ALCOHOL 237 



the period of active and effective life. Insurance exam- 

 iners are glad when they can record of an applicant that 

 he is a total abstainer. 



Enough has been said to show how various are the 

 aspects of alcohol. It has been easy to treat them sep- 

 arately in the preceding paragraphs, but no such separa- 

 tion is possible in practice. The undoubted value of the 

 alcoholic relish, its occasional merit as a significant part 

 of the ration, and even its virtue as a drug cannot be util- 

 ized without some experience of its cerebral effect and the 

 risk, not always remote, of forming a habit. The hygienic 

 ideal to be striven for is a robustness of life which shall 

 make alcohol superfluous as relish, food, or drug, and a 

 cheerful, active mind which needs no artificial aid to keep 

 it hopeful and sympathetic. The attainment may not be 

 an easy task. Grief and worry and overwork may be 

 added to an original depression of temperament, but the 

 use of alcohol is never more unsafe than when sorrows are 

 the excuse, and never so selfish and cowardly as when the 

 motive is to shun responsibilities that ought to be faced. 

 Men do not often see the sinister suggestion in the high 

 spirits of one who has forgotten his cares for an evening by 

 the most moderate indulgence. They fail to see that the 

 banishment of the sense of pressing duties is the very 

 characteristic of the drunkard when, developed to a logical 

 extreme, it makes him indifferent to every obligation of 

 conscience and of love. 



