Nearly all diseases have their predisposing causes. The same thing may be said of the intemperate use of distilled spirits. It will, therefore, be useful to point out the different employments, situations, and conditions of the body and mind, which predispose to the love of those liquors, and to accompany them with directions to prevent persons being ignorantly and undesignedly seduced into the habitual and destructive use of them.
1. Labourers bear with great difficulty, long intervals between their meals. To enable them to support the waste of their strength, their stomachs should be constantly, but moderately stimulated by aliment, and this is best done by their eating four or five times in a day during the seasons of great bodily exertion. The food at this time should be solid, consisting chiefly of salted meat. The vegetables used with it, should possess some activity, or they should be made savoury by a mixture of spices. Onions and garlic are of a most cordial nature. They composed a part of the diet which enabled the Israelites to endure, in a warm climate, the heavy tasks imposed upon them by their Egyptian masters; and they were eaten, Horace and Virgil tell us, by the Roman farmers, to repair the waste of their strength, by the toils of harvest. There are likewise certain sweet substances, which support the body under the pressure of labour. The negroes in the West-Indies become strong, and even fat, by drinking the juice of the sugar cane, in the season of grinding it. The Jewish soldiers were invigorated by occasionally eating raisins and figs. A bread composed of wheat flour, molasses, and ginger (commonly called gingerbread), taken in small quantities during the day, is happily calculated to obviate the debility induced upon the body by constant labour. All these substances, whether of an animal or vegetable nature, lessen the desire, as well as the necessity, for cordial drinks, and impart equable and durable strength to every part of the system.
2. Valetudinarians, especially those who are afflicted with diseases of the stomach and bowels, are very apt to seek relief from ardent spirits. Let such people be cautious how they make use of this dangerous remedy. I have known many men and women of excellent characters and principles, who have been betrayed, by occasional doses of gin and brandy, into a love of those liquors, and have afterwards fallen sacrifices to their fatal effects. The different preparations of opium are much more safe and efficacious than distilled cordials of any kind, in flatulent or spasmodic affections of the stomach and bowels. So great is the danger of contracting a love for distilled liquors, by accustoming the stomach to their stimulus, that as few medicines as possible should be given in spiritous vehicles, in chronic diseases. A physician, of great eminence and uncommon worth, who died towards the close of the last century, in London, in taking leave of a young physician of this city, who had finished his studies under his patronage, impressed this caution with peculiar force upon him, and lamented at the same time, in pathetic terms, that he had innocently made many sots, by prescribing brandy and water in stomach complaints. It is difficult to tell how many persons have been destroyed by those physicians who have adopted Dr. Brown's indiscriminate practice in the use of stimulating remedies, the most popular of which is ardent spirits, but, it is well known, several of them have died of intemperance in this city, since the year 1790. They were probably led to it, by drinking brandy and water, to relieve themselves from the frequent attacks of debility and indisposition, to which the labours of a physician expose him, and for which rest, fasting, a gentle purge, or weak diluting drinks would have been safe and more certain cures.
None of these remarks are intended to preclude the use of spirits in the low state of short, or what are called acute diseases, for, in such cases, they produce their effects too soon to create a habitual desire for them.
3. Some people, from living in countries subject to intermitting fevers, endeavour to fortify themselves against them, by taking two or three wine-glasses of bitters, made with spirits, every day. There is great danger of contracting habits of intemperance from this practice. Besides, this mode of preventing intermittents is far from being a certain one. A much better security against them, is a tea-spoonful of the jesuits bark, taken every morning during a sickly season. If this safe and excellent medicine cannot be had, a gill or half a pint of a strong watery infusion of centaury, camomile, wormwood, or rue, mixed with a little of the calamus of our meadows, may be taken every morning, with nearly the same advantage as the jesuits bark. Those persons who live in a sickly country, and cannot procure any of the preventives of autumnal fevers which have been mentioned, should avoid the morning and evening air; should kindle fires in their houses, on damp days, and in cool evenings, throughout the whole summer; and put on winter clothes, about the first week in September. The last part of these directions applies only to the inhabitants of the middle states.
4. Men who follow professions, which require constant exercise of the faculties of their minds, are very apt to seek relief, by the use of ardent spirits, from the fatigue which succeeds great mental exertions. To such persons, it may be a discovery to know, that TEA is a much better remedy for that purpose. By its grateful and gentle stimulus, it removes fatigue, restores the excitement of the mind, and invigorates the whole system. I am no advocate for the excessive use of tea. When taken too strong, it is hurtful, especially to the female constitution; but when taken of a moderate degree of strength, and in moderate quantities, with sugar and cream, or milk, I believe it is, in general, innoxious, and at all times to be preferred to ardent spirits, as a cordial for studious men. The late Anthony Benezet, one of the most laborious schoolmasters I ever knew, informed me, he had been prevented from the love of spiritous liquors, by acquiring a love for tea in early life. Three or four cups, taken in an afternoon, carried off the fatigue of a whole day's labour in his school. This worthy man lived to be seventy-one years of age, and died of an acute disease, with the full exercise of all the faculties of his mind. But the use of tea counteracts a desire for distilled spirits, during great bodily, as well as mental exertions. Of this, Captain Forest has furnished us with a recent and remarkable proof, in his History of a Voyage from Calcutta, to the Marqui Archipelago. “I have always observed (says this ingenious mariner) when sailors drink TEA, it weans them from the thoughts of drinking strong liquors, and pernicious grog; and with this, they are soon contented. Not so with whatever will intoxicate, be it what it will. This has always been my remark. I therefore always encourage it, without their knowing why.”
5. Women have sometimes been led to seek relief from what is called breeding sickness, by the use of ardent spirits. A little gingerbread, or biscuit, taken occasionally, so as to prevent the stomach being empty, is a much better remedy for that disease.
6. Persons under the pressure of debt, disappointments in worldly pursuits, and guilt, have sometimes sought to drown their sorrows in strong drink. The only radical cure for those evils, is to be found in religion; but where its support is not resorted to, wine and opium should always be preferred to ardent spirits. They are far less injurious to the body and mind, than spirits, and the habits of attachment to them are easily broken, after time and repentance have removed the evils they were taken to relieve.
7. The sociable and imitative nature of man, often disposes him to adopt the most odious and destructive practices from his companions. The French soldiers who conquered Holland, in the year 1794, brought back with them the love and use of brandy, and thereby corrupted the inhabitants of several of the departments of France, who had been previously distinguished for their temperate and sober manners. Many other facts might be mentioned, to show how important it is to avoid the company of persons addicted to the use of ardent spirits.