On alcohol : a course of six Cantor Lectures delivered before the Society of Arts / by Benjamin W. Richardson.

  • Richardson, Benjamin Ward, 1828-1896.
Date:
1875
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On alcohol : a course of six Cantor Lectures delivered before the Society of Arts / by Benjamin W. Richardson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    TEANSMITTED DISEASE. The most solemn fact of all bearing upon these mental aber- rations produced by alcohol, and upon the physical not less than the mental, is, that the mischief inflicted on man by his own act and deed cannot fail to be transferred to those who descend from him, and who are thus irresponsibly afflicted. Amongst the many inscrutable designs of nature none is more manifest than this, that physical vice, like physical feature and physical virtue, descends in line. It is, I say, a solemn reflection for every man and every woman, that whatever we do to ourselves so as to modify our own physical conforma- tion and mental type, for good or for evil, is transmitted to generations that have yet to be. Not one of the transmitted wrongs, physical or mental, is more certainly passed on to those yet imborn than the wrongs which are inflicted by alcohol. We, therefore, who live to reform the present age in this respect, are stretching forth our powers to the next; to purify it, to beautify it, and to lead it towards that milennial happiness and blessed- ness, which, in the fulness of time, shall visit even the earth, making it, under an increasing light of knowledge, a garden of human delight, a Paradise regained. SUMMAEY. In summary of what has past, I may be briefness itself. This chemical substance, alcohol, an artificial product devised by man for his purposes, and in many things that lie outside his organism a useful substance, is neither a food nor a drink suitable for his natural demands. Its application as an agent that shall enter the living organisation is properly limited by the learning and skill possessed by the physician, a learning that itself admits of being recast and revised in many important details, and perhaps in principles. If this agent do really for the moment cheer the weary, and impart a flush of transient pleasure to the unwearied who crave for mirth, its influence (doubtful even in these modest and moderate degrees) is an infinitesimal advantage, by the side of an infinity of evil for which there is no compensation, and no human cure.