<TITLE>05. Par 16-18</TITLE>L-16 And a certain fellow we raised up, and he spoke to him, said, "Can you hear me?"
He said, "Give me a drink."
I said, "I'm a--a minister. I would like to know why that you would throw your life away like this." When I said, "Minister..." roused up and looked at me. And he said, "Excuse me, sir, for asking you for enough money to buy me a drink, but you don't know my case."
I said, "Sir, I sympathize with you. My father drink. And he drink on until death took him. And I'm not making you the worst person in the world, but I would like to know, a man that's got enough decency about him, to excuse hisself when he sees that he's done wrong, how could you ever have throwed your life to this?"
He said, "Son, I can almost point my finger and show you with my eyes the bank that I was president of."
And I said, "Sir, is that truth?"
He said, "My name is such-and-such a name. You might go to the bank and see if that's right or not."
I said, "How did you come to do this?"
He said, "I had Christian training. And I was once a member of the church."
I said, "But what caused you to do this?"
Said, "One day, I come home from work; I had a lovely family and a beautiful wife." He said, "But I found what we called a "Dear John letter" laying on the table. My wife had gone. And from that time, I tried to drown my sorrow with drinking."
"Oh," I said, "I wish that I could take you back to that time." That time, if he could only go back to that time...

L-17 I talked to a young woman, some time ago, who was in the emergency room. She was from the psychopathic. In a great meeting at Flint, Michigan, and they had, maybe, thirty cases of insanity in the room, and they said, "You could not bring them out in public, because they were in straight jackets, and--and all kinds of conditions."
And I went into the room, and one man went with me, and when we went in there, there was a beautiful, young woman, looked to be about twenty or twenty-five years old, setting there. I said, "How do you do?"
She said, "How do you do?"
And I said, "Well, it's hard to know which way to start, and some of them out of their minds and screaming. And--and people watching them, and..."
She said, "If you don't mind, sir, I'd like for you to start with me."
I said, "With you?"
She said, "Yes, sir."
"Why," I said, "you're not a patient, are you?"
She said, "Yes, sir, I am."
"Well," I said, "you seem to have your right mind."
She said, "I wonder." And she said, "Could you listen to my story just a moment?"
I said, "Certainly, madam."

L-18 And she started telling me, she said, "I was reared in a good home." She said, "And my mother taught me not to do wrong, to shun evil, and to embrace the right thing." She said, "And I lived that kind of a life for a number of years, and I got mixed up with a young man." And she said, "It caused a disgrace to me." And said, "I just started and throwed myself away, and I become a alcoholic." Said, "Then they picked me up and sent me to a Catholic institution, called the Good Shepherd's Home." Said, "There I was under correction for a number of years, and then they released me. And as soon as I got out from that, I started drinking again." And said, "Then I served a year or two in woman's state prison." And said, "Then I had changed from Protestant to Catholic. Then doing this time, I changed back to Protestant again, from the chaplain talking to me." And said, "I come out and tried again," but said, "I went right back into it again, into prostitution, drinking."
And I said, "Your mother?"
"She's dead."
"Your father?"
"Dead."
And I--I said, "What do you think they would think about you now?"
She said, "Oh, if I could only go back again."


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