Study and Stimulants: Or, the Use of Intoxicants and Narcotics in Relation to Intellectual Life, as Illustrated by Personal Communications on the Subject, from Men of Letters and of Science
Science
Study and Stimulants: Or, the Use of Intoxicants and Narcotics in Relation to Intellectual Life, as Illustrated by Personal Communications on the Subject, from Men of Letters and of Science
It was for me a complete resurrection, not only of memory, but of
general health and well-being. It was only necessary for me to do,
what I did eighteen years later, to lessen nearly one-half the
quantity of food which I took every day, to eat less meat and more
vegetables, to obtain such incomparable health, of which it is hardly
possible to form any idea, unlimited capacity of labour, perfect
digestion, absence of wrinkles, pimples; and I beg leave to affirm
that those who tread in my footsteps will be as sound as I am. Add to
this the habit, irrevocably established, of never saying, I
_shall_ do, nor I am doing, but I _have done_, and you have
the secret of the enormous amount of work I have been able to
accomplish, and am accomplishing every day, in spite of my eighty
years. Nobody will dispute me the honour of being the greatest
hard-working man of my century.
I ought, finally, to add that I find it well for me to take at
breakfast a small half-cup of coffee without milk, to which, when only
two or three teaspoonful remain at the bottom of the cup, I add a
small spoonful of brandy, or other alcoholic liquor. That is my whole
allowance of stimulants. How happy would those be who should adopt my
_regime_. They would be able, without harm, to sit at their desk
immediately after breakfast, and to stay there till dinner-time. No
sooner would they be in bed, at about nine o'clock, but they would be
softly asleep a few minutes later, and could rise at five in the
morning, full of strength, after a nourishing sleep of eight hours.
ABBE F. MOIGNO.
July 20, 1882.
REV. J. MORRISON, D. D.,
PRINCIPAL OF THE EVANGELICAL UNION COLLEGE.
For my kind of work, I have found it absolutely necessary to abstain
altogether from the use of both alcohol and tobacco.
J. MORRISON.
May 11, 1882.
MR. AUGUSTUS MONGREDIEN.
I am 75 years of age. I have smoked moderately all my life; and for
the last fifty years have never, except in rare and short instances of
illness, retired to bed without one tumbler of whiskey toddy. You will
therefore see that I am utterly incompetent to pronounce on the
respective effects, on the mind and body, of moderate indulgence, and
of total abstinence, for I have never tried the latter.
A. MONGREDIEN. March 10, 1882.
DR. J. A. H. MURRAY,
EX-PRESIDENT OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY, AND EDITOR OF ITS ENGLISH
ETYMOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL DICTIONARY.
I use no stimulants of any kind, and should be very sorry to do so. I
thought it was now generally admitted that the more work a man has to
do, the less he can afford to muddle himself in any way. But as I have
never tried the experiment in using either alcohol or tobacco, and
cannot afford to do it, I have no comparative experience to offer. It
might be beneficial; I do not believe it would, and prefer not to risk
the chance. _Fiat experimentum in corpore viliore_.
J. A. H. MURRAY.
March 2, 1882.
MR. D. CHRISTIE MURRAY.
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