“Then when you oppose beer you are doing it to keep yourself from getting sick, aren't you? Do you really care a darn whether those fellows get sick at the stomach or not?”
“Certainly, I—”
“You don't want them to get sick at the stomach?”
“Then, why did you give that lecture on corned beef and make those strong fellows all sick at the stomach while you enjoyed your own dinner?”
“I didn't know it would disturb them so. Besides I wanted to keep them from getting sick later.”
“Well, they prefer to have their health now, and wait for their sickness until later on. You are doing no man a favor by making him sick when he is feeling well. If God is willing for them to be well, and they want to be well, and the only thing that keeps them from being well is you, aren't you afraid that they will pile on to you and knock the daylights out of you?”
“I am really working for their good.”
“Then you want their stomachs to have what agrees with them?”
“Certainly.”
“Well, I'll tell you something, then. Water doesn't always agree with the stomach as well as beer does. You never worked at terrific muscular exertion handling white-hot iron in a mill like this. You haven't got the muscles to do it, and I doubt if you've got the heart. You can not know the condition a man is in when he hits his hardest lick here. But they know, and I know. Some of the men feel they can't drink water at that time. My pal tells me that his stomach rejects it; his throat seems to collapse as he gulps it. But beer he can drink and it eases him. The alcohol in beer is a blessing at that time. It soothes his laboring stomach until the water can get into his system and quench the man's thirst. Iron workers in the Old World have used malt beverages for generations. Why take away the other man's pleasure if it doesn't injure you? If it was deadly we would have been weakened in the course of generations. But look at the worker's body. It is four times as strong as yours.” I saw an envious look in his eye.