FOODS AND THEIR PHYSIOLOGICAL VALUE. 325 



porary exhilaration which is pleasant, and which no doubt 

 explains the desire which has so generally prompted man- 

 kind to use it. There are so many good books now avail- 

 able giving the detailed and specific action of this substance 

 on the various organs, and on the body in general, that such 

 a detailed account is deemed unnecessary here. That alco- 

 hol taken in excess produces derangements of the most 

 serious nature in almost all the organs, is a point which no 

 man can doubt who has seen the brutish drunkard lying in 

 the gutter. Whether alcohol in moderate quantities is a 

 food or not, whether in small amounts it may not be helpful, 

 is a question which does not concern us here. Suffice it to 

 say that all physiology and possibly all medicine has shown 

 conclusively that there is absolutely no necessity for a sound 

 man to add alcohol in any of its forms to his daily diet. The 

 person who persists in doing so must seek his reason else- 

 where, while the fact that in innumerable instances it has 

 done unspeakable harm, is equally well established. With- 

 out denying for a moment, or disregarding the effect of 

 alcoholic excesses upon the various tissues of the body, the 

 point remains that the truest reason against the use of this 

 substance is a moral one. The fact that the heart of the 

 toper is unnaturally stimulated by his whiskey, is a very 

 insignificant fact compared with the more serious one that 

 this whiskey in its effects has broken possibly a wife's and 

 a mother's heart; the fact that the drinking of alcohol 

 lowers the temperature of the body of the toper is a very 

 trifling fact compared with the more awful one that it has 

 given babies cold feet for want of shoes, and wives cold 

 backs for want of warm clothing; that it has made homes 

 cold, and has reduced the warmth of a thousand friends. 

 The fact that it may curdle the liver is of small conse- 

 quence when compared with the more serious fact that it 

 too frequently curdles the sentiments, the hopes, and the 

 aspirations. That alcoholic excesses may produce the ugly 

 ulcerations of the drunkard's stomach is possibly not so 



