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only the proportion which is taken by the Government. That amount must be multiplied at least by four to ascertain the real cost of those articles, especially that of spirits. It represents a consumption, and I may say, with scarcely an exception, a useless consumption of at least $16,000,000 per annum (hear, hear), an amount which is very nearly equal to the whole amount of the commercial failures in the country on the average for the last five years. While I am speaking on this subject of the revenue derived from these beverages, I may take occasion to remark that though the amount is not so large as it was stated last night, when it was put at six millions, it quite large enough—for it is four and a half millions—and that is one of the difficulties which have in the future to be met with in advocating total prohibition. Now, there is another point mentioned by my friend, Rev Mr. Duff, last night, which I think I may say two or three words about. In his eloquent remarks he referred to the amount of revenue raised from ardent spirits, and in terms which were probably understood by the audience, and were so understood by me as charging upon the Government what really amounted to a great sin in obtaining this money (hear, hear). I am quite sure that that could not have been what Mr. Duff proposed the meeting should understand. The truth is, that far from the Government being blame-worthy in raising that amount from spirits, they are acting precisely in the direction that is most in the interests of temperance. The more money they raise from spirits the more expensive those beverages become, and clearly the less they are within the reach of the poorer classes of this country, and I should be glad if, instead of four millions and a half, the Government had been able to raise twice that sum. (Hear, hear.) If they could raise twice that amount to-morrow from this particular source it would be unquestionably a move in the right direction, and one for which instead of blaming the Government we should support it, for we should be glad to know that so large a portion of the taxation necessary to the Government of this country is drawn from a source which our object should be to dry up, since it is drawn from an article of consumption which is, in very many respects, and
