THE CAUSES OF DRUNKENNESS 79 



assume that men are drunken or sober accordingly 

 as they do, or do not, exercise self-control. It 

 does not enter their minds that a man may be 

 temperate, and yet exercise no self-control ; in other 

 words, that he may be sober because deep 

 indulgence is not agreeable to him. Self-control 

 is not alleged to be a principal factor in abstinence 

 from, or moderation in, the use of tobacco. It is 

 manifest, indeed, that most smokers indulge to near 

 the limit of their capacity for enjoyment. The 

 nicotine habit, as a rule, does very little harm to 

 health, and, therefore, as regards it, self-control is 

 not vehemently insisted on. But deep drinking 

 does very much harm, and therefore self-control is 

 urged, and rightly, with vehemence. But because 

 it is thus urged, the mistake is made of supposing 

 that it is the only, or the principal, factor in the 

 causation of sobriety. As a fact, self-control is the 

 principal factor only in those exceptional cases in 

 which the moderate drinker, or abstainer, has both 

 the craving for drunkenness and the opportunity of 

 gratifying it. 



Let the reader judge for himself. He — I 

 apologise for the implied doubt in advance — is 

 probably neither an abstainer nor a drunkard, but, 

 like most people of the better classes,^ a moderate 



1 The reason for alluding to the " betterj classes " will be apparent 



presently. 



