158 TOBACCO: ITS HISTORY. 



The moral influence of tobacco is not a light 

 matter. That principle within it which imparts 

 electric action to the brain, and therefore to the 

 whole system by the nerves, must necessarily be 

 a moral agent for good or evil. 



That wise monarch James L, who, gude mon, 

 was hardly quarrelsome on any subject but to- 

 bacco, to which he had a mortal hatred, as we 

 have seen, used to say, in his hours of relaxation, 

 that this plant was 



" the lively image and pattern of hell ; for that it had, by 

 allusion, in it all the parts and vices of this world whereby 

 hell may be gained, to wit, — 1st, it was a smoke — so are 

 the vanities of this world ; 2ndly, it delights those who 

 take it — so do the pleasures of the world make men loth 

 to leave them ; 3rdly, it maketh men drunken and light 

 in the head — so doth the vanity of the world — men are 

 drunken therewith ; 4thly, he that taketh tobacco saith 

 he cannot leave it, it heiuitcheth him — even so the plea- 

 sures of the world make men loth to leave them, they 

 are so enchanted for the most part with them ; and 

 further, besides all this, 5thly, it is hke hell in the very 



when we know what it was in past times — a raging fashion 

 prevalent in places whence it is now most rigorously ex- 

 cluded, and adopted for the most part with personal views, 

 which no longer influence the public mind. If the calcula- 

 tion could be made, it would be found that there are fewer 

 smokers in England now— in proportion to the increased 

 population — than there were fifty years ago. 



