The actual extent of injury from the moderate use of tea and coffee has not been scientifically determined. The difficulty is, as Irving Fisher states it, "Sensitive people do not keep moderate." A little unnatural stimulation calls for a little more, and the tendency is to create a demand for something stronger. Fisher has truthfully declared that to abstain is much easier than to be moderate.
The claim that alcoholic beverages give added strength is a fallacy. The narcotic action of alcohol benumbs the sense of fatigue. From reliable clinical and laboratory findings, we are warranted in asserting with authority that alcohol lowers the power of all mental processes. The muscular efficiency is reduced. The ability of the body to protect itself against disease is undermined. The policemen of the body—the white corpuscles—are rendered more or less inactive—paralyzed; and the formation of other resistive elements of the blood is restricted. In other words, vital resistance is below par. Alcohol is furthermore a heart and circulatory depressant, and is no longer used by competent physicians as a circulatory stimulant. In short, it lowers mental and physical efficiency, and of course will naturally give its stamp to the unfortunate offspring.
Tobacco, too, blunts the edge of fatigue and worry. But its effect is transient, and the stimulation is followed by depression, which of course calls for more of the stimulant. Statistics tell us that where the weed is prohibited, efficiency is increased, and morale is improved.
Among the serious consequences of smoking, we find cancer of lip, tongue, and mouth, and serious cardiovascular changes. In a series of one hundred cases of cancer of the tongue and mouth, Dr. Abbe, of New York, found that ninety were inveterate users of tobacco; and he gives the stimulant the credit of being the ætiological factor in a high percentage of all malignant growths in this region. Tobacco not only directly affects the heart muscle, but its nicotine, through stimulation of the suprarenal gland, causes the production and throwing into the blood of an excessive amount of adrenalin, which brings about a tremendous rise in blood pressure, and of course an increase in the burden that the heart must carry. The ultimate result is arteriosclerosis, tobacco heart, nephritis, and very possibly a closing of the scene with a paralytic stroke.
Professor Fisher very aptly appeals against the introduction of more poisons into a system already burdened with poisons of its own elaboration.
We are not at liberty to ignore nature and her laws. Our bodies are not our own. When the Creator has opened to us of heaven's abundance for the sustenance of life, and has given us a dietary that answers every need of palate and body, we are palpably in error before our Maker when we question His wisdom, and take into our systems those substances which we know to be destructive to mind, soul, and body.
Our country, however, is blessed with an abundance of foodstuffs; and if our people will economize in their use of food, providently confining themselves to the quantities required for the maintenance of health and strength, if they will eliminate waste, and if they will make use of those commodities of which we have a surplus, and thus free for export a larger proportion of those required by the world now dependent on us, we shall not only be able to accomplish our obligations to them, but we shall obtain and establish reasonable prices at home.—Woodrow Wilson.