Does it do any one any physical good? Arguments in favor of tobacco for any physical reason are baseless. It does not aid digestion, preserve the teeth, or disinfect, and it is not a remedy for anything. The good it does--and no habit can become general, of course, unless it does apparent good--can only be mental. Let me admit at once that smoking confers mental satisfaction. It seems to give one companionship when one has none, something to do when one is bored, keeps one from feeling hungry when one is hungry, and blunts the edge of hardship and worry. This sums up the agreeable results of tobacco. There are one or two more specialized agreeable results which I exclude at this moment because they are only temporary. The results I mention--let me admit at once--are real, and both immediate and apparent. On the other hand, the injurious results, after one has become inured to tobacco poison, are both unapparent and delayed. THE PHYSIOLOGICAL ACTION OF TOBACCO As to the physiological and toxic effects of tobacco there is much difference of opinion. Everybody knows that the first chew or the first smoke is apt to create nausea; and that no matter how long a man has been smoking, a little lump of the tar which has collected in his pipe will sicken him. Nicotine is in itself highly toxic, but is very volatile and is absorbed only from the portion of the cigar or cigarette held in the mouth. The products of combustion of tobacco are chemical substances which are also toxic, and nausea naturally stops the smoker before symptoms of acute poisoning result. One must look, then, for symptoms of _slow_ poisoning. The popular belief that tobacco stunts growth is supported by the fact that non-smokers observed for four years at Yale and Amherst increased more in weight, height, chest-girth, and lung capacity than smokers did in the same period. Every athlete knows that it hurts the wind; that is, injures the ability of the heart to respond quickly to extra work. It also affects the precision of eye and hand. A great billiard-player who does not smoke once assured me that he felt sure of winning when his opponent was a smoker. A tennis-player began to smoke at the age of twenty-one, and found that men whom he had before beaten with ease could now beat him. Sharp-shooters and riflemen know that their shooting is more accurate when they do not smoke. But you may say: "The athletes and billiard-players and the rest are experts. I am an average man, making average use of my faculties. Besides, I am not contending that excessive smoking isn't injurious, and I will even concede that the limit of excess varies with the man. But is it not true that harmful results of average smoking for the average man are rare?" In answer, let me on my side admit that they are--the _apparent_ harmful results.