The latter is
accounted for, by the fact, that they are brought, in the merciful
providence of God, to observe and study and understand the consequences
of their employment--especially on those who drink their liquor--the
liquor which they sell or make, or, with no less criminality, furnish
the materials for making. These consequences they find to be "evil, only
evil, and that continually." They find, that this liquor imparts no
benefit to them who drink it, but tends to destroy, and, oftentimes,
does destroy, their healths and lives. To continue, therefore, in an
employment in which they receive their neighbor's money, without
returning him an equivalent, or any portion of an equivalent, and, in
which they expose both his body and soul to destruction, is to make
themselves, in their own judgments, virtually guilty of theft and
murder.
Thus it is in the case of a national war, waged for conquest. Christians
have taken part in it; and, because they were blinded by a wrong
education, and were acting in the name of their country and under the
impulses of patriotism, they never suspected that they were doing the
devil, instead of "God, service.
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