BISHOP BERKELEY ON THE DRINK TRADE. [To THE EDITOP. 07
THE " SPECTATOR."]
Sra,—The following extract from Bishop Berkeley's Siris (40) may be of interest at this time :- " But why should such a canker be tolerated in the vitals of a state under any pretence or in any shape whatsoever? Better by far the whole present set of distillers were pensioners of the public, and their trade abolished by law; since all the benefit thereof put together would not balance the hundredth part of its mischief." It would be doing no more than what the nation did, at the cost I think of twenty millions, when it abolished slavery throughout the British dominions. Bishop Berkeley was a remarkable man.
Wo may recall Pope's eulogy : "To Berkeley every virtue under Heaven." The brief epitaph may be seen on the stone which covers his remains in the ante-chapel of Christ Church, Oxford. The Bishop's discovery of the virtues of tar-water, pine not coal tar, may be worth considering also.—1 am, Sir, &c.,
G. J. C. B.
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