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this, the mind must be uninfluenced by artificial excitement. Everything, therefore, which has a tendency to produce improper excitement, either of mind or of body, or to inflame the passions, must be viewed as dangerous in its consequences. Such has ever been found to be the invariable tendency of strong drink, which ought therefore to be eschewed as our greatest foe.

The purpose of this chapter is to examine the effects of intoxicating liquors on individual happiness and welfare, and to exhibit the baneful influence which they exercise on the intellectual and moral powers of man, as well as upon his social virtues and domestic enjoyments.

We have previously adverted to the peculiarly fascinating effect of inebriating liquor. Its approaches are slow and insidious, often imperceptible, yet eventually potent, ensnaring, and destructive. How few are to be found of those who indulge even in the moderate use of intoxicating liquors, who are prepared to assert that they can, at any time, abandon the habit without some physical or mental struggle? Feelings of this nature are almost invariably. found to follow the relinquishment of even moderate indulgence, and exhibit conclusive evidence of the dangerous character the habit has already begun to assume. "No man," says Dr. John James, of the United States, "is safe, who cannot without inconvenience omit for days and for weeks all kinds of intoxicating drink. No man is safe who cannot sleep without something generous before he goes to bed; by frequent repetition a glass of wine, or a tumbler of beer, becomes dangerous. The moderate use of intoxicating liquor undermines the constitution without exciting the suspicion of the victim, until reformation is all but hopeless. No quantity of spirituous liquors, however small, can with safety be taken daily, much less several times in the day, with impunity. We should never taste vinous or other fermented liquors, without remembering that danger lurks in every cup."

Parents who indulge in the habit of moderate drinking, rarely contemplate the possibility of their children becoming drunkards. Forgetful of the fact that evil habits are easily acquired, they introduce the wine-bottle, and incul, cate the safety and propriety of moderate indulgence. Hence their children gradually acquire a taste for stimu

• Medical Opinions. Report of New York City Temperance Society,

lating liquors, and in innumerable instances, become irreclaimable drunkards.

It may be affirmed, without fear of contradiction, that no individual, at the commencement of his career of intemperance, ever intended to become an habitual drunkard. The moderate use, however, of intoxicating liquors, creates the habit, and hosts of "moderate drinkers" ultimately become dissipated characters. A vast variety of facts irresistibly tend to show that there is no safety in the practice of moderate drinking. By total abstinence alone can permanent and effectual security be attained.*

On examination, it will be found that intoxicating liquors do not, as is generally supposed, in any degree contribute to cheerfulness of mind, or equanimity of temper. The animation produced by wine is boisterous and transitory, and does not confer either lasting strength of intellect or mental refinement. The individual, who in social intercourse is dependant on wine for mental cheerfulness, or power of conversation, is indeed a pitiable slave. Observe the conduct of such characters at their homes, where the endearing relations of domestic life ought to be found, and you discover that the fretful uneven temper of the debauchée, contributes not to the sweet stores of social enjoyment.

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Many examples might, if necessary, be adduced within the author's own observation, by way of illustration. The remarks of a learned divine on this subject, will be found to be verified by daily experience:-" Since I have abandoned the use of all fermented drinks, I have made the discovery that I do not get angry.' The observations of Dr. Trotter are forcible and correct:-"My whole experience," he affirms, " assures me that wine is no friend to vigour or activity of mind. It whirls the fancy beyond the judgement, and leaves the body and soul in a state of listless indolence and sloth. The man, that on arduous occasions is to trust to his own judgement, must preserve an equilibrium, alike proof against external contingencies and internal passions. He must be prompt in his decisions -bold in enterprise-fruitful in resources-patient under

* Dr. Samuel Johnson having stated in a conversation with Dr. Boswell, that he drank a large quantity without being materially affected by it, and that he did not leave off drinking wine because he could not bear it, adduced this reason for his abstinence-"because it is so much better for a man to be sure that he is never to be intoxicated, never to lose the power over himself,"

expectation-not elated with success, or depressed with disappointment. But if his spirits need a fillip from wine, he will never conceive or execute anything magnanimous or grand. In a survey of my whole acquaintance and friends, I find that water-drinkers possess the most equal tempers and cheerful dispositions."

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The celebrated American physician, Dr. Rush, coincides with the views just quoted. "The first effects of spirits. upon the mind show themselves in the temper. I have constantly observed men, who are intoxicated in any degree with spirits, to be peevish and quarrelsome; after awhile they lose the moral sense," &c.f Sir A. Carlysle, among other of "the moral effects of fermented liquors," attributes to them "the production of a disturbed temper, fretful, unsteady, or irascible." Perhaps nothing, remarks the same writer, contributes so much to moral equability of mind as the total abandonment of strong liquors.

The author's personal observation has been equally decisive in regard to the uneven tempers of those who indulge even moderately in the use of intoxicating liquor. The mental and physical depression consequent on vinous indulgence, forms a strong predisposing cause to this inequality of disposition. These unnatural motions, however, are seldom exhibited in the conduct of waterdrinkers. "There can be no question," observes a writer of considerable eminence, "that water is the best and the only drink which Nature has designed for man. The water-drinker glides tranquilly through life, without much exhilaration or depression, and escapes many diseases to which otherwise he would be subject. The wine-drinker experiences short, but vivid periods of rapture, and long intervals of gloom; he is also more subject to disease. The balance of enjoyment then turns decidedly in favour of the water-drinker, leaving out his temporal prosperity and future anticipations; and the nearer we keep to his regimen, the happier we shall be."§

The same writer relates an instance of the superiority displayed in the temper and cheerfulness of the waterdrinker over those who indulge in vinous potations. Some years ago, when in a large company at Prince of Wales'

Trotter's Essay on Drunkenness, p. 186.

