This was the text of Dr. Day's discourse, and he employed it in
enforcing anew his three cardinal points: 1. No hope for an inebriate
until he thoroughly distrusts the strength of his own resolution; 2. No
hope for an inebriate except in total abstinence as long as he lives,
both in sickness and in health; 3. Little hope for an inebriate unless
he avoids, on system and on principle, the occasions of temptation, the
places where liquor is sold, and the persons who will urge it upon him.
Physicians, he said, were the inebriate's worst enemies; and he advised
his hearers to avoid the tinctures prepared with alcohol, which had
often awakened the long-dormant appetite. During my stay at Binghamton,
a clergyman resident in the town, and recently an inmate of the Asylum,
had a slight indisposition resulting from riding home from a meeting
ten miles in the rain. One of the physicians of the place, who knew his
history, knew that he had been an inebriate of the most pronounced type
(quart of liquor a day), prescribed a powerful dose of brandy and
laudanum. "I dare not take it, doctor," he said, and put the damnable
temptation behind him. "If I _had_ taken it," said he to me, "I should
have been drunk to-day." The case, too, required nothing but rest,
rice, and an easy book. No medicine was necessary. Dr. Day has had
under his care a man who, after being a confirmed drunkard, had been a
teetotaler for eighteen years, and had then been advised to take wine
for the purpose of hastening a slow convalescence. His appetite resumed
its old ascendency, and, after drinking furiously for a year, he was
brought to the Asylum in delirium tremens. Dr. Day expressed a strong
hope and belief that the returned inmate mentioned above had _now_
actually taken his last glass of whiskey; for he had discovered his
weakness, and was in a much more hopeful condition than he had been
before his lapse. The Doctor scouted the idea that a man who has the
misfortune to break his resolution should give up the struggle. Some
men, he said, _must_ fall, at least once, before the last rag of
self-confidence is torn from them; and he had had patients who, after
coming back to him in Boston four times, had conquered, and had lived
soberly for years, and were still living soberly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account