A lecture on the effects of alcoholic drinks on the human system and the duties of medical men in relation thereto : delivered in the lecture room of Rush Medical College, on Christmas Day, 1854, in compliance with the request of the class attending the college / by N.S. Davis.

  • Davis, N. S. (Nathan Smith), 1817-1904.
Date:
[1855?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A lecture on the effects of alcoholic drinks on the human system and the duties of medical men in relation thereto : delivered in the lecture room of Rush Medical College, on Christmas Day, 1854, in compliance with the request of the class attending the college / by N.S. Davis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    19/32
    fcrain and nervous centres, as is sometimes the case in the ad- vanced stages of typhus fevers, when the direct exhilerating in- fluence of the alcohol may be made available for temporarily sus- taining the nerve sensibility; and second, when the process of dis- integration or waste of tissues takes place much too rapid, with an active state of the excretory organs, as is sometimes the case in the advanced stage of phthisis, when the power of alcohol to re- tard organic changes may be rendered beneficial, to a limited ex- tent in retarding the process of waste. Such, gentlemen, are my views of the action of alcoholic drinks on the human system ; out some may be disposed to say, in reply that those drinks have been in common use for many generations, that the popular ideas in regard to their beneficial effects in the various relations of life are founded on direct experience, and that such experience is entitled to more confidence than all the de- ductions of science. I admit that these beverages have been in common use for many generations; and so has tobacco, and many other things, that neither prolong human life nor prevent disease. But what is the result of all this long experience in the use of intoxicating drinks ? Has it all furnished us with any clear proof that they are capable of increasing man's power to endure either cold or fatigue, or to resist more successfully the causes of disease and pestilence? I answer no, not any—not even a shadow of such proof. During the last fifteen years I have carefully and diligent- ly searched the dark rccoidof alcohol's doings, on the land and on the sea, in the frozen regions of the North, and on the sultry plains of the South, in the city and in the country, on the farm, in the workshop, in the manufactory, and on ship-board; but no- where have I found the least proof of the beneficial effects alleged* And I boldly challenge the world to furnish such evidence. On the contrary, I have found abundant evidence to corroborate the inferences drawn from the scientific part of our inquiry. For in- stance, if we follow the earlier expeditions in search of a north- west passage amidst the icebergs of the Northern ocean, we are told by every witness that the use of intoxicating drinks ac- tually diminished the power to sustain severe and protracted cold.