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The Bishop of London.—" I have read your book
with the greatest interest, and consider it the most valuable
contribution towards the solution of the temperance problem
which has yet appeared."
The late Bishop of Durham.—" I heartily agree
with your main proposals, and congratulate you on the effect
which your book has already produced. Though I shall gladly
welcome every reform which tends to lessen the evils of
the drink traffic, I am satisfied that they cannot be dealt
with successfully till private profit is eliminated from
the retail trade. At the same time, ' constructive,' no
less than ' restrictive,' measures are essential for the
complete solution of the social problems involved in the
question."
The Bishop of Rochester.—" I do not think that
anything could do a greater service to the cause of reasonable
and statesmanlike temperance reform than the widest circulation
of your book, and I am extremely glad to hear that it is
to appear in a more popular form.
" The value of its statistics and information is quite
independent of the particular proposals which you advocate;
but I have myself long felt that change in the direction
of those proposals is our best hope—viz. that the trade
should cease to be a matter of private profit, and should
be controlled in the public interest."
The Bishop of Wakefield.—" No book I have ever
read has given me so hopeful a feeling for the future of
temperance legislation. It treats the whole question upon
a scientific basis of facts, and offers a solution on which
temperance reformers ought to be able to unite, at least
in its main features. All earnest temperance workers owe
you an immense debt."
The Bishop of Liverpool.—"I gladly express my
general approval of the main proposals in your weighty and
convincing book, The Temperance Problem and Social Reform.
I believe them to be just, reasonable, and eminently practical."
The Bishop of St. Andrews.—" I heartily hope
that the fundamental proposals of the book may soon be carried
into effect."
The Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain, M.P.—" The
book appears to me a most useful work of reference on the
whole temperance question, and I am in full sympathy with
the writers in desiring that experiments should be made
on the lines of the system which in Sweden and Norway has,
in my judgment, produced excellent results."
Rt. Hon. Sir Henry H. Fowler, M.P.—" I regard
their treatise as a most important contribution to the solution
of the very difficult problem of temperance reform. . .
. Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell have compiled facts and
statistics which must be considered by all true temperance
reformers."
Rt. Hon. James Bryce, M.P.—"Desiring to see the
temperance problem seriously and promptly grappled with,
I am glad to hear that Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell's book
is being re-issued in a cheaper form. It ought to stimulate
reflection ; and I hope that its views and arguments will
receive a fair, candid, and careful consideration."
The Right Hon. A. H. D. Acland.—"I am very glad
you are going to publish a cheap edition. The mass of facts
and figures which you have collected concerning the working
of different systems of control of the liquor traffic are
of the greatest interest and importance. It is interesting,
too, to see what importance you attach to the problem of
housing the poor, and to the need of further facilities
for recreation. It would be a great advantage if it were
made possible to try experiments on the lines you suggest."
T. W. Russell, M.P.—" I agree with Messrs. Rowntree
and Sherwell that the problem cannot be effectually solved
until the elimination of private profit is secured."
Rev. Charles Garrett.—" This book will be of
immense value to the temperance cause, for it is a wonderful
storehouse of temperance information. Its plan for grappling
with and destroying our national curse appears to me to
be admirable. I have long felt the unwisdom of attempting
to accomplish the impossible. If it were possible I would,
at all costs, sweep the drink traffic away for ever, but
I have hitherto seen no way in which this could be accomplished
in my time. This book, however, opens before me ' a door
of hope.' There are two ways of taking a fortress —one
is by assault, the other by sapping and mining. This book
suggests both ways of dealing with the traffic : first by
bringing local veto into operation wherever it can be successfully
applied, and, having thus taken the outworks, it shows how
the citadel itself can be undermined and taken. Every step
seems to me to be in the right direction, and I heartily
trust that no prejudice will be allowed to block the way."
Archdeacon Wilberforee.—" Without endorsing all
the conclusions arrived at, I consider Messrs. Rowntree
and Sherwell's book a most valuable contribution towards
the solution of the greatest social problem of our day,
and I trust that it will be widely read and studied."
