240 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



author has made narcotics and anaesthet- 

 ics a matter of special scientific study 

 and physiological experiment ; and, al- 

 though his hypothesis of a "nervous 

 ether" is regarded as fanciful, yet his 

 statement of the way alcohol influences 

 the system is independent of that specu- 

 lation, and will be found instructive. 



The evils that arise to individuals 

 and to society, through the agency of 

 alcoholic drinks, are universally admit- 

 ted, but the question what is to be done 

 to remedy them proves most difficult. 

 It has been asked in this country and 

 in England, for half a century, without 

 eliciting any satisfactory reply, and the 

 same question is being now very seri- 

 ously proposed by the French. There 

 seems to have been an enormous in- 

 crease in the consumption of spirits in 

 France, a great reduction of cost, and 

 a deterioration of quality. In 1820, 

 there were consumed 7,700,000 gallons 

 of alcoholic drink ; in 1869, it had risen 

 to 21,500,000 gallons. In 1850, nine- 

 tenths came from the distillation of the 

 products of the vine, while in 1869 the 

 vine furnished only three-tenths of it 

 the remainder coming from beet-root 

 and grain. So a gallon of liquor, which 

 in 1850 cost nine francs, sells to-day 

 for two and a half francs. It is alleged 

 that suicides and insanity have in- 

 creased during this period in a rapid 

 ratio. 



To arrest this tendency of things, 

 the French are fertile in projects. They 

 would tax cheap liquors, they would ex- 

 tirpate the vine, they would make pub- 

 lic drunkenness criminal, they would 

 pledge men to total abstinence from 

 ever setting foot in a cafe. 



But, what is more to the purpose, 

 a society has been organized in Paris, 

 embracing a large number of physicians 

 and scientists, who propose to instruct 

 the people by the press and lectures as 

 to the evils which flow from the habit- 

 ual use of alcoholic drinks. They will 

 not insist on teetotalism or prohibition, 

 but urge the substitution for the strong- 



er liquors of such beverages as coffee, 

 native wines, cider, and beer. 



It is not to be disguised that the 

 problem here proposed, and with which 

 civilization is now confronted, is one 

 of the most refractory that philanthropy 

 has yet encountered. Slavery was a 

 local and anomalous institution, based 

 upon legislation, and, when the turf of 

 moral suasion failed to dislodge it, the 

 stones of war proved effectual. But 

 the evil of intemperance cannot be ter- 

 minated by burning gunpowder. The 

 craving for stimulation and for stimu- 

 lants, in one or another of their innu- 

 merable forms, is not a local, unusual, 

 arbitrary, or statutory thing, but a 

 rooted and universal passion of human 

 nature. It is not confined to special 

 communities, but pervades alike the 

 civilized and uncivilized races all over 

 the world ; varying in different types of 

 humanity, but common to all. Some 

 races take to opium, others to hashish, 

 others to alcohol. It is this deep basis 

 of the propensity in human nature that 

 gives to the subject its mystery and its 

 perplexity. 



The rationale of stimulation is in- 

 deed not so puzzling. Food builds up 

 and maintains the vital activity of the 

 whole animate creation in its working 

 state, but that is not enough for man. 

 He leads a life of high and complex 

 feeling, subject to wide fluctuations, 

 while his intellect furnishes him with 

 the means of influencing his emotional 

 states. He therefore seeks those agen- 

 cies which act to arouse pleasurable 

 emotion, and these are stimulants. 

 Capable of appreciating the immediate 

 pleasure, but incapable of realizing 

 adequately the distant pain, the habit 

 is formed, and use runs into abuse. 



What, then, is to be done? Here 

 logic is soon at fault, for the headlong 

 reformer, who fixes his attention upon 

 some special phase of the evil, and 

 would eradicate it root and branch, is 

 soon found to be himself involved in 

 something not very unlike what ho so 



