GENERAL, HEALTH HINTS . 703 



cians, who commonly prohibit only what they term 

 excess. We have for many years observed, however, 

 that half-way measures will not do in these cases. 

 Tobacco must be discarded wholly and forever. 



The amount of nerve energy and vital force that is 

 being squandered by the use of this drug is beyond 

 estimate. If the sum total of human life and strength 

 sacrificed to tobacco could be represented in figures, the 

 aggregate would be astounding. Tobacco is unques- 

 tionably one of the worst of all the curses of civili- 

 zation. It certainly is equaled only by two vices— 

 inebriety and immorality. The mischief done by 

 opium, cocaine, and other vice-drugs is enormous, but 

 incomparable beside the far-reaching evils justly at- 

 tributable to the use of tobacco. Thousands of men 

 are kept in a state of chronic lethargy by its narcotic 

 influence. Millions of consciences are benumbed by 

 its subtle spell. Countless nmltitudes of children are 

 born with weak nerves and feeble constitutions, as the 

 result of the chronic nicotine-poisoning of parents. 



The use of the vile drug by civilized man is one of 

 the enigmas of modern civilization. The old Greeks 

 and Romans, who shaped the foundations of our mod- 

 ern civilization, used neither tobacco, tea, nor cotfee, 

 nor strong liquor. If they had indulged in these stimu- 

 lants as do men and women of the present day, it is 

 safe to say that by the present time the human race 

 would have been deteriorated to the vanishing point, 

 with the possible exception of those savage tribes who 

 may have been preserved by their isolation from the 

 influence of these destructive agents. Unless a radical 

 change for the better can be effected within a few gen- 

 erations to come, the condition of the then existing race 

 at the present rate of deterioration, is fearful to con- 



