraint merely substitute secret debauchery for 

 open drunkenness. Intemperance is increased, not 

 diminished, by Prohibition. 



