Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Morphinomania. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![becomes talkative. In short, the doctor is only to be found in bis normal condition after an injection. The numbing and narcotic effects of morphia do not come on until an hour or two after the injection; but the first influence which it exerts upon the body is shown in an increase of power and in calming the nervous system. The description which has been given of the way in which the mor- phia habit is induced applies only to those countries (let us hope England is one) in which the vice is comparatively rare and only secretly indulged in. When it becomes more prevalent the drug is used for the most trivial reasons, or even simply to produce a condition of intoxication, rernicions as alcohol is when used for this purpose, it is not as bad as opium ; for, as an American writer says— The appetite for strong liquors may subside and then slumber for months, or until waked up again, as when a stray spark has accidentally dropped into a ])owder magazine, thus affording space for an attempted reform : opium allows no slumber- ings, no intervals, no baitings. Now what are the ill effects which morphia produces ? Persons who have become morphia habitues remain free from trouble for variable periods of time. Some begin to suffer seriously in a few months, others only after years. This difference depends rather upon individual peculiarities than upon the quantity of the drug which is taken. But sooner or later all degenerate, both bodily and mentally. They become pale, sallow, and emaciated; their appetite is greatly diminished, and the digestive processes are disordered; sleeplessness sets in in spite of their morphia, and what rest they do get is disturbed by horrible dreams. They become sterile, and lose their energy and interest in life, while all their thoughts are con- centrated on their morphia. If they have been accustomed to inject the drug subcutaneously, those parts of the body which are within reach of the syringe are one mass of sores, so that they are sometimes at a loss to find a sound spot where they can tolerate an injection. These physical troubles are bad enough, but the moral change eclipses them. Xo one who has not had experience of these melan- choly cases can form an idea of the moral perversion which this habit produces. ‘ The constant and increasing use of the drug—for this is the rule—at length enfeebles the will and makes the man a moral paralytic, of all spectacles the most pitiable this side the grave ’ {Opium-Smoking and Opium-Eating, by George Shearer, M.D., 1881). Untruth is a second nature with them. ‘ As a rule, no one thinks of trusting to the word of an opium-smoker, his character is wholly unreliable ’ (George Shearer) ; the same may certainly be said of the morphia habitue. Levinstein, one of the greatest German authorities on the subject, says : ‘ Educated, intelligent men and women, other^vise deserving of respect, descend to lying.’ Even De Quincey, though he denies moral perversion, admits that opium renders a man incapable of doing what he knows to be right. ‘ The](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22468183_0007.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
