The paper focuses on the discourse on alcoholic beverages in the 19th century. The 19th century is an age of change in many fields and especially the public as well as the scientific opinion on alcoholic beverages experienced dramatic change. It was the aim to find the geographic and economic roots of the change in discourse. It was revealed that alcoholic beverages were regarded more often as a social problem. The distribution of alcoholic beverages was fought by international temperance movements. Especially the rise of the spirts like rum, vodka and whiskey was decried by moralists of the time. How temperance ideas developed in various English and German countries was examined in this paper