LETTERS TO BROTHER JOHN. 217 



submit their bodies to the same influence, and suf- 

 fer the same evils, although the cause be different. 

 " Comforts " are, opiates anodynes narcotics ; as 

 certainly so as opium itself, although not in so 

 powerful a degTee. The lover of "comforts," 

 therefore, must neither censure nor ridicule the 

 eater of opium : he is himself guilty of the same 

 fault, and will certainly reap the same harvest. I 

 say, their fault is the same : they both are producing 

 the same effect, only by different means : they are 

 both travelling to the same point, only by different 

 roads. 



Like hemlock, then like the deadly nightshade 

 like opium, and other poisonous narcotics " com- 

 forts," as we are pleased to term them, have the 

 direct effect of lowering the tone and lessening the 

 activity of the living actions ; and of inducing that 

 condition of the body called sleep, which, when too 

 frequently or too much indulged, is highly, most 

 highly, injurious to the health. 



Light, and wet, and wind, and cold, and noise, 

 &c. &c., are what are enumerated among the dis- 

 comforts of life. But these, and the like of these, 

 are the natural whips and spurs which keep the 

 living actions, as it were, awake: they form a part 

 of man's natural condition : they form a part of the 



