Grappling with the Monster; Or, the Curse and the Cure of Strong Drink - Timothy Arthur 6 стр.

Dr. Alexander Peddie, a physician of over thirty-seven years' practice in Edinburgh, gave, in his evidence, many remarkable instances of the moral perversions that followed continued drinking.

Dr. John Nugent said that his experience of twenty-six years among lunatics, led him to believe that there is a very close relation between the results of the abuse of alcohol and insanity. The population of Ireland had decreased, he said, two millions in twenty-five years, but there was the same amount of insanity now that there was before. He attributed this, in a great measure, to indulgence in drink.

Dr. Arthur Mitchell, Commissioner of Lunacy for Scotland, testified that the excessive use of alcohol caused a large amount of the lunacy, crime and pauperism of that country. In some men, he said, habitual drinking leads to other diseases than insanity, because the effect is always in the direction of the proclivity, but it is certain that there are many in whom there is a clear proclivity to insanity, who would escape that dreadful consummation but for drinking; excessive drinking in many persons determining the insanity to which they are, at any rate, predisposed. The children of drunkards, he further said, are in a larger proportion idiotic than other children, and in a larger proportion become themselves drunkards; they are also in a larger proportion liable to the ordinary forms of acquired insanity.

Dr. Winslow Forbes believed that in the habitual drunkard the whole nervous structure, and the brain especially, became poisoned by alcohol. All the mental symptoms which you see accompanying ordinary intoxication, he remarks, result from the poisonous effects of alcohol on the brain. It is the brain which is mainly effected. In temporary drunkenness, the brain becomes in an abnormal state of alimentation, and if this habit is persisted in for years, the nervous tissue itself becomes permeated with alcohol, and organic changes take place in the nervous tissues of the brain, producing that frightful and dreadful chronic insanity which we see in lunatic asylums, traceable entirely to habits of intoxication. A large percentage of frightful mental and brain disturbances can, he declared, be traced to the drunkenness of parents.

Dr. D.G. Dodge, late of the New York State Inebriate Asylum, who, with. Dr. Joseph Parrish, gave testimony before the committee of the House of Commons, said, in one of his answers: "With the excessive use of alcohol, functional disorder will invariably appear, and no organ will be more seriously affected, and possibly impaired, than the brain. This is shown in the inebriate by a weakened intellect, a general debility of the mental faculties, a partial or total loss of self-respect, and a departure of the power of self-command; all of which, acting together, place the victim at the mercy of a depraved and morbid appetite, and make him utterly powerless, by his own unaided efforts, to secure his recovery from the disease which is destroying him." And he adds: "I am of opinion that there is a

"I am decidedly of opinion that the former has taken its place in the family of diseases as prominently as its twin-brother insanity; and, in my opinion, the day is not far distant when the pathology of the former will be as fully understood and as successfully treated as the latter, and even more successfully, since it is more within the reach and bounds of human control, which, wisely exercised and scientifically administered, may prevent curable inebriation from verging into possible incurable insanity."

In a more recent lecture than the one from which we have quoted so freely, Dr. Richardson, speaking of the action of alcohol on the mind, gives the following sad picture of its ravages:

"An analysis of the condition of the mind induced and maintained by the free daily use of alcohol as a drink, reveals a singular order of facts. The manifestation fails altogether to reveal the exaltation of any reasoning power in a useful or satisfactory direction. I have never met with an instance in which such a claim for alcohol has been made. On the contrary, confirmed alcoholics constantly say that for this or that work, requiring thought and attention, it is necessary to forego some of the usual potations in order to have a cool head for hard work.

"On the other side, the experience is overwhelmingly in favor of the observation that the use of

"make weak men and women the easy prey of the wicked and strong, and leads men and women who should know better into every grade of misery and vice. * * * If, then, alcohol enfeebles the reason, what part of the mental constitution does it exalt and excite? It excites and exalts those animal, organic, emotional centres of mind which, in the dual nature of man, so often cross and oppose that pure and abstract reasoning nature which lifts man above the lower animals, and rightly exercised, little lower than the angels.

