PHYSIOLOGICAL POSITION OF ALCOHOL. 225 



or degrees of alcoholic narcotism, from the first to the last. Let me 

 add two or three observations. 



In the first place, we gather that this agent is a narcotic. I have 

 compared it throughout to chloroform, and the comparison is good in 

 all respects save one, viz., that alcohol is less fatal than chloroform as 

 an immediate destroyer. 



The well-proven fact that alcohol, when it is taken into the "body, 

 reduces the animal temperature, is full of the most important sugges- 

 tions. It shows that alcohol does not in any sense act as a supplier of 

 vital heat, as is so commonly supposed, and that it does not prevent 

 the loss of heat, as those imagine " who take just a drop to keej) out 

 the cold." It shows, on the contrary, that cold and alcohol in their 

 effects on the body run closely together, an opinion most fully con- 

 firmed by the experience of those who live or travel in cold regions 

 of the earth. 



The conclusive evidence now in our possession that alcohol taken 

 into the animal bodv sets free the heart, so as to cause the excess of 

 motion of which the record has been given above, is proof that the 

 heart, under the frequent influence of alcohol, must undergo deleterious 

 change of structure. It may, indeed, be admitted in proper fairness, 

 that when the heart is passing through this rapid movement it is 

 working under less pressure than when its movements are slow and 

 natural ; and this allowance must needs be made, or the inference would 

 be that the organ ought to stop at once in function by the excess of 

 strain put upon it. 



I cannot, by any argument yet presented to me, admit the alcohols 

 by any sign that should distinguish them from other chemical sub- 

 stances of the exciting and depressing narcotic class. When it is 

 physiologically understood that what is called stimulation or excite- 

 ment is, in absolute fact, a relaxation, I had nearly said a paralysis, 

 of one of the most important mechanisms in the animal body the 

 minute, resisting, compensating circulation we grasp quickly the 

 error, in respect to the action of stimulants, in which we have been 

 educated, and obtain a clear solution of the well-known experience 

 that all excitement, all passion, leaves, after its departure, lowness 

 of heart, depression of mind, sadness of spirit. In the scientific 

 education of the people no fact is more deserving of special comment 

 than this fact, that excitement is wasted force, the running down 

 of the animal mechanism before it has served out its time of mo- 

 tion. 



It will be said that alcohol cheers the weary, and that to take a 

 little wine for the stomach's sake is one of those lessons that come 

 from the deep recesses of human nature. I am not so obstinate as to 

 deny this argument. There are times in the life of man when the heart 

 is oppressed, when the resistance to its motion is excessive, and when 

 blood flows languidly to the centres of life, nervous and muscular. 

 15 