Lady Henry Somerset.—" We are on the eve now
of a struggle which will probably be the decisive one, but
which will be fierce and prolonged. At this point, therefore,
it seems to me of supreme importance that the temperance
forces should unite. Too long they have been severed and
weakened by differences which I believe must be overcome
before their attack can be efficient; and it is for this
reason that I, in accordance with many others, hail the
appearance of a remarkable book, which is the most valuable
addition to the literature of the temperance cause that,
to my mind, has yet been given— I mean the book called
The Temperance Problem and Social Reform, by Mr. Joseph
Eowntree and Mr. Arthur Sherwell."
Rev. C. F. Aked.—" This fine book aims, as you
know, at the creation of a platform broad enough to include
all friends of temperance and all who are working for social
reform. ... I have argued for years against every form of
municipalisation. I have denounced it in a hundred towns.
But Messrs. Eowntree and Sherwell's scheme has met all the
objections which I have ever urged, and for the first time
we are presented with a plan which the sworn prohibitionist
can adopt without compromise of deep conviction, and without
fear of ultimate danger and loss."
Canon Hicks (of Manchester).—" Yours is the weightiest
book I have ever read on the temperance question. Your statement
of the case for permissive prohibition is all the more convincing
because you are not so enamoured of it, as some of us are,
as the chief remedy for the terrible drink evil. Especially
do I thank you for pointing out so clearly the obvious dangers
that beset the cruder proposals for municipalising the drink
traffic. The positive proposals of your volume deserve the
most careful attention, and may form a basis of union for
all advanced temperance reformers."
Lady Elizabeth Biddulph.—" It interests me greatly
to hear that your valuable book, The Temperance Problem
and Social Reform, is to be popularised throiigh a cheap
edition. The fundamental proposals it contains are to my
mind undeniable. I trust this generous endeavour on your
part will have a very great success."
Rev. James Paton, D.D. (Convener of Church of Scotland
Committee on Temperance).—" In my judgment, after
five-and-thirty years of careful study of all temperance
literature, this book is the only one worthy of being called
a ' Classic.' Its unanswerable reasoning, and its noble
moral inspiration, have breathed a new and victorious impulse
into all men who believe that temperance reform is the true
pathway to further social progress; and that there are lines,
such as those indicated by Messrs. Eowntree and Sherwell,
on which such reform can be carried: (1) without delay;
(2) in accordance with the recorded convictions of the community;
and (3) with vast benefit to the nation as a whole."
Principal Rainy, D.D.—"No man should advocate
opinions on the way in which the drink traffic should be
dealt with unless he has read carefully Messrs. Eowntree
and Sherwell's book. Both for facts and for discussion at
the present stage it is indispensable."
Principal J. Marshall Lang, D.D.—" No book on
the temperance problem has so deeply interested me as that
which is associated with the names of Messrs. Eowntree and
Sherwell. Its presentation of the facts connected with the
sale and consumption of alcoholic liquor is unrivalled for
completeness and lucidity. Its examination of the measures
which have been adopted, or the plans which have been suggested
with a view to remedying the evils, directly or indirectly
attributable to indulgence in intoxicating drink, is thorough;
and its proposals commend themselves as worthy of the most
serious consideration,"
Principal Salmond, D.D.—"It is the most impressive
book that I have read on the drink question, and the most
enlightening. ... It is likely to make an epoch in the history
of temperance endeavour. . . . Other methods surely should
be attempted where Local Veto will not work, and the plan
of public control, stripped as it is in the scheme of this
book of the perilous element of immediate civic gain, seems
to me one that all reasonable men should be glad to see
tried. . . . The constructive side of Messrs. Eowntree and
Sherwell's scheme also deserves serious and sympathetic
consideration. If human nature is to be taken into account,
there must be such a side in any ameliorative programme,
and the authors of this book have done a most important
service in giving it so essential a place in their proposals."
