CHAPTER VIII.
De Quincey’s Life rather than his Writings the Best Evidence of the Effect of Opium upon him.—Disapproval of his Manner of Treatment of the Subject in his “Confessions.”—From First to Last the Effect of Opium is to Produce Unhappiness.—The Difference between the Effect of the Drug taken Hypodermically and Otherwise Explained.—The Various Effects of Opium, Stimulative and Narcotic, Described.—The Effect of my First Dose at Beginning of Habit.—Remarks of De Quincey on his First Dose.—My own Remarks as to First Dose.—Difference between Opium and Liquor.—Stimulation is Followed by Collapse.—Melancholy from Beginning.—Nervousness and Distraction of the Intellectual Powers.—Sleeplessness.—Different and Peculiar Influences of the Drug Detailed.—Pressure upon the Brain from Excessive Use of Opium.—Distress in the Epigastrium.—The Working of the Brain Impeded.
The life of De Quincey, as gathered from his constant and unguarded, and therefore sincere, expressions of his wretched condition, which he made to others while living, shows the effect opium had upon him much more truthfully than do his writings. His extravagant eulogy of opium, and almost wildly-gay and lively manner of treating such a sardonically solemn subject as the effects of opium, though under the anomalous title, “The Pleasures of Opium,” show the man to have been morally depraved,[1] and utterly regardless of the influence of his writings. The result of the opium habit, first, last, and always, is to bring hopeless unhappiness.
I began taking opium by having it administered through a hypodermic syringe, as the reader is aware. The effect, taking it in this way, differs somewhat from that which follows taking it in the usual way. It is more pleasant, ethereal, and less gross, I may say. It had not previously been possible for me to use morphia in the usual way. I had tried it to relieve myself in a season of severe headaches, and it had given me such a distressing pain in my stomach that I dropped it as a useless remedy, and tried it no more. Taking it per hypodermic injection, it did not seem to come so directly in contact with the sensitive part of my stomach; and there was, therefore, no impediment in the way of my taking it in this manner.
Although the effect of morphia taken hypodermically is more pure, and perhaps more forcible for the time being, its force is expended much more quickly than when taken in the customary way. The effect of a dose of morphia—that is, its immediate and exhilarating effect or influence—may often last but a very short time, and rarely longer than three or four hours, but the ultimate and narcotic effect does not leave the system until twenty-four hours have elapsed. This is an effect in morphia that can be relied on. In stating that the exhilarating effect may last three or four hours, I mean that it may do this in the first stages of the habit. Of course, all I have to say just now refers to the first stages. But to begin with the second dose, the first having been too heavy, and nearly burst me.
The second dose happened to be the proper quantity, and had the legitimate effect. As I have not the slightest doubt that I was suffering as much, and was just as sensitive, I might (though I will not) expatiate with Mr. De Quincey to the following effect: “Heavens! what a revulsion! what an upheaving, from its lowest depths, of the inner spirit! what an apocalypse of the world within me! That my pains had vanished, was now a trifle in my eyes; this negative effect was swallowed up in the immensity of those positive effects which had opened before me—in the abyss of divine enjoyment thus suddenly revealed. Here was a panacea for all human woes; here was the secret of happiness, about which philosophers had disputed for so many ages, at once discovered; happiness might now be bought for a penny, and carried in the waistcoat pocket; portable ecstasies might be had corked up in a pint bottle; and peace of mind sent down in gallons by the mail-coach. But, if I talk in this way, the reader will think I am laughing; and I can assure him that no one will laugh long who deals much with opium; its pleasures even are of a grave and solemn complexion; and in his happiest state, the opium eater cannot present himself in the character of L’Allegro; even then he speaks and thinks as becomes Il Penseroso. Nevertheless, I have a very reprehensible way of jesting at times in the midst of my own misery; and, unless when I am checked by some more powerful feelings, I am afraid I shall be guilty of this indecent practice, even in these annals of suffering or enjoyment. The reader must allow a little to my infirm nature in this respect; and with a few indulgences of that sort, I shall endeavor to be as grave, if not drowsy, as fits a theme like opium, so anti-mercurial as it really is, and so drowsy as it is falsely reputed.” I will say, and admit, however, that this second dose of mine highly stimulated me; that I retired from the doctor’s presence in an extremely sentimental condition of complacency and self-assurance, with a partly-defined feeling that the world had injured me; but that I did not care particularly; that the remainder of my life I could live alone and without it very comfortably. Opium does not intoxicate, as liquor, even at the beginning of its use; it does not deprive one of reason or judgment, but, while under its influence, it makes one more sanguine and hopeful.
The next day after taking this first dose, as I may call it (though second in reality), I was physically wilted and mentally collapsed, and felt a kind of nervous headache whenever I stirred the least from perfect quietness. I was unfit to do any work, a thumping, distressing headache and mental distraction, with nothing but a shaken and nervously exhausted system to withstand it, followed quickly and overpoweringly upon the least exertion. I found myself in wretched plight, and could have exclaimed in the language of our ever-beloved poet:
“I ’gin to be aweary of the sun,
And wish the estate o’ the world were now undone.”
It was my experience straight along that for every stimulation I had a corresponding depression. I confess that the drug did stimulate me, and highly enough, but there was always an attending sickishness, and the general tenor of the stimulation was to produce melancholy rather than a healthy cheerfulness of spirit. This melancholy seemed a relaxation, which the mind and feelings could lay back and enjoy sometimes, but the appearance of a mortal and intruder on the scene would throw a person into a deplorable state of irritability and confusion.[2] The stimulation bred nervousness very fast, and the distraction of the intellectual forces was one of the first and worst consequences and devastations experienced.
After I had come to take the drug daily, I often passed sleepless nights, the brain in uncontrollable action during the whole night. Having started it, I could not stop it at pleasure, and I was then but a novice in the art of opium taking. Yet I do not know, either, but that, had I taken it at any time during the day then, the result would have been the same, as I was still very susceptible to its influence, which, in its shattering effects on the nervous system, extended over the period of twenty-four hours.