XVI. Epilepsy.—Drunkenness may bring on epilepsy, or falling sickness, and may excite it into action in those who have the disease from other causes. Many persons cannot get slightly intoxicated without having an epileptic or other convulsive attack. These fits generally arise in the early stages, before drunkenness has got to a height. If they do not occur early, the individual will probably escape them altogether for the time.
XVII. Sterility.—This is a state to which confirmed drunkards are very subject. The children of such persons are, in general, neither numerous nor healthy. From the general defect of vital power in the parental system, they are apt to be puny and emaciated, and more than ordinarily liable to inherit all the diseases of those from whom they are sprung. On this account, the chances of long life are much diminished among the children of such parents. In proof of this, it is only necessary to remark, that according to the London bills of mortality, one-half of the children born in the metropolis die before attaining their third year; while, of the children of the Society of Friends, a class remarkable for sobriety and regularity of all kinds, one-half actually attain the age of forty-seven years. Much of this difference, doubtless, originates in the superior degree of comfort, and correct general habits of the Quakers, which incline them to bestow every care in the rearing of their offspring, and put it in their power to obtain the means of combating disease; but the main-spring of this superior comfort and regularity is doubtless temperance—a virtue which this class of people possess in an eminent degree.
XVIII. Emaciation.—Emaciation is peculiarly characteristic of the spirit drinker. He wears away, before his time, into the “lean and slippered pantaloon” spoken of by Shakspeare in his “Stages of Human Life.” All drunkards, however, if they live long enough, become emaciated. The eyes get hollow, the cheeks fall in, and wrinkles soon furrow the countenance with the marks of age. The fat is absorbed from every part, and the rounded plumpness which formerly characterized the body soon wears away. The whole form gets lank and debilitated. There is a want of due warmth, and the hand is usually covered with a chill clammy perspiration.
The occurrence of emaciation is not to be wondered at in persons who are much addicted to ardent spirits, for alcohol, besides being possessed of no nutritive properties, prevents the due chymification of the food, and consequently deteriorates the quality, besides diminishing the quantity of chyle. The principle of nutrition being thus affected, the person becomes emaciated as a natural consequence.
XIX. Corpulency.—Malt liquor and wine drinkers are, for the most part, corpulent, a state of body which rarely attends the spirit drinker, unless he be, at the same time, a bon vivant. Both wines and malt liquors are more nourishing than spirits. Under their use, the blood becomes, as it were, enriched, and a universal deposition of fat takes place throughout the system. The omentum and muscles of the belly are, in a particular manner, loaded with this secretion; whence the abdominal protuberance so remarkable in persons who indulge themselves in wines and ales. As the abdomen is the part which becomes most enlarged, so is it that which longest retains its enlargement. It seldom parts with it, indeed, even in the last stages, when the rest of the body is in a state of emaciation. There can be no doubt that the parts which first lose their corpulency are the lower extremities. Nothing is more common than to see a pair of spindle shanks tottering under the weight of an enormous corporation, to which they seem attached more like artificial appendages, than natural members. The next parts which give way, are the shoulders. They fall flat, and lose their former firmness and rotundity of organization. After this, the whole body becomes loose, flabby, and inelastic; and five years do as much to the constitution as fifteen would have done under a system of strict temperance and sobriety. The worst symptom that can befall a corpulent man, is the decline of his lower extremities.[32] So long as they continue firm, and correspond with the rest of the body, it is a proof that there is still vigour remaining; but when they gradually get attenuated, while other parts retain their original fulness, there can be no sign more sure that his constitution is breaking down, and that he will never again enjoy his wonted strength.
XX. Premature Old Age.—Drunkenness has a dreadful effect in anticipating the effects of age. It causes time to pace on with giant strides—chases youth from the constitution of its victims—and clothes them prematurely with the grey garniture of years. How often do we see the sunken eye, the shrivelled cheek, the feeble, tottering step, and hoary head, in men who have scarcely entered into the autumn of their existence. To witness this distressing picture, we have only to walk out early in the mornings, and see those gaunt, melancholy shadows of mortality, betaking themselves to the gin-shops, as to the altar of some dreadful demon, and quaffing the poisoned cup to his honour, as the Carthagenians propitiated the deity of their worship, by flinging their children into the fire which burned within his brazen image. Most of these unhappy persons are young, or middle-aged men; and though some drunkards attain a green old age, they are few in number compared with those who sink untimely into the grave ere the days of their youth have well passed by.[33] Nothing is more common than to see a man of fifty as hoary, emaciated, and wrinkled, as if he stood on the borders of fourscore.
The effect of intemperance in shortening life is strikingly exemplified in the contrast afforded by other classes of society to the Quakers, a set of people of whom I must again speak favourably. It appears from accurate calculation, that in London only one person in forty attains the age of fourscore, while among the Quakers, whose sobriety is proverbial, and who have long set themselves against the use of ardent spirits, not less than one in ten reaches that age—a most striking difference, and one which carries its own inference along with it.
It is remarked by an eminent practitioner, that of more than a hundred men in a glass-manufactory, three drank nothing but water, and these three appeared to be of their proper age, while the rest who indulged in strong drinks seemed ten or twelve years older than they proved to be. This is conclusive.[34]
XXI. Ulcers.—Ulcers often break out on the bodies of drunkards. Sometimes they are fiery and irritable, but in general they possess an indolent character. Of whatever kind they may be, they are always aggravated in such constitutions. A slight cause gives rise to them; and a cut or bruise which, in health, would have healed in a few days, frequently degenerates into a foul sloughy sore. When drunkards are affected with scrofula, scurvy, or any cutaneous disease whatever, they always, cæteris paribus, suffer more than other people.
XXII. Melancholy.—Though drunkards over their cups are the happiest of mankind, yet, in their solitary hours, they are the most wretched. Gnawing care, heightened perhaps by remorse, preys upon their conscience. While sober, they are distressed both in body and mind, and fly to the bowl to drown their misery in oblivion. Those, especially, whom hard fate drove to this desperate remedy, feel the pangs of low spirits with sevenfold force. The weapon they employ to drive away care is turned upon themselves. Every time it is used, it becomes less capable of scaring the fiend of melancholy, and more effectual in wounding him that uses it.