† An Inquiry into the Effects of Ardent Spirits, by Benjamin Rush, M. D. Lecture on Fermented Liquors, by Sir A. Carlysle.

& Civic Life and Sedentary Habits, 1818, by Dr. James Johnson, Editor of the Medico-Chirurgical Review.

Island, Dr. Johnson met with a gentleman who was remarkable for his flow of spirits and convivial talents. He attributed his animation and hilarity to the wine, which he supposed him to have taken, and expected to see them flag, as is usual, when the first effects of the stimulus had passed off. Dr. Johnson, however, was surprised to find them maintain a uniform level, after many younger heroes had bowed to the rosy god. To use his own words, he now contrived to get near to him, and entered into a conversation, when the gentleman disclosed the secret, by assuring him that he had drank nothing but water for many years in India; as a consequence, his health was excellent-his spirits were free, and his faculties were unclouded, although far advanced on time's list; in short, he could conscientiously recommend the antediluvian beverage, as he called it, to every one that sojourned in a tropical climate.* Dr. Samuel Johnson thus expresses himself on the subject in question. "Wine," he remarks, "gives no light, gay, ideal hilarity, but tumultuous, noisy, clamorous merriment; I admit," he further observes, "that the spirits are raised by drinking as by the common participation of any pleasure; cock-fighting or bear-baiting will raise the spirits of a company as drinking does, though surely they will not improve conversation.†

The use of intoxicating liquors is found to impart a false confidence, by which those who indulge in it assume a disposition foreign to their natural temper. "Wine," says the illustrious individual whose opinion has just been quoted, "makes a man better pleased with himself, but the danger is, that while a man grows better pleased with himself, he may be growing less pleasing to others. Wine gives a man nothing. It neither gives him knowledge nor wit; it only animates a man, and enables him to bring out what a dread of company has repressed. A man should cultivate his mind so as to have that confidence and readiness without wine, which wine gives.

Tropical Hygiene, sect. Drink. All authorities concur in describing Waller as one of the most celebrated wits of the day. This was no easy reputation for a man of seventy to sustain in such society as composed the circle of that licentious court. The vivacity of his conversation was unflagging; and while Buckingham and others indulged freely in wine, he, confining himself to water, was equal to the highest pitch of their festivity. He was the only water-drinker of that roisterous company; and Saville used to say that Ned Waller was the only man in England he would allow to sit with him without drinking.-Bell's Poets.

Boswell's Life of Johnson. Conversation with Sir Joshua Reynolds.
Sir Joshua Reynolds having maintained that wine improved conversa

*

The complacent feelings consequent on moderate vinous indulgence are so commonly known, that they require only to be adverted to. The greater the indulgence in strong drink the less power do we possess over the natural disposition. Many persons have been observed, when under the influence of wine, to discover those matters, which, while sober, they were desirous to conceal. Thus the old proverb, "Ingrediente vino egreditur secretum." As the wine goes in, so the secret goes out. This, however, must be viewed in a limited sense, and the popular phrase "in vino veritas," is decidedly not universal in its application. The general effect of stimulating liquor, no doubt, is in proportion to the amount of indulgence, to remove a man from the possession of his faculties, and very frequently, to infuse into him such feelings as are alien to his natural disposition.

Addison appears to have been of this opinion, for he remarks, that not only does the vice of intemperance betray the hidden faults of a man, and show them in the most odious colours, but it often occasions faults to which he is not naturally subject. "Wine," adds this celebrated moralist, "throws a man out of himself, and infuses qualities into the mind, which she is a stranger to in her sober moments."

The use of intoxicating liquors is powerfully injurious to the moral faculties, and destructive of moral principles. The position of man as a moral agent, and an accountable being, is of the highest importance. He is susceptible of the most refined and exquisite feelings, which are capable of affording him the highest enjoyment. The happiness of human beings depends in a great measure on the proper discipline of the moral feelings. Happiness is essentially progressive. The mind is ever restlessly engaged in searching out new means of occupation or sources of

tion, Dr. Johnson replied, "No, Sir, before dinner men meet with great inequality of understanding, and those who are conscious of their inferiority, have the modesty not to talk; when they have drank wine, every man feels himself comfortable, and loses that modesty, and grows impudent and vociferous; but he is not improved, he is only not sensible of his defects."— Boswell's Johnson.

"At the beginning of intoxication the ideas flow with a more than natural rapidity; self-love soars above our prudence, and shows itself openly; we lay aside the scale of deliberation, the slow, pondering, measuring, and comparing instruments of judgement. In this condition every man is a hero to himself; he feels as he wishes, and the state of his mind is betrayed by boastings and falsehoods, by pretensions to abilities beyond his possessions, and by a delusive contempt for the evils that beset him."-Sir A. Carlysle on Moral Influence of Fermented Liquors.

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