PHYSIOLOGICAL ACTION OF THR METHYL AND ALLIED SERIES. 417 



seiousness altogether. The leading peciiliarity of the action is the slowness 

 with which those centres which suj)ply the heart and diaphragm with power 

 are affected. In this lies the comparative safety of alcohol ; acting evcnlj' and 

 slowly, the different systems of organs fall together, with the exception of 

 the two on which the continuance of mere animal life depends. But for this 

 every deeply intoxicated man would die. 



The alcohols arc strictly anaesthetics ; and indeed the first published case 

 of surgical operation under anaesthetic sleep was performed, in 1S39, by Dr. 

 Collier on a person who was rendered insensible by breathing the fumes of 

 alcohol. But the anaesthesia is not commendable ; it is too slow and too 

 prolonged. Methylic alcohol, if it could bo entirely purified and made inodo- 

 rous, might be used, and with methylic ether it would be one of the safest of 

 agents ; but as yet its inhalation is disagreeable. 



The difference of action of the alcohols, as they ascend in the series and as 

 the carbon increases, is most striking. The slowness of action, the prolonga- 

 tion of action step by step, from the lighter to the heavier compounds, is a 

 fact as definite as any in physiology. Curious is it also that neither 

 the methylic nor the ethylie alcohols produce those tremors in the inferior 

 animals which we recognize and speciallj- name from their occuiTence in 

 man ; while the butylic and the amylic most effectively call them forth. 

 Considering how much of the heavier alcohols is distributed for consumption, 

 especially among the lower orders, I think it is possible that the heavier 

 fluids may also be the cause of delirium tremens in the human subject, as they 

 are frequently the cause of that continued coldness, lassitude, and depression 

 which follow the well-known dinner Avith " bad wine." 



Speaking honestly, I cannot, by any argument yet presented to me, admit the 

 alcohols through anj' gate that might distinguish them as separate from other 

 chemical bodies. I can no more accept them as foods than I can chloroform, 

 or ether, or methylal. That they produce a temporary excitement is true ; 

 but as theii- general action is quickly to reduce animal heat, I cannot see 

 how they can supply animal force. I see clearly how they reduce animal 

 power, and can show a reason for using them in order to stop physical or 

 to stupify mental pain ; but that they give strength, ?. e. that they supply 

 material for construction of fine tissue, or throw force into tissues supplied by 

 other material, must be an eri'or as solemn as it is widespread. 



The true place of the alcohols is clear; they are agreeable temporary shrouds. 

 The savage, with the mansions of his soul unfurnislicd, buries his restless 

 energy under their shadow. The civilized man, overburdened with mental 

 labour, or with engrossing care, seeks the same shade ; biit it is shade, after 

 all, in which, in exact proportion as he seeks it, the seeker retires from per- 

 fect natural life. To search for force in alcohol is, to my mind, eqiiivalent to 

 the act of seeking for the sun in subterranean gloom until all is night. 



As yet alcohol, the most commonly summoned of accredited remedies, has 

 never been properly tested to meet human diseases. I mean by this, that it 

 has never been tested as alcohol of a given chemical composition, of a given 

 purity, and in given measures. Wines, beers, spirits, arc mixtures — com- 

 pounds of alcohols, and compounds of alcohols with ethers and other organic 

 substances. It is time, therefore, now for the learned to be precise respecting 

 alcohol, and for the learned to learn the positive meaning of one of their 

 most potent instruments for good or for evil; whereupon I think they will 

 place the alcohol series in the position I have placed it, even though their 

 prejudices in regard to it are, even as mine are, by moderate habit and 

 confessed inconsistency, in its favour. 



