8o A STUDY IN HEREDITY 



drinker. Is he, then, temperate only because he 

 exercises self-control? Does he answer "Yes"? 

 Then, from the bottom of my heart, I pity him. 

 Continually tormented by his unsatisfied craving 

 for drunkenness, he must indeed be a miserable 

 being — a being only one degree less miserable than 

 an actual drunkard. I, most certainly, am not 

 constituted as he is. Never in my life have I 

 had to resist the craving for alcohol. I am 

 temperate, not because I have resisted temptation, 

 but through a fortunate lack of it. I have not what 

 doctors call the alcohol diathesis. I am sure most 

 sober men are constituted as I am, not as my reader 

 says he is. They can, as workmen say, " take a 

 glass or leave it." Most people with whom I am 

 brought into social contact are temperate manifestly 

 without effort. A little alcohol satisfies them, more 

 would awaken sensations which, on the whole, are 

 unpleasant. A certain section of moderate drinkers 

 — who generally drink somewhat more — would 

 doubtless enjoy deeper indulgence, but the 

 craving is not so strong as to balance their dislike 

 to the consequences. A remainder so delight in 

 alcohol, are so driven to it, as by the force of a 

 tempest, that, ignoring the remote consequences, 

 they seek immediate satisfaction and are in- 

 temperate. 



I am tolerably sure, in spite of my reader's hasty 



