I call them _apologies_. They cannot be considered _reasons_. Almost every lover of the dirty weed, feels that he needs an apology. One will tell us he has a cold, watery stomach, and he thinks that tobacco, by promoting expectoration, relieves the difficulty. Another will tell us he is very much troubled with indigestion, and he thinks tobacco relieves the difficulty; though, in truth, tobacco is the very worst drug he could use to relieve that disease, and is among the primordial causes of inducing it. Another will tell us that he is afflicted with the rising of his food after eating, and he thinks tobacco gives immediate relief; not suspecting, perhaps, that this rising of the food is occasioned by over eating. Another will tell us he has a distressing difficulty in the head, and brain, and he thinks a little good Scotch snuff affords relief; as though the filling the pores, and cavities of the head, and clogging up the brain, with this dirty stuff, would remove a disease which in most cases it originates. Others use tobacco to preserve the teeth; and this, though it is a solemn truth, that many a one loses his teeth by smoking and chewing the poisonous plant. Others, again, use tobacco to excite the mind to more vigorous intellectual effort. But when and where do we find great lovers of tobacco great students, and intellectual giants? Dr. Rush says, "I suspect tobacco is oftener used for the _want_ of ideas, than to excite them." There are some whose apology for using tobacco is, that it guards them against the power of contagious diseases. But Dr. Rees affirms that tobacco does not contain an antidote against contagion, and that, in general, it has no antiseptic power; and is therefore of no special use. There is another class still, who use tobacco because it soothes the irksomeness of life. They fear solitude; and to prevent self-examination, and to while away their probation time, they fly to the _pipe_, _quid_, and _snuff-box_; and soon, by an easy transition, to the wine-glass and brandy-bottle. These are the _usual apologies_ of the devotees to tobacco. And what do they amount to? In truth, the common opinion that tobacco is good for the head-ache,--weak eyes,--cold and watery stomachs,--the preservation of the teeth,--and the like, is sheer delusion. Let every man and woman, who would live long, and usefully, and happily, awake from this delusion; and let no one, as he values health, life, and salvation, _taste_, _touch_, or _handle_, the filthy poison. I maintain my position,