Confessions of an English opium-eater / [Thomas De Quincey].

  • Thomas De Quincey
Date:
1822
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Confessions of an English opium-eater / [Thomas De Quincey]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    enjoyments of alcohol, I take it for granted, That those eat now, who never ate before ; And those who always ate, now eat the more. Indeed the fascinating powers of opium are admitted, even by medical writers, who are its greatest enemies: thus, for instance, Awsiter, apothecary to Greenwich-hospital, in his ‘ Essay on the Effects of Opium,” (published in the year 1763), when attempt- ing to explain, why Mead had not been sufficiently explicit on the properties, coun- - teragents, &c. of this drug, expresses him- self in the following mysterious terms, (Qavavta cuvetoiot): “ perhaps he thought the subject of too delicate a nature to be made common; and as many people might then indiscriminately use it, it would take from that necessary fear and caution, which should prevent their experiencing the ex- tensive power of this drug: for there are many properties in it, if universally known, that would habituate the use, and make it more in request with us than the Turks themselves: the result of which knowledge,” he adds,
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