One fact attendant on
habitual drinking stands out so prominently that none can call it in question.
It is that of the steady growth of appetite. There are exceptions, as in the
action of nearly every rule; but the almost invariable result of the habit we have
mentioned, is, as we have said, a steady growth of appetite for the stimulant
imbibed. That this is in consequence of certain morbid changes in the physical
condition produced by the alcohol itself, will hardly be questioned by anyone
who has made himself acquainted with the various functional and organic
derangements which invariably follow the continued introduction of this
substance into the body.
But it is to the fact
itself, not to its cause, that we now wish to direct your attention. The man who
is satisfied at first with a single glass of wine at dinner, finds, after a while,
that appetite asks for a little more and, in time, a second glass is conceded.
The increase of desire may be very slow, but it goes on surely until, in the
end, a whole bottle will scarcely suffice, with far too many, to meet its
imperious demands. It is the same regarding the use of every other form of
alcoholic drink.
Now, there are men so
constituted that they are able, for a long series of years, or even for a whole
lifetime, to hold this appetite within a certain limit of indulgence. To say
"So far, and no farther." They suffer ultimately from physical
ailments, which surely follow the prolonged contact of alcoholic poison with
the delicate structures of the body, many of a painful character, and shorten the
term of their natural lives but still, they can drink without an increase of
appetite so great as to reach an overmastering degree. They do not become
abandoned drunkards.
No man safe who drinks. ----------------------
But no man who begins the use of alcohol in
any form can tell what, in the end, is going to be its effect on his body or
mind. Thousands and tens of thousands, once wholly unconscious of danger from
this source, go down yearly into drunkards' graves. There is no standard by
which anyone can measure the latent evil forces in his inherited nature. He may
have from ancestors, near or remote, an unhealthy moral tendency or physical
diathesis, to which the peculiarly disturbing influence of alcohol will give
the morbid condition in which it will find its disastrous life. That such
results follow the use of alcohol in a large number of cases, is now a
well-known fact in the history of inebriation. The subject of alcoholism, with
the mental and moral causes leading thereto, have attracted a great deal of
earnest attention. Physicians, superintendents of inebriate and lunatic
asylums, prison-keepers, legislators and philanthropists have been observing
and studying its many sad and terrible phases, and recording results and
opinions. While differences are held on some points, as, for instance, whether
drunkenness is a disease for which, after it has been established, the
individual ceases to be responsible, and should be subject to restraint and treatment,
as for lunacy or fever, a crime to be punished, or a sin to be repented of and
healed by the Physician of souls, all agree that there is an inherited or
acquired mental and nervous condition with many, which renders any use of
alcohol exceedingly dangerous.
The point we wish to take
with you is, that no man can know, until he has used alcoholic drinks for a
certain period, whether he has or has not this hereditary or acquired physical
or mental condition and that if it should exist, a discovery of the fact may
come too late.
Dr. D.G. Dodge, late
Superintendent of the New York State Inebriate Asylum, speaking of the causes
leading to intemperance, after stating his belief that it is a transmissible
disease, like "scrofula, gout or consumption," says:
"There are men who
have an organization, which may be termed an alcoholic idiosyncrasy with them
the latent desire for stimulants, if indulged, soon leads to habits of
intemperance, and eventually to a morbid appetite, which has all the
characteristics of a diseased condition of the system, which the patient,
unassisted, is powerless to relieve since the weakness of the will that led to
the disease obstructs its removal.
"Again, we find in
another class of persons, those who have had healthy parents, and have been
educated and accustomed to good social influences, moral and social, but whose
temperament and physical constitution are such, that, when they once indulge in
the use of stimulants, which they find pleasurable, they continue to habitually
indulge till they cease to be moderate, and become excessive drinkers. A
depraved appetite is established, that leads them on slowly, but surely, to
destruction."