"Tea is a beverage well suited to the taste of an indolent and voluptuous age. To the glutton it affords a grateful diluent after a voracious dinner; and, from being drunk warm, it gives a soothing stimulus to the stomach of the drunkard: but, however agreeable may be its immediate flavour, the ultimate effects are debility and nervous diseases. There may be conditions of health, indeed, where tea can do no harm, such as in the strong and athletic; but it is particularly hurtful to the female constitution, to all persons who possess the hereditary predisposition to dyspepsia, and all diseases with which it is associated, to gout, and to those who are naturally weak-nerved. Fine tea, where the narcotic quality seems to be concentrated, when taken in a strong infusion, by persons not accustomed to it, excites nausea and vomiting, tremors, cold sweats, vertigo, dimness of sight, and confusion of thought. I have known a number of men and women subject to nervous complaints, who could not use tea in any form without feeling a sudden increase of all their unpleasant symptoms; particularly acidity of the stomach, vertigo, and dimness of the eyes. As the use of this article of diet extends among the lower orders of the community and the labouring poor, it must do the more harm. A man or a woman who has to go through much toil and hardship has need of substantial nourishment; but that is not to be obtained from an infusion of tea. And if the humble returns of their industry are expended in this leaf, what remains for the purchase of food better adapted to labour? In this case tea becomes hurtful, not only from its narcotic quality, but because that quality acts with double force in a body weakened from other causes. This certainly is one great reason for the increased and increasing proportion of nervous, bilious, spasmodic, and stomach complaints, &c. appearing among the lower ranks of life." It is well known that tea is frequently resorted to by literary men to keep them awake during their lucubrations. Dr. Cullen said he never could take it without feeling gouty symptoms; and we frequently see aged females, who are in the habit of taking strong green tea, subject to paralytic affections. Many experienced physicians, such as Grimm, Crugerus, Wytt, Murray, Letsom, condemn the abuse of the plant as highly dangerous.[25] That it is a most powerful astringent we well know; and the hands of the Chinese who are employed in its preparation are shrivelled, and, to all appearance, burned with caustic. Chemists have extracted from it an astringent liquor containing tannin and gallic acid. This liquor, injected in the veins or under the integuments of frogs, produces palsy of the posterior extremities, and, applied to the sciatic nerve for half an hour, has occasioned death.