God Almighty never intended that the devil should triumph over the Church. He never intended that the saloons should walk rough-shod over Christianity.

Billy Sunday (1862–1935), a former professional baseball player turned evangelist, became one of the most prominent revival preachers of the early 20th century. His campaigns blended theatrical oratory with militant Protestant moral reform, especially opposition to alcohol. The language of “saloons” reflects the pre-Prohibition era, when the saloon was widely treated by temperance advocates as the social and political engine of drunkenness, vice, and urban corruption. Sunday regularly framed the temperance struggle as spiritual warfare—Christianity versus the devil—and urged churches to mobilize politically and socially against the liquor traffic. This quotation fits that recurring revival theme rather than a private remark.

The quotation casts the contest between the church and the saloon as a cosmic battle whose outcome is guaranteed by divine intent. Sunday’s rhetoric fuses providential confidence (“God Almighty never intended…”) with a call to action: if the church is being “triumph[ed] over,” it is not because evil is stronger, but because Christians have failed to assert their moral authority. “Walk rough-shod” suggests not merely coexistence but domination—public life being trampled by liquor interests. The line exemplifies Sunday’s populist, combative style: it simplifies complex social problems into a stark moral binary, energizing audiences toward temperance and, ultimately, support for Prohibition.