Now, these inferences are all rendered null and void by the fact that ardent spirits, or alcohol, which is their essence, do not exist naturally in apples, grain, or sugar-cane. No one ever perceived the odor or the taste of alcohol in apples, or the cider obtained from them, while it was new and sweet; but after it had fermented for a time, by a due degree of warmth, the sweetness in a measure disappeared, and alcohol was found to be present. And just so in obtaining spirits from rye, or any other substance; a sweet liquor is at first obtained, which, by fermentation, is found to be partly converted into alcohol. This sweetness results from the sugar which the substances naturally contain, or which is formed by the process. This sugar is next destroyed, or decomposed, by the fermentation, and its parts go to make up a new substance, then first brought into existence, called alcohol. If the fermentation be carried on still farther, another new substance is produced, viz., vinegar. Carried still farther, putrid, unhealthy exhalations are the result, such as we find rising from swamps and other places where vegetable matter is decaying. If, then, we may conclude, because alcohol is obtained from grain and other nutritious substances, that therefore God intended it for the use of man, the same reason will show that he intended man should breathe these poisonous exhalations. If alcohol cannot be poisonous or injurious, because derived from harmless and salutary substances, neither can these exhalations be so; nor, indeed, those more putrid and deadly ones arising from the putrefaction of sweet animal food. And if alcohol must be nutritious, because apples, grain, and molasses are so, it follows that these exhalations are nutritious.