78 GENERAL SCIENCE 



their use. Even the reputable physician who has a full 

 understanding of the physical condition of the patient should 

 be exceedingly cautious in prescribing any habit-forming 

 drugs 1 . The use of medicines at all times is chiefly for the 

 purpose of bringing about conditions of the body favorable 

 for its recuperative powers. Drugs afford at the best but a 

 negligible amount of energy or nourishment for the body, 

 and contribute nothing to the store of "life" as it exists in 

 the protoplasm of the cells. 



No discussion of the abuse of various drugs and prepara- 

 tions to benumb the nerve centres, and produce an unnatural, 

 unconscious state, is complete without mention of the bless- 

 ings to humanity in the use of anesthetics. The use of the 

 vapors of ether and of chloroform to produce insensibility 

 to pain in the extraction of teeth by dentists, and as used 

 extensively by physicians and surgeons in their practice, 

 dates back to the years 1844-1847. The freedom from 

 torture under the knife of the surgeon, and the relief given in 

 times of excruciating pain by administering an anaesthetic, 

 can be fully appreciated only by those who have had some 

 experience. The elimination of the exhaustion from endur- 

 ance of suffering, and the avoidance of the shock to the 

 nerve centres resulting from great pain, make likely a 

 more prompt rally and a more speedy recovery than other- 

 wise would occur. It must not be overlooked that adminis- 

 tering an anaesthetic is always attended by risk to life, and 

 that preferably it should be given by an experienced physi- 

 cian only. 



1 In the gth Revision of the U.S. Pharmacopoeia (Sept., 1916), an authority 

 on medicinal preparations used in this country and recognized as a standard 

 in all courts of law, no use of whisky, brandy, or wines as medicines is 

 included. Alcohol has an industrial use as a solvent of various substances 

 which have medicinal value, but such preparations are used in spite of their 

 alcoholic content rather than because of it. 