Rev. A. M. Fairbairn, D.D. (Principal of Mansfield College,
Oxford).—" I am glad to hear that you think of
publishing a cheap edition of your book on The Temperance
Problem and Social Reform. It is a book full of knowledge
and instruction to all interested in social problems, and
its proposals deserve the most careful consideration, not
only of all temperance reformers, but of all public men
and statesmen."
Charles Booth, F.R.S. (author of Life and Labour of the
People in London, etc.).—" I am very much interested
to hear of the projected cheap popular edition of your and
Mr. Sherwell's great book, and hope it may have a marked
effect in ripening public opinion for action in the direction
towards which your conclusions point."
Sidney Webb, LL.B. (Chairman of Local Government and Taxation
Committee, and Vice-Chairman of Technical Education Board
of the London County Council).—" I feel that these
proposals contain a more promising scheme of reform than
any that I have seen. The evils of the present situation
are so great and far-reaching that probably more than one
remedy must be used against them. Nor would I shrink from,
or shut out, other and more drastic expedients. But I am,
as at present advised, greatly attracted by the idea of
replacing the present retail trader in drink by a genuine
" public-house," run by the public for the public.
I regard this work as a striking demonstration of the value,
in social problems, of independent investigation and hard
thinking."
J. A. Hobson, M.A. (author of Problems of Poverty, etc.).—"
The longer I study social-economic problems in their practical
bearing on the life of the people the more deeply I am impressed,
not merely with the enormous gravity of the drink question,
but with the necessity of treating it in organic relation
to the other economic and moral issues. ... I regard your
work as by far the most scientific in its method, and most
practical in the hopes of reform which it presents, among
the books which I have read, and I earnestly hope it may
have the widest possible circulation among all sorts and
conditions of men." Rev. Alexander Whyte, D.D.—"
I hail the prospects of a popular edition of your masterly
book. Your book has made an immense impression on the minds
of men in its costly form, and I feel sure its appearance
in a cheap edition will begin a new era of thought and progress
in connection with the drink traffic."
W. C. Braithwaite, B.A., LL.B. (Chairman of National Council
of Adult Schools).—" Messrs. Eowntree and Sherwell's
book is a careful and masterly examination of the problem
of temperance reform. They show conclusively that Local
Option and Prohibition are not likely to be effective at
present in thickly populated areas, and that accordingly
some further method should also be available in these cases.
" Their scheme for municipal control with payment
of profits into a central fund to be used for counteracting
the public-house deserves the close and unprejudiced consideration
of every temperance reformer, and, I believe, shows the
line of right action. It does not run counter in any way
to the proposals in Lord Peel's report."
Rev. John Smith, D.D.—" I rejoice that Messrs.
Rowntree and Sherwell's volume is to be put into the hands
of the people. It is a perfect thesaurus of temperance teaching;
and the whole discussion is carried through with such' amplitude
of knowledge, freshness of view, transparent honesty, and
conspicuous ability that men of all schools cannot fail
to profit from it."
Rev. J. B. Paton, D.D. (Hon. Secretary of the National
Home Reading Union, and of the Social Institutes Union).
—" The publication of the book has been epoch-making
in the history of temperance and social reform, and its
influence is bound to grow. I have read no book on the social
needs of our time with a more perfect and thankful approval,
and I entirely accept the two fundamental principles which
you so eloquently expound and vindicate. . . . Like every
temperance worker, however, I specially welcome and support
your second proposal—namely, that the profits arising
from these public-houses, administered so that they shall
do the least possible evil to those who frequent them, shall
be devoted to the establishment of places for social fellowship
and bright and healthy recreation, because I believe that
the establishment of such places is one of the greatest
social needs of our time."
Dr. Spence Watson.—" The writers have brought
together an unparalleled collection of facts, the result
of long and patient research and wide and careful observation.
