CHAPTER XV 



NARCOTICS 



A mental problem The elimination due to alcohol The reasons why 

 men drink Self-control Will-power Variations amongst drinkers 

 Alcoholic selection Kacial differences Alcoholic evolution Is 

 parental intemperance the cause of filial degeneration? Opium The 

 sobriety of South Europeans The comparative drunkenness of 

 North Europeans The excessive drunkenness of some savages The 

 sobriety of others Intemperance in the ancient world Climate 

 Potency of beverages Environment The memory of past disasters 

 Civilization Education The parallel between diseases and 

 narcotics. 



314. ZYMOTIC disease is not the only selective agent of 

 elimination among civilized men. Certain narcotics are 

 causes of an elimination quite as great and every whit as 

 selective as that caused by any disease. Like diseases 

 narcotics choose for elimination individuals of a certain type, 

 and for survival individuals of the opposite type. But the 

 choice made by narcotics is determined primarily not by the 

 physical but by the mental characters of the person selected. 

 The man who dies of alcohol or opium is not necessarily one 

 who is especially liable to be injured physically by excessive 

 indulgence. He is always one to whom the sensations 

 produced by excessive drinking are especially delightful. 

 His drinking habits and, therefore, his elimination, are 

 determined, not by peculiarities of body, but by peculiarities 

 of mind. Strictly speaking, therefore, the study of the effects 

 produced by narcotics should be deferred till we have con- 

 sidered the phenomena of mind. But from the point of 

 view of heredity the analogy between narcotics and diseases 

 is so close that it is more convenient to deal with them at 

 once, especially as narcotics usually kill by producing disease. 

 315. It is hardly worth while, indeed it is hardly possible 

 to produce direct evidence of the precise magnitude of the 

 mortality caused by alcohol, the most widely used of all 



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