"Exciting these animal centres, it lets loose all the passions, and gives them more or less of unlicensed dominion over the man. It excites anger, and when it does not lead to this extreme, it keeps the mind fretful, irritable, dissatisfied and captious.... And if I were to take you through all the passions, love, hate, lust, envy, avarice and pride, I should but show you that alcohol ministers to them all; that, paralyzing the reason, it takes from off these passions that fine adjustment of reason, which places man above the lower animals. From the beginning to the end of its influence it subdues reason and sets the passions free. The analogies, physical and mental, are perfect. That which loosens the tension of the vessels which feed the body with due order and precision, and, thereby, lets loose the heart to violent excess and unbridled motion, loosens, also, the reason and lets loose the passion. In both instances, heart and head are, for a time, out of harmony; their balance broken. The man descends closer and closer to the lower animals. From the angels he glides farther and farther away.

"The destructive effects of alcohol on the human mind present, finally, the saddest picture of its influence. The most æsthetic artist can find no angel here. All is animal, and animal of the worst type. Memory irretrievably lost, words and very elements of speech forgotten or words displaced to have no meaning in them. Rage and anger persistent and mischievous, or remittent and impotent. Fear at every corner of life, distrust on every side, grief merged into blank despair, hopelessness into permanent melancholy. Surely no Pandemonium that ever poet dreamt of could equal that which would exist if all the drunkards of the world were driven into one mortal sphere.

"As I have moved among those who are physically stricken with alcohol, and have detected under the various disguises of name the fatal diseases, the pains and penalties it imposes on the body, the picture has been sufficiently cruel. But even that picture pales, as I conjure up, without any stretch of imagination, the devastations which the same agent inflicts on the mind. Forty per cent., the learned Superintendent of Colney Hatch, Dr. Sheppard, tells us, of those who were brought into that asylum in 1876, were so brought because of the direct or indirect effects of alcohol. If the facts of all the asylums were collected with equal care, the same tale would, I fear, be told. What need we further to show the destructive action on the human mind? The Pandemonium of drunkards; the grand transformation scene of that pantomime of drink which commences with, moderation! Let it never more be forgotten by those who love their fellow-men until, through their efforts, it is closed forever."

"As I have moved among those who are physically stricken with alcohol, and have detected under the various disguises of name the fatal diseases, the pains and penalties it imposes on the body, the picture has been sufficiently cruel. But even that picture pales, as I conjure up, without any stretch of imagination, the devastations which the same agent inflicts on the mind. Forty per cent., the learned Superintendent of Colney Hatch, Dr. Sheppard, tells us, of those who were brought into that asylum in 1876, were so brought because of the direct or indirect effects of alcohol. If the facts of all the asylums were collected with equal care, the same tale would, I fear, be told. What need we further to show the destructive action on the human mind? The Pandemonium of drunkards; the grand transformation scene of that pantomime of drink which commences with, moderation! Let it never more be forgotten by those who love their fellow-men until, through their efforts, it is closed forever."

We might go on, adding page after page of evidence, showing how alcohol curses the souls, as well as the bodies, of men; but enough has been educed to force conviction on the mind of every reader not already satisfied of its poisonous and destructive quality.

How light are all evils flowing from intemperance compared with those which it thus inflicts on man's higher nature. "What," says Dr. W.E. Channing, "is the great essential evil of intemperance? The reply is given, when I say, that intemperance is the

"The great evil is inward or spiritual. The intemperate man divests himself, for a time, of his rational and moral nature, casts from himself self-consciousness and self-command, brings on frenzy, and by repetition of this insanity, prostrates more and more his rational and moral powers. He sins immediately and directly against the rational nature, that Divine principle which, distinguishes between truth and falsehood, between right and wrong action, which, distinguishes man from the brute. This is the essence of the vice, what constitutes its peculiar guilt and woe, and what should particularly impress and awaken those who are laboring for its suppression. Other evils of intemperance are light compared with this, and almost all flow from this; and it is right, it is to be desired that all other evils should be joined with and follow this. It is to be desired, when a man lifts a suicidal arm against his higher life, when he quenches reason and conscience, that he and all others should receive solemn, startling warning of the greatness of his guilt; that terrible outward calamities should bear witness to the inward ruin which he is working; that the handwriting of judgment and woe on his countenance, form and whole condition, should declare what a fearful thing it is for a man, "God's rational offspring, to renounce his reason, and become a brute."

