Defence of Dr. Sewall's work on the pathology of drunkenness, and his drawings of the human stomach, as affected by the use of alcoholic drinks, from health to death by delirium tremens.

Edward C. Delevan

Date:: [1843]

Credit: Defence of Dr. Sewall's work on the pathology of drunkenness, and his drawings of the human stomach, as affected by the use of alcoholic drinks, from health to death by delirium tremens. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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to meet Doctor Sewall, by which you arrive at your conclusion, in a way much more satis- factory yourself, lhan convincing- to me. live attributes which render it the true and ap- propriate symbol of the diseased stomach un- der the incipient action of alcoholic poison, ls Doct. Sewall affirms it to be ? Or how can You say, I take it, this (No. 2) is intend- as cd to represent a stomach slightly injected | you, who profess not to know^wbat effect alco- with blood. It is probable, though I do not know of any experiments on man directly prov- ing it, that alcoholic drinks, when introduced into the stomach in moderate quantities, pro- duce injection, and redness of the mucous membrane, similar to that produced by food. And you further say, The injection of the stomach during digestion, (and you add, though, as you admit, without the knowledge of any experiments to authorize the addition,) or from the action of alcoholic drinks, is not a state of incipient disease, or inflammation, any more than the suffusion of the cheeks in blushing, is a state of commencing erysipelas. Now, if you do not know of any experi- ments that iro to prove that the effects of food, and alcoholic drinks on the stomach are simi- lar, (and you affirm that you do not,) how can you affirm, that because the former is not a state of incipient disease, that therefore the latter is not? Now, to deduce from the fact, that alco- holic drinks produce an injection and red- ness of its mucous membrane, similar to that produced by food, a fact, the truth of which, though probable, you admit, you know of no experiments on man directly proving it. I say, to deduce from this unknown similarity of effects bctween/oo(/ and alcohol on the sto- mach, that the state induced by the latter, as well as the former, is a healthy state, seems to me to.be a kind of a priori reasoning, very similar to that of proving, that because plate No. 2 was not founded on a series of obser- vations, (the verything on which it was found- ed,) that consequently it must be founded on a priori reasoning. As, however, the rea- soning i.i tiic one case is known to be untrue, it is not very certain that it is not so in the other; at any rate, the reasoning from premi- ses not known to be true, seems to me suf- ficient to take from it all scientific valu< You seem to think that plate No. 2, al- lowances being made for coarseness of exe- cution, and defect 6f finish, would, answer as the symbol of the healthy stomach during di- gestion. Now, I ask, how do you know that the very coarseness of execution and defect of finish, to which you allude, as a defect in this print, for which allowance must be made when considered as the symbol of the healthy holic drinks in small quantities do produce on the stomach, consider yourself better qualifi- ed to inform the public what effect they do not produce, than Doctor Sewall is, who professes to know, and whose knowledge he affirms to be derived from pathological researches for upwards of thirty years, (about the period of your entire life,) during which (he says) I have enjoyed many opportunities of in- specting the stomach of the drunkard after dealh, in the various stages and degrees of in- ebriation, and who adds, these drawings will be found to present a pretty accurate de- lineation of the principal morbid changes pro- duced upon that organ by intemperance— changes which are eminently worthy of being brought to the view of the unsuspecting, and which I should hope might have some effect in deterring the temperate from the use of alco- holic poison. I am aware, as you affirm, that the transient and changeful suffusion of blood in blush- ing is not a state of commencing erysipelas, or of any other cutaneous disease. But that it follows from this that the permanent rum blossoms on the nose of so many of Doctor Sewall's temperate drinkers, is not a state of inceptive disease, is what I cannot assent to; for if any analogy is to be traced between the stomach of such a temperate drinker and any tint on the human countenance, it is to be traced between the rum blossoms stereotyped on the nose by alcohol, and not the transient blush on the maiden cheek of modesty—a blush, which, indeed, suddenly changes the hue on such a cheek, but, be it observed, as suddenly vanishes; whereas, the rum blos- soms on such a nose remain as unchanged as the nose on which they flourish; which nose carries them about, displaying on all occa- sions, in all weathers, and in all seasons, its livid rugged surface before the averted eye of the abstinent beholder. In acquainting your readers with the im- mense labors necessary to arrive at any satis- factory conclusion on this point by means of direct observation, you remark, bow raic it was, until within a few years, to find any person who had practised abstinence from all alcoholic drinks. This, as seems to me, is a pretty good reason why the difference be-

Defence of Dr. Sewall's work on the pathology of drunkenness, and his drawings of the human stomach, as affected by the use of alcoholic drinks, from health to death by delirium tremens.

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