really only a breakdown of the system of control. The situ- 

 ation is somewhat similar to the case of a runaway horse. 

 The horse is no stronger, but is much more dangerous, 

 when it is running away than when it is held firmly by the 

 reins in the hands of a skilled driver. 



A long series of experiments, of which the most recent 

 have been carried out by Prof. F. G. Bene- .. , . « 

 diet, in the Carnegie Nutrition Laboratory, Fffi . 

 have made it abundantly clear that even 

 very moderate doses of alcohol tend seriously to interfere 

 with the working of the nervous machinery of the body and 

 to make its reactions slow and clumsy. Of eleven different 

 tests of efficiency made by Professor Benedict, all but two 

 showed a decrease in quickness or accuracy of from 3 to 46 per 

 cent, in the persons who had taken alcohol. The relation of 

 the use of alcoholic liquors to industrial accidents is well rec- 

 ognized; and the attitude of public service corporations and 

 other large employers of labor toward alcohol offers eloquent 

 testimony to its harmful influence. No one who has ever 

 been a steady user of alcohol is accepted as a member of an 

 arctic expedition, and alcoholic drinks are never used by 

 those engaged in these enterprises. Such persons have been 

 found by experience to be lacking both in efficiency and in 

 the ability to endure the necessary hardships. 



Xor are the results of the use of alcoholic liquors limited 

 to a temporary interference with mental and A1 , 1 

 physical powers. Exhaustive studies of the , , 



death rate among abstainers and non-ab- n , p 

 stainers conducted by English and American 

 life insurance companies have yielded most significant results. 

 One such recent investigation made by forty-three American 

 life insurance companies showed that the death rate of those 

 who used alcohol steadily and freely was 86 per cent, above 

 the normal, while the rate among steady moderate drinkers 

 (persons taking the equivalent of two glasses of beer or 

 one glass of whiskey a day) was 18 per cent, above the normal. 



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