They have founded upon these facts the most practical and
probable scheme for dealing with the question, a scheme
which is gaining adherents every day, which fairly holds
the field and is destined to fill it."
R. B. Haldane, K.C., M.P.—" I am glad to hear
that Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell are about to publish
a cheap edition of their book on the temperance problem.
This book has exercised already a very great influence on
the public mind, and has made many people reformers who,
until they read it, had not appreciated the magnitude of
the problem. The circulation of the work in a popular form
will probably extend largely the number of those who now
look upon its proposals as a practicable remedy for a great
• evil. Speaking for myself, I attach most value to
the large portion of the book which describes the mischief.
In the proposals for a remedy there is much that is valuable
and also somewhat that is controversial."
Sir John Leng, M.P.—" Too long have we been beating
the air, holding temperance meetings and demonstrations,
passing futile resolutions, and making no legislative headway,
while the drink traffic, under the application of the Limited
Liability Acts, has become of vaster proportions, more deeply
entrenched, and more deadly in its moral and social results.
Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell point to more practical methods
and more hopeful achievements. Their proposals merit consideration
and discussion with a view both to legislative measures
and municipal and individual action."
John Burns, M.P.—" Undoubtedly the best book
yet written on the temperance question. Fair, accurate,
suggestive, and full of useful information, it is a worthy
contribution to the discussion of a very serious problem.
It ought to do much useful work."
J. W. Crombie, M.P.—" I wish every success to
the cheap edition of your already successful book. It offers
a serious and practicable contribution to the solution of
the most urgent social and political problem of our day."
Captain Pirie, M.P.—" You will be rendering one
among the greatest of national services if by a popular
publication of your work you can quicken public conscience
as regards the evils of intemperance into insistence on
definite action in order to lessen them. .. . More can be
done by reaching the masses with a work such as yours than
by any other method, and you have my sincere thanks and
good wishes."
J. Keir Hardie, M.P.—" It is no figure of speech
to say that this volume marks the beginning of a new epoch
of the temperance movement. I cordially thank the authors
for having brought temperance reform within the sphere of
the practicable."
Professor Marcus Dods, D.D.—" I am very glad
to hear that Messrs. Eowntree and Sherwell mean to publish
a cheap edition of their book. It needs no recommendation
from anyone, and least of all from me, but I certainly think
that their proposals are more worthy of consideration than
any others before the public."
Professor W. M. Ramsay, D.C.L., LL.D.—" I am
in agreement with the spirit of your two fundamental proposals.
The municipal control and regulation of traffic in drink,
and the affording of better opportunities for spending leisure
time to those who at present have difficulty in finding
such opportunities elsewhere than in the public-house, seem
to me the best auxiliaries to that raising of the moral
tone by education which will in time so far diminish drunkenness
as to place the remnants of it under the control of wise
legislation. At present legislation could not (so far as
I can pretend to judge) be profitably called in to exercise
such control directly."
Professor George Adam Smith, D.D., LL.D.—" The
book cannot be too highly praised. The treasury of facts
which they have collected and so admirably arranged, the
sanity and judgment of their conclusions, the wide view
they take of all the social questions with which that of
temperance is so closely connected, the high ideals of national
welfare and civic duty which inspire their effort from first
to last, render this the book of our time on the temperance
question."
Professor Kennedy, D.D. (Edinburgh University).—"I
gladly welcome your proposal to issue a cheaper edition
of your epoch-making book, The Temperance Problem and Social
Reform. It has made itself indispensable to every worker
in the cause of temperance. I am certain you will have no
warmer supporters in any scheme of reform on the lines laid
down in that work than the many friends of temperance in
the Church of Scotland."
Professor James Denney, D.D.—" No book has ever
been published on legislative temperance reform so rich
as this, both in facts and ideas. Even those who begin to
read it with a prejudice, and end not quite convinced, will
readily admit that it has enlarged and cleared their minds,
and no one will say that it has cooled his ardour in the
cause of temperance. It is a book to be studied by everyone
who wishes to know what the law can and cannot do in this
distressing subject."