CHAPTER V

NOT A FOOD, AND VERY LIMITED IN ITS RANGE AS A MEDICINE

The use of alcohol as a medicine has been very large. If his patient was weak and nervous, the physician too often ordered wine or ale; or, not taking the trouble to refer his own case to a physician, the invalid prescribed these articles for himself. If there was a failure of appetite, its restoration was sought in the use of one or both of the above-named forms of alcohol; or, perhaps, adopting a more heroic treatment, the sufferer poured brandy or whisky into his weak and sensitive stomach. Protection from cold was sought in a draught of some alcoholic beverage, and relief from fatigue and exhaustion in the use of the same deleterious substance. Indeed, there is scarcely any form of bodily ailment or discomfort, or mental disturbance, for the relief of which a resort was not had to alcohol in some one of its many forms.

It is fair to say that, as a medicine, its consumption has far exceeded that of any other substance prescribed and taken for physical and mental derangements.

The inquiry, then, as to the true remedial value of alcohol is one of the gravest import; and it is of interest to know that for some years past the medical profession has been giving this subject a careful and thorough investigation. The result is to be found in the brief declaration made by the Section on Medicine, of the

which met in Philadelphia in 1876. This body was composed of about six hundred delegates, from Europe and America, among them, some of the ablest men in the profession. Realizing the importance of some expression in relation to the use of alcohol, medical and otherwise, from this Congress, the National Temperance Society laid before it, through its President, W.E. Dodge, and Secretary, J.N. Stearns, the following memorial:

"The National Temperance Society sends greeting, and respectfully invites from your distinguished body a public declaration to the effect that alcohol should be classed with other powerful drugs; that, when, prescribed medicinally, it should be with conscientious caution and a sense of grave responsibility; that it is in no sense food to the human system; that its improper use is productive of a large amount of physical disease, tending to deteriorate the human race; and to recommend, as representatives of enlightened science, to your several nationalities, total abstinence from alcoholic beverages."

In response to this memorial, the president of the society received from J. Ewing Mears, M.D., Secretary of the Section on Medicine, International Congress, the following official letter, under date of September 9th, 1876:

"DEAR SIR: I am instructed by the Section on Medicine, International Medical Congress, of 1876, to transmit to you, as the action of the Section, the following conclusions adopted by it with regard to the use of alcohol in medicine, the same being in reply to the communication sent by the National Temperance Society.

"1. Alcohol is not shown to have a definite food value by any of the usual methods of chemical analysis or physiological investigation.

"2. Its use as a medicine is chiefly that of a cardiac stimulant, and often admits of substitution.

"3. As a medicine, it is not well fitted for self-prescription by the laity, and the medical profession is not accountable for such administration, or for the enormous evils arising therefrom.

"4. The purity of alcoholic liquors is, in general, not as well assured as that of articles used for medicine should be. The various mixtures, when used as medicine, should have definite and known composition, and should not be interchanged promiscuously."

The reader will see in this no hesitating or halfway speech. The declaration is strong and clear, that, as a food, alcohol is not shown, when subjected to the usual method of chemical or physiological investigation, to have any food value; and that, as a medicine, its use is chiefly confined to a cardiac stimulant, and often admits of substitution.

A declaration like this, coming, as it does, from a body of medical men representing the most advanced ideas held by the profession, must have great weight with the people. But we do not propose resting on this declaration alone. As it was based on the results of chemical and physiological investigations, let us go back of the opinion expressed by the Medical Congress, and examine these results, in order that the ground of its opinion may become apparent.

There was presented to this Congress, by a distinguished physician of New Jersey, Dr. Ezra M. Hunt, a paper on "Alcohol as a Food and Medicine," in which the whole subject is examined in the light of the most recent and carefully-conducted experiments of English, French, German and American chemists and physiologists, and their conclusions, as well as those of the author of the paper, set forth in the plainest manner. This has since been published by the National Temperance Society, and should be read and carefully studied by every one who is seeking for accurate information on the important subject we are now considering. It is impossible for us to more than glance at the evidence brought forward in proof of the assertion that