76 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The arrogant spirit of man revolts against the idea of its so-called 

 bodily shell being a mere natural product, just like every other organ- 

 ized structure ; but, for all that, the universal morj)hological law still 

 remains. Art alone transcends all the requirements of natural pro- 

 duction. Where art comes in play, the individual disappears ; the 

 contingent gives way before the eternal, the permanent. But this is 

 a harmony that is never attained by Nature. Die JVatur. 



THE CONFESSION OF A EEFOKMED SMOKEE. 



A RECORD OF OBSERVATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS CONCERNING THE PHYSIOLOGICAL 



ACTION OF TOBACCO. 



By FEANCIS GEEEY FAIEFIELD. 



IN submitting the following observations as to the physiological 

 effect of smoking, it is not my intention to discuss the tobacco 

 question in an exhaustive manner, but, on the other hand, to limit my 

 remarks to experiments tried and recorded in the course of the year 

 ending July 10, 1874, and to the more general memoranda of the pre- 

 vious twelve years, during which the habit was formed, and, with 

 the exception of brief paroxysms of abstinence, steadily developed. 

 Many will no doubt dissent from the conclusions at which I arrived : 

 to whom I have only to reply that my observations and experiments 

 have not been, save in a cursory memorandum now and then, extended 

 beyond my own person, and represent uniquely the manner in which 

 I have been individually affected by habitual smoking. So far as I 

 have any opinion to express, it consists of induction from actu a 1 x- 

 periments, and of inferences from actual symptoms ; and, if I seem to 

 leave many points undetermined, it must be set down to the fact that 

 they are not within the scope of the particular method I have fol- 

 lowed. That tobacco differently affects different temperaments there 

 is no doubt. That different grades and qualities of tobacco differ ma- 

 terially in their physiological action, in manner and symptom, if not 

 essentially, is demonstrated by experiment. In smoking, even, to say 

 nothing of other forms of the tobacco-habit, it makes a material dif- 

 ference M'hether the same quality is used in conjunction with the pipe 

 or consumed in the form of the cigar a fact mainly due, no doubt, 

 to the escape of the pyreiline, a base of extreme volatility, in cigar- 

 smoking, and to its conservation to a greater extent in pipe-smoking. 

 Yet, making all due allowances for differences of temperament, for the 

 bias of transmitted habit, and for idiosyncrasies developed by special 

 circumstances, I am constrained to the conclusion that, in the majority 

 of instances, the habit of smoking is productive of nervous degeneracy. 



