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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 74

The Order: Its Organisation

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The Order: Its Organisation.

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Many of the most zealous and estimable teetotallers in the country regard the claborate organisation of Good Templarism with considerable repugnance. They are greatly exercised by the ritual, and the regalia they cannot away with. This is what thoughtful men anticipated, because individualism has assumed its extremest and wildest development. Countless voices are continually dinning into our ears that the highest social and political condition is that in which "every man does what is right in his own eyes." The one sacred thing is the " liberty of the subject." Now, it is very natural that, in a country where extravagant theories of individual liberty are rampant, men should rebel against the almost military discipline of our Order. " Why can't I serve the cause of Temperance without going down week after week to a Lodge, and observing all this form and ceremony?" My friend, all this form and ceremony is the very secret of our strength. Throw that regalia into the fire, a colish that ritual—and in six months we should have degenerated into little noisy, disorderly coteries; in twelve months we should have melted away in space. Our strength is union. Our power is organisation. Our virtue is co-operation. And if we mean to destroy the enormous power of the Liquor Traffic, and of the drinking customs of society, we must develop our utmost strength by organisation, we must weld our scattered forces into mighty solidarity by discipline.

Two hundred years ago, when the Commons of England rose in arms against a tyrannical and faithless King, they were very inferior in cavalry. The dashing cavaliers of the fiery Rupert swept the Roundhead horse before them like chaff. At this dangerous crisis, a quiet country gentleman named Oliver Cromwell determined to raise a regiment of calvary of " such men as had the fear of God before them; as made some conscience of what they did." He knew that his only chance against Rupert was better organisation, firmer discipline—such organisation as none would submit to, except for the sake of God and conscience. Soon his regiment became famous for its severe training and admirable proficiency. The hour has come for that power to be felt in the Temperance War. The Good Templars are the Ironsides of the abstainers' army. For the sake of God and conscience we submit to elaborate organisation and rigid discipline. We are being drilled into a mighty regiment. Again and again the numerous and dashing cavalry of Beer and Bacchus has discomfited the soldiers of Temperance. The Liquor Traffic has tyrannised in Parliament. The drinking customs have tyrannised in social life. But wait a bit. We are preparing an army of Ironsides, such as you have never seen before. Cromwell is nearly ready to meet Rupert.

Day by day our ranks are filling, our regiments are multiplying, our munitions of war are increasing, our organisation is growing, our discipline is improving. The war is about to enter a new phase. Our enemies know this. The Licensed [unclear: Vicuallers]' Guardian announced that a National Licensed Victuallers' Defence League was on the eve of formation. Listen to the reasons for this important step. "Good Templars, Alliancites, and Teetotallers all over the kingdom are marshalling their forces, and by an elaborate organisation are increasing their power every day. It is not by numerical force that they prevail, for the Teetotallers are not a tithe of the population of the country; yet, by their perfect organisation and by one settled plan of action, they prepared the country for the Act which has just become law." The battle will now be more dangerous and more desperate. In every town and village, with plenty of money and beer, the Liquor Traffickers will wage a fierce war, but the Good Templar Ironsides will, by God's blessing, match their organisation, and surpass their zeal. With an open Bible in every Lodgeroom, and a prayer to God in every heart, organised, disciplined, armed, we areready to stand forward to the fight.

Issued by the Grand Lodge Of New Zealand, I.O.G.T. Price 2s 6d per 1000 copies; or, including postage, 3s 6d per 1000 copies.