Thus from day to day, week to week, year to year, they go on; not living—simply existing. Each day, each hour, each minute binds them more firmly, until at last they feel their own inability to cope with the demon that has overpowered them, and abandon themselves, hopelessly, listlessly, to the vice. Repentance comes too late. The momentary pleasure, the short period of excitement, the hour of vivacity bears fruit a thousand-fold; fruit, the bitter taste of which must last them a lifetime. That which at first gave them pleasure has now become the veriest tyrant, enforcing long hours of pain and anguish, gloom and despondency. They do not continue its use _because it gives them pleasure_, but simply because it is the only thing that, in increasing doses, can save them from the torment it has itself imposed; because without it they are sunk into a living hell. The mind is incapable of healthy action, the temper is decidedly aggravated, the person taking offence at and scolding furiously about things that in health, or while under the influence of opium, would excite no comment. They suffer from terrible nightmares. They are constantly on the edge of imaginary precipices, or falling, falling down dizzy heights. Sleep, if had at all, is broken, unsatisfactory and fraught with the most frightful and torturing dreams, into the warp and woof of which are constantly woven the most horrible sights. Now they are the victims of some terrible accident, again, they are hurried on by some malignant persecution. They fancy that they are drowning, that they are being burned at the stake, inhaling the sickening odor of their own burning flesh, feeling it peel from their aching bones. Then comes the awakening with a start or scream. The gradual realization that these things are not real; the cold sweat; the trembling of the limbs; the sense of utter exhaustion from which they sink into sleep once more, to live again the agonizing scenes of their diseased imagination; waking and sleeping and counting the minutes as days, the hours as years, until morning finally comes.