The physiology of temperance & total abstinence : being an examination of the effects of the excessive, moderate, and occasional use of alcoholic liquors on the healthy human system / by William B. Carpenter.

Date:: 1853

Credit: The physiology of temperance & total abstinence : being an examination of the effects of the excessive, moderate, and occasional use of alcoholic liquors on the healthy human system / by William B. Carpenter. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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$1 mg character of the sane mind of Man, is considerably weakened, so that the heightened imagination and enlivened fancy have more unrestricted exercise; so, whilst ideas and images succeed each other in the mind with marvellous . readiness, no single train of thought can be carried out with the same continuity as in the state of perfect sobriety; and the passions and emotions are more easily aroused, and are loss capable of being restrained by an effort of the will. Iix all this we see that, whilst there is an exaltation of the automatic activity of the mind, there is with this a weakening of that power of self-direction which is the source of our ' i'reedom and responsibility; and such is precisely the nature of the incipient stage of Insanity. 10. If no more liquor be taken than is sufficient to pro- iluce this condition, it gradually subsides, and is followed by I a state of the opposite character ; the appetite, the digestive ])o\ver, and the organic functions in general, being lowered iu activity, the skin becoming dry, the secretions diminished, Hie spirits depressed, and the power of mental exertion for a lime impaired. For this condition, sleep with abstinence (not merely from a renewal of the stimulus, but from more I ibod than the stomach really demands) are the most effectual I remedies. 11. If the first dose of Alcohol be such as to produce more potent effects, or if (as in ordinary intoxication) it be re- ! newed after the first effects have already been manifested, the iieco7id stage is induced, in which not merely the intellectual but the sensorial apparatus is disturbed. The voluntary control over the direction of the thoughts is completely lost, and the excitement has more the character of delirium: the ideas becoming confused, the reasoning powers dis- ■ ordered, a,nd the passions more vehement. At the same time, giddiness, double vision, ringing in the ears, and vari- ous other sensory illusions, occur; the muscular movements ■ become tremulous and unsteady, the voice thick, the eyes vacant, and the face commonly pale. There is now'an entire loss of the power of self-direction ; so that the indi- vidual who has thus abandoned himself to the domination of his passions, and has suspended his capacity of reasoning, is truly insane for the time, and is dangerous both to himself$