Phineas F. Bresee - A Prince In Israel - Media Sabda Org

Dr. Bresee thus describes the character of the people who had united with the Church of the
Nazarene in the part of Illinois where this campmeeting was held:
Heroic People
"The Nazarene people in these parts--like those called to this work usually--are of the noble,
heroic type. They have generally gone into this work because of their love for holiness, and the deep
sense of the necessity of organization where there is full liberty Godward and heavenward, where
holiness can be enjoyed, preached and testified to, without hindrance, and where the people can be
led into the cleansing fountain. Many of them have the faith and devotion of the early church, and
stand as pillars against the ungodliness of these times. Their homes are places of holy influence, and
they are as salt in these communities where sin so sadly prevails."
Whiskey-Soaked Conditions
I continue to quote from Dr. Bresee: "We were surprised, shocked, and appalled at the revelations
made to us of the condition of this part of the country. We are not familiar with the laws of this state
in reference to the sale of liquor. But it is licensed, the saloons in these parts paying $1,000 a year
for the privilege of robbing and killing the people, and rapidly destroying civilization.
"I understand that the state has made at least a feint of setting some bounds of decency to the work
of the saloon, but it is like setting bounds of safety to a licensed mad dog. Here it overleaps all
bounds, breaks down all barriers, and pours out its liquid death all around.
"A young man dying from whisky nearby during the campmeeting, aroused my inquiries, and I
was told that the same thing occurred during the meeting last year; that nearly all the young men in
the country drink; that it is difficult to find boys in this section from twelve to twenty-four that do
not drink. One good, reliable man told me that in the township in which he lives and knows the
people well, out of forty or fifty boys whom he knows, there are only four who do not drink liquor;
that many of the younger husbands and fathers are drunkards; that many of the young men are also
drunkards, and that most of the boys are fast on the way. He states that the saloon-keepers sell to any
boy that has the money, and that the older boys debauch the younger ones, until the boy that is not
already in the way to drunkenness, is a rarity. This same brother told me of the sad condition of the
family of an old local preacher; that his four sons were drunkards, and that his daughter's three sons
were already drunkards.
"This is as fair and fertile a land as the sun ever shone upon, and to be thus bitterly cursed by the
whisky demon, seems beyond endurance. If it can not be remedied by law or moral suasion, who
would blame the mothers and wives, if they got Mrs. Nation's hatchet, and began a revival of
destruction of the venomous serpents of hell? If the right of revolution is sacred, it certainly inheres
to the homes which are being robbed of all their possessions, and from which the dearest treasures
of childhood are being sold into slavery and death."