day, and the life of the world to come, through our Lord Jesus Christ."

And the choir respond, "I heard a voice from Heaven, saying unto me, write from henceforth, Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord; even so saith the Spirit; for they rest from their labors."

Thus closes the earthly history of William Wilberforce, the Christian Statesinan. He has left, however, in the hearts of the Christian world, a far more permanent monument, than the majestic pile of buildings which covers his mortal remains.

LICENSING LAWS.

For the Religious Magazine.

MESSRS. EDITORS:-The tendency of these laws requires to be carefully examined. If favorable to temperance they should he sustained; if inconsistent with and operating against the moral interests of the cominunity why should they continue on the statute book?

My objections to these laws are contained in the following propositions.

1. They were founded on the supposed necessity of temperate drinking, and therefore based upon a mistake.

2. They legalize drinking and authorize a revenue from it. 3. They are not observed.

4. To enforce them may protect the retailer but can never aid the cause of temperance.

5. Inconsistency is involved in their execution.

6. They are in various ways immoral in their tendency. It will not be difficult to establish these positions. The first two let us now consider together. The first licensing law passed in Massachusetts was in 1646. It was doubtless suggested by similar laws in England, framed expressly for revenue, and which are now so rigid that a proprietor of two houses cannot move twelve bottles of wine from one to the other without a permit from the Excise office. The law of 1646 premises that "drunkenness is abhorred of all nations, especially those professing the gospel of Jesus Christ." It then restrains the retail of wines &c. to licensed taverners-a sum to be paid down and yearly sent for each license-£10 fine for otherwise selling-profits to retailers limited to 6 cents per quart, "besides the benefit of their art and mystery, which

they know "how to make use of" a singular expression truly and an "art" most carefully preserved.

The "tiger now unchained" we find law after law for suppressing intemperance and restricting more effectually the exercise of the "art and mystery" of retailing, to houses of entertainment for travellers, and sea-faring persons and for the public service. Sometimes notorious drinkers are to be posted and all retailing to such, forbidden-sometimes they are to be committed to jail; then again the laws are to be read in town meeting (as in the Statute 1712) and again, offending retailers, too poor to pay the fine, are to be whipped; but all to no purpose; the sanction of legal permission increased the drinking, and increased drinking demanded more licenses, and so it has continued with little legal alteration to the present time, the laws of the country relieving personal conscience of all apparent accountability. When Maine received her separate laws, the same principle of necessity was recognized, but licenses were restricted to "men of sober life and conversation." The practical construction of this restriction has been that all were worthy to practice "the art and mystery" of retailing on paying to the town $6 towards the support of the very poor, which every dram-shop was yearly adding to the list.

Now if these laws do not make the sale of spirits legal, at least to all except to notorious drunkards, and thereby authorize the common use of ardent spirits, I know not what the tendency and operation of a law can be. In direct, opposition to the asssumed ground of necessity, still held out in our laws, let me adduce the certificate signed by upwards of seventy-five practioners of medicine in Boston (including the whole number or very nearly so) "That men in health are NEVER benefitted by the use of ardent spirits." I would now ask, why legalize the selling of ardent spirits any more than the selling of arsenic or laudanum. The propriety of retailing cannot be defended; it is an insult to common sense to attempt it, and yet the law defends it, and authorizes a revenue from it, and one license alone yields to the city of Boston upwards of $700; and in that city alone (the reputed head quarters of good principles) 700 licenses are granted, one voter probably in fif teen or twenty keeping a dram-shop.

3. These laws are not observed. Cotton Mather states that an English divine had declared in a sermon, before parliament, that in seven years in New England, he had never seen a drunkard; "but now," adds the author of Magnalia in 1698, "they that go from hence must tell another story." In the statutes of Massachusetts, the non-observance of these laws

both by retailers and tipplers is expressly and continually stated; and at the present time are any laws in all their provisions so much disregarded? In Maine, more than fifty towns grant no licenses, thus disregarding the laws and declaring them unnecessary. Of sixty towns out of eighty-six, from which returns have been received by the State temperance society, it is expressly declared that in them the licensing laws are not observed. And in the remaining towns from which no returns have been received, and where the enemies of temperance are probably strong, I ask if any other species of observance is at all probable, except that of freely granting licenses.

4. To enforce such laws effects no other purpose than to protect the licensed retailer. The bargain is plain. "Pay us says the town $6, and you shall be protected in your lawful trade;" and thus he who sells without a license is not liable to any offence against morality,-against his fellow whom he prostrates in the brutal excesses of drunkenness, but simply because he does this without paying for the privilege, and thereby injures his neighbor, who has purchased his legal right to do the same. How is it that the friends of temperance can ever expect to avail any thing by bringing in such weapons to defend a righteous cause? The retailer and the tippler rightly consider these laws as their defence made to protect them, and they always come off triumphant whenever an attempt is made to divert them from their purpose and use them in aid of temperance by prosecuting under any of their provisions. All that was ever intended for temperance was to render the licensing authorities liable for granting power to improper persons, and the retailers, again, in their turn, liable for selling to improper drinkers. But temperate persons may drink on, if they only buy of the proper cask, and when they become notorious drunkards, why then they must stop and be posted one year till they become temperate, and then begin again, and all is legal. Can any thing be more absurd than to use such laws to promote temperance?