Professor Dove Wilson (Aberdeen University).—"
It is most satisfactory to hear that Messrs. Rowntree and
SherwelPs work on temperance reform is about to appear at
a price which will place it within the reach of everyone.
There has been no more valuable contribution towards the
practical solution of the difficulty. . . . Tin crying evils
of selling liquor to the young, to the partially intoxicated,
and to inebriates, will never be effectually checked till
the liquor-seller ceases to have any interest in promoting
the sale."
Thos. Hodgkin, D.C.L.—" I am heartily in sympathy
with the scheme of temperance reform sketched in your book
on The Temperance Problem and Social Reform,, and shall
rejoice if the circulation of that book in a popular form
shall bring us in any way nearer to the adoption of your
programme."
George J. Holyoake.—"The most practical, the
most readable, and most informing book on the temperance
question I have seen."
Dean Farrar.—" I have read Messrs. Rowntree and
Sherwell's Temperance Problem with great interest. It is
a careful and valuable work."
Rev. Nehemiah Curnock (editor of The Methodist Recorder).—"
The proposals contained in this work— which I have
read with the greatest interest—ought to be tried.
The experiment should have a fair field and neither favour
nor disfavour. Its assigned area should be sufficiently
large, with populations varying in density and character.
Its period should be sufficiently prolonged, so as to afford
opportunity for all conceivable reactions.
" The present system is hopeless. Bad in itself, it
is cumulatively mischievous. Even imperial total prohibition,
with all its dangers, would probably be less injurious.
The plan proposed by Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell is the
nearest approach to a true and safe solution of the problem
that has yet appeared."
Canon Barker.—" The book contains such an exhaustive
statement of the whole problem, and such voluminous and
valuable facts from which every man can draw his own conclusions,
that nothing but good can come from as wide a circulation
of the book as possible."
Rev. F. B. Meyer.—" The publication of this book,
as I venture to think, will date an epoch in the history
of the temperance movement. I have read and pondered it
with profound interest, and am convinced that the conclusions
to which the authors have come afford a working basis for
the ultimate solution of the vexed problem of the liquor
traffic. . . . The complete and satisfactory reform of the
liquor traffic is impossible so long as it is organised
and conducted from motives of private gain. . . . May I
live to see this system adopted! "
Canon Barnett (Warden of Toynbee Hall).—" Messrs.
Rowntree and Sherwell show the overwhelming danger which
threatens our commonwealth in sober language, and suggest
a remedy acceptable to sober people."
Rev, R. J. Campbell (Brighton).—"I have for years
advocated the reforms you mention, and would be most sincerely
glad to see them adopted."
Archdeacon Wilson. —" I heartily support your
proposals, and have long advocated them. All United Kingdom
Alliance men should support them, for if these permissive
powers were given to localities, some would adopt prohibition,
and in all who used these powers prohibition would be indefinitely
facilitated. All Church of England Temperance Society men
should support them; for they will effectively carry out
what we have at heart—the diminution in number and
the better regulation of public-houses."
Rev. R. A. Armstrong (Liverpool).—"The scheme
of Messrs. Rowntree and Sherwell, as drawn by them, would,
it seems to me, be valuable and effective, if it can be
carried as a whole with all its safeguards and without injurious
amendments. All England owes a deep debt of gratitude to
the propounders for their toil and devotion."
Canon Moore Ede.—" In the campaign against the
liquor traffic we have for long years tried the policy of
frontal attacks, only to find that at the end of the century
the enemy is more strongly entrenched in his position than
he was at the beginning. As wise men, we should alter our
tactics, and try to find some way round; and I believe that
the true way to outflank the position of the trade is that
indicated in your work on The Temperance Problem and Social
Reform.
" It stands to reason that if the liquor-sellers have
no interest in pushing the sale of liquor many of the worst
evils of our English system will disappear, for its worst
features consist of devices to induce people to drink.
