"That is quite true," Sydney continued. "It is not a food, and therein lies its great charm for an age when people eat far too much for the sedentary lives they live; but it prevents the waste of tissue, and enables man to keep in health without half his time and two-thirds of his energy being exhausted in the process of digestion. It is, however, a so-called poison, and must be treated as such; but the poisons of to-day will probably become the nutriment of the future. On the other hand, sugar, a splendid food for savages and labourers, is little better than a slow poison to those who neglect exercise. Some day we shall have a new commandment--’Thou shalt not take sweet things.’ Considering the misery brought about in families through dyspepsia, I have a good mind to try and start a new order of lemontotallers at once. "If, however, you want a temperance sermon, you must go to the drunkard, and as an antidote to what I have said, if you care to hear it, I will tell you a story of a friend of mine who is now dead. He was a young man of great ability, who had passed through the University, carrying off some of its most coveted prizes. For some years having heard nothing of him, I decided to look him up. I knew that he had been ordained, and, retaining his fellowship, had accepted a quiet living in the country, intending to spend his spare time in literary work. It had surprised me that since then I had heard nothing from him, nor had any book of his been published. I found him a hopeless wreck, and this, in a few words, is what he told me. "He had come down to the country for the purpose of having leisure to study and write. For some time all went well. He had been brought up not to take wine, and was one of the few teetotallers of his College. His father had died from drink when Hamlin was a boy, and his mother had done all in her power to keep her child from following in the same course. ’I never,’ he said, ’touched drink till I was ordained. My curacy was in the West End of London, and as the time drew near for me to preach my first sermon, I became hopelessly nervous, feeling that I should break down, or losing all self-control, behave like a lunatic. The thought horrified me. As I went over my sermon in private, my hand shook so that I could not read the words. In despair I tried a remedy many University men resort to when they have to read the lessons in chapel. I took a small dose of brandy and tried the effect. It was only about a tablespoonful, yet the result was miraculous. In a few minutes I felt capable of preaching in St. Paul’s. On the following Sunday, having provided myself with a flask, I took a double dose in the vestry before the sermon, and the result was equally successful. From that day to this I have never preached without the aid of a stimulant.’