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This text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
Theobald Mathew (1790–1856), an Irish teetotalist reformer, popularly known as Father Mathew was born at Thomastown, near Golden, County Tipperary, on October 10, 1790.
He received his schooling in Kilkenny, then moved for a short time to Maynooth. From 1808 to 1814 he studied in Dublin, where in the latter year he was ordained to the priesthood. Having entered the Capuchin order, after a brief period of service at Kilkenny, he joined the mission in Cork.
Statues of Mathew stand on St. Patrick's Street, Cork by JH Foley (1864), and on O'Connell Street, Dublin by Mary Redmond (1893). __NOTOC__
Father Mathew did not believe in gradual approaches or temporary commitments. He advocated a promise that meant complete commitment. It did not bind like the vows of marriage, but the principle of permanent commitment was the same. Fr. Mathew understood that as long as the act of will continued, it could overcome all difficulties.
One simple commitment, encased in the words of the Total Abstinence Pledge, supposedly did the trick. The surroundings did not make much difference. One could take the pledge as a single individual or as one of a waiting line coming up in a parish, mobilized and brimming with enthusiasm for the occasion. However, Father Mathew arrived at this conclusion only after much prayer for guidance and after urging by others who proposed total abstinence over moderation.
}} In less than nine months no fewer than 150,000 names were enrolled as taking the Pledge. It rapidly spread to Limerick and elsewhere, and some idea of its popularity may be formed from the fact that at Nenagh 20,000 persons are said to have taken the pledge in one day, 100,000 at Galway in two days, and 70,000 in Dublin in five days. At its height, just before the Great Famine of 1845-48, his movement enrolled some 3 million people, or more than half of the adult population of Ireland. In 1844 he visited Liverpool, Manchester and London with almost equal success.
His work had a remarkable impact on the condition of the people in Ireland:
“The number of homicides, which was 247 in 1838, was only 105 in 1841. There were 91 cases of ‘firing at the person’ reported in 1837, and but 66 in 1841. The ‘assaults on police’ were 91 in 1837, and but 58 in 1841. Incendiary fires, which were as many as 459 in 1838, were 390 in 1841. Robberies, thus specially reported, diminished from 725 in 1837, to 257 in 1841. The decrease in cases of ‘robbery of arms’ was most significant; from being 246 in 1837, they were but 111 in 1841. The offence of ‘appearing in arms’ showed a favourable diminution, falling from 110 in 1837, to 66 in 1841. The effect of sobriety on ‘faction fights’ was equally remarkable. There were 20 of such cases in 1839, and 8 in 1841. The dangerous offence of ‘rescuing prisoners,’ which was represented by 34 in 1837, had no return in 1841!”
The number committed to gaol fell from 12,049 in 1839 to 7,101 by 1845. Sentences of death fell from 66 in 1839 to 14 in 1846, and transportations fell from 916 to 504 over the same period.
However, his campaign did have the unforeseen consequence of an increase in diethyl ether consumption, much more dangerous than alcohol, by those seeking intoxication without breaking their pledge. It also caused many breweries and distilleries to close.
For two years, despite grave illness, Father Mathew blazed a trail of success across the United States. Boston, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Little Rock, New Orleans, and many places in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Virginia, Delaware and other areas heard his exhortations and were won to the practice of total abstinence. Everywhere there were crowds and enthusiastic receptions.
When he left the USA in 1851, strong temperance societies carried on the work. “I thank heaven I have been instrumental in adding to the ranks of temperance over 600,000 in the United States,” he wrote. Mathew has a statue dedicated to him in Salem, Massachusetts.
Mathew, a high-profile visitor to the USA, found himself at the center of the Abolitionist debate. Many of his hosts were pro-slavery, and wanted assurances that their influential guest would not stray outside his remit of battling alcohol consumption. But Mathew had signed a petition against human bondage in 1842 when he had hosted former slave Frederick Douglass in his Cork home. Now however, in order to avoid upsetting his powerful American friends, he snubbed an invitation to publicly endorse Abolition, sacrificing his friendship with that movement.
Category:Irish temperance activists Category:1790 births Category:1856 deaths Category:Capuchins Category:Irish Roman Catholic priests Category:People from County Tipperary
da:Theobald Mathew de:Theobald Mathew csb:Theobald Mathew sv:Theobald MathewThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
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