" We cannot eradicate the social instincts of men,
and it is the social instinct which drives so many to the
public-house, which, as things now are, is the only available
social gathering-place for, at any rate, the poorest; and
those who go to the public-house must drink, and must continue
to drink as long as they remain. If, however, the surplus
profits from the trade are utilised for the provision of
various kinds of recreation, provision will be made for
the gratification of the social instincts without imposing
any necessity for cultivating the drinking habit."
Rev. Mark Guy Pearse.—" I feel most deeply that
the suggested solution has laid down the lines on which
our deliverance from this vast evil must come."
Rev. R. F. Horton, M.A., D.D.—" To my mind, the
most attractive chapter in the book is the large-minded
and intelligent survey of the causes which lead our people
in the crowded streets to drink; and it seems to me that
no remedy can be pronounced of any great value which does
not recognise that a large proportion of men go to the public-houses
not so much to drink but simply to find a place of social
communion, to find what one might call a drawing-room, from
the crowded tenements in which they live."
Canon Armitage Robinson, D.D.—" If we are to
make further progress with the problem of the liquor traffic,
we must stimulate the interest and claim the aid of the
great body of serious persons who at present hold aloof
from the question in perplexity or despair. It is to such
minds that the main propositions of Messrs. Rowntreo and
Sherwell will, I believe, commend themselves as offering
a new hope of practicable reform. All who are interested
in the religious and social life of England should study
their book."
Rev. Alex. Mackennal, D.D.—" Three things strike
me in the volume in addition to the valuable and carefully
given information, and the pleading for united action.
" One is the precision with which you have indicated
the first evil we have to conquer, and which, left untouched,
will perpetuate all we deplore—the private gain in
liquor-selling. Drunkenness itself is not so obdurate an
evil as this. ... I admire also the constructive part of
your book. I have long believed that mere demonstration
will do very little for permanent deliverance of the people
from this snare; and I rejoice in the fact that you have
devoted so much space to this part of your book."
Canon Scott Holland.—" This book lays down admirably
the position which every sane man is bound to accept. .
. . The book's conclusion is most clear, intelligible, and
practical. . . . The whole scheme is perfectly practicable
to-morrow. It rests on unanswerable reasons for the intervention
of the State. It meets the broad human needs and it assimilates
the clearest teachings of experience. It combines those
who are passionately bent on restricting the evil and those
who deem this futile so long as social conditions are untouched."
Rev. J. Monro Gibson, D.D.—" The reading of this
admirable book has kindled in me a new hope for the future
of temperance reform. Nowhere else have I seen the terrible
facts so skilfully marshalled, or the remedies so carefully
examined. The suggestions which it throws out for united
action seem to me to be such as to commend themselves to
all who realise the necessity of the friends of temperance
acting together and acting at once."
Canon Gore, D.D.—" I am exceedingly glad to learn
that you are going to circulate a very cheap edition of
your Temperance Problem and Social Reform. I think the book
has really marked an epoch, because (1) it has approached
the problem as part of the whole social problem, and because
(2) you have provided such a broad basis on which people
of all sorts can co-operate. I am most anxious that your
fundamental proposal should be carried into effect, and
that nothing should be done in the way of temperance reform
which should block the road towards the realising of your
proposals."
Rev. Hugh Price Hughes, M.A.—" These thoroughly
competent experts, after prolonged personal investigation
at home and abroad, have made the best statement of the
problem that has yet been printed. . . . We greet its appearance
with gratitude: it is by far the most valuable and useful
book on the whole temperance problem that has been published.
. . . We are convinced that the method suggested by Mr.
Eowntree and Mr. Sherwell is the only practical method of
dealing with this gigantic evil in the towns and cities
of Great Britain."
Rev. John Clifford, D.D.—" The appearance of
this book is surely one of the best signs of the times.
Every patriotic citizen should read it, and read it at once,
and seek to promote legislation along the lines it suggests."
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