5. There is inconsistency involved in acting under these laws. If a town votes that no licenses are necessary, the law is disregarded; and if an apothecary then sells spirits for a necessary purpose, he lays himself open to a prosecution and actually violates a law of his country. But if licenses are granted, we have seen that drinking is promoted, and the only remedy is in favor of the very man, who legally produces the mischief. And this man knows his best friends too well ever to bring an action against an unlicensed retailer. Was such a prosecution ever known?

6. These laws are in various ways immoral in their tenden

cy. This we have already seen, but we may trace the result still further in the blinding of conscience and perverting the moral sense. A conscientious town officer well knows that retailing is a positive injury to society, and yet if the town votes that licenses are to be granted, he must grant them, and the law itself, until this year makes it every thing but actual legal duty to grant them, even without such a vote. The retailers who obtain a license feel that they have paid to the legal authorities, the price demanded for a legal permission; and are such persons, in the exercise of a lawful calling, likely to inquire very closely into the nature of the business? do they not lean to the long continued legal usage, and place themselves on the same footing with the importer of molasses, who scarcely deems himself responsible for drunkenness, because he may happen to sell by auction to a distiller? And is not the man, who frequents the store of the licensed retailer somewhat sanctioned, at least in his own opinion, in laying the foundation of intemperance, by persuading himself, that so long as he keeps clear from notorious drunkenness, he complies with a law of his country, which has pronounced temperate drinking a necessary thing, and provided accordingly, for its indulgence? And he again who sells without a license, does he not shift the true nature of his traffic over to a mere offence against the licensed retailer, and does he not feel at liberty so to do, as long as the person, whose trade is a little invaded, takes no steps to prevent him? The legal trader will scarcely incommode him with a prosecution when he considers that the trade flourishes in proportion to the number of sellers, and that his own hands are strengthened by every shop that is opened for the same purpose whether licensed or not, and if spirits are every day and every where sold without a license, and this fact is in full toleration among us, how long can the general obligation to obey be sustained in our land.

If you would know the true nature and operation of licensing laws, look at the magnitude of the sanctioned evil, which demanded a temperance reform on principles diametrically opposite. Look at what every New England state was fast becoming when no one saw the evil, in the light of conscience, and when the temptation to town officers was unchecked, leading them to grant a hundred or more licenses, and thus put 600 or more dollars into the town treasury. Look at these states now, under the operation of such laws, and see what they are, notwithstanding all that has been done in favor of temperance, every movement of which has been against the very laws themselves. I blame not the makers of the laws. They suited the opinions of the times; but they never can suit the prin

ciples of temperance as now universally acknowledged by all disinterested persons. I do not pretend to say that no laws can be substituted which shall be in favor of our moral interests, and shall also be observed. But I am decided in the conclusion, that the temperance cause will advance by withdrawing legal permission to sell and drink. Abolish these pernicious enactments and throw the whole responsibility upon public opinion, and it will soon be as needless to license the drinking of brandy as it is now to license the drinking of laudanum.

Yours, &c.

A CORRESPONDENT.

Maine, Oct. 1833.

CHILDREN DOING GOOD.

A STORY TO BE READ IN SABBATH SCHOOLS.*

A little girl in one of the largest and pleasantest towns in New England, once proposed to her pastor, that the children of his congregation should form themselves into a Juvenile Tract Society. The minister approved the plan, and the next Sabbath he invited all the children between certain ages to meet at his study on the next Saturday afternoon, which they did, and he assisted them to form the Society. Their tax was to be ninepence, annually: and the tracts which they received they were first to read themselves, and then to lend or give to others. After two or three years, however, the monthly tract distribution having gone into operation in this parish, it was thought best to relinquish tracts, and do something else with their money. But let us look in a moment upon a meeting of the Society, and listen to their deliberations.

NOTE; TO THE PASTOR OR SUPERINTENDENT.

One important, and at the same time difficult part of a pastor's duty, towards the children under his care, is, to show them distinctly, how their co-operation with the benevolent societies of the day, really produces useful results. We are very glad therefore, to insert the above communication, which we are assured, is a strictly true account of a real transaction.

Perhaps there is no way by which a juvenile society can appropriate a small amount of funds to a more useful object, than to thus laying the foundation of a Sabbath School library, in some new school. During the past summer, we visited, in a retired part of the country, a very flourishing Sabbath School consisting of about 25 teachers and 100 scholars, and having now a library of nearly 300 volumes; which almost owed its origin to a present of a few tracts, sent by the President of one of cur colleges. The officers of any Sabbath School Union would, undoubtedly, give all necessary direction and assistance in carrying such a plan into effect, should any juvenile society, or Sabbath School, betore whom this article may come, make the attempt to follow the example here described.