On Temperance Jan 7th, 1844
Intemperance is one of the meanest and most vile things in existence. But it is fast going out of date, and I am happy to say it. A great many men when they were young they had a good fortune to begin their lives upon, but they chance to go to the grog shop and a friend will ask him to drink a social glass with him, and he drinks. And this will increase his appetite for it, and it will continue to increase until he dies. Dr. Franklin lived to be a good old age and he was temperate in all things. Not only had we ought to be temperate in our drink, but in other things tobacco we ought to abstain from. There is but 3 thing’s things that will eat tobacco. The first is a species of African goat, the tobacco worm & thirdly the man. What shame it is that men are to be compared with a goat or a worm, but I do not know any animal that will drink more.
I hope you or I shall never shall drink any. Good Bye
G A Weeks 1844