Study and Stimulants Part 1

Study and Stimulants.

by A. Arthur Reade.

INTRODUCTION.

The real influence of the intoxicants and narcotics in common use has been a matter of fierce and prolonged controversy. The most opposite opinions have been set forth with ability and earnestness; but the weight they would otherwise carry is lessened by their mutually contradictor-y character. Notwithstanding the great influence of the physician's authority, people are perplexed by the blessings and bannings bestowed upon tobacco and the various forms of alcohol.

What is the real influence of stimulants and narcotics upon the brain?

Do they give increased strength, greater lucidity of mind and more continuous power? Do they weaken and cloud the intellect, and lessen that capacity for enduring a prolonged strain of mental exertion which is one of the first requisites of the intellectual life? Would a man who is about to enter upon the consideration of problems, the correct solution of which will demand all the strength and agility of his mind, be helped or hindered by their use? These are questions which are asked every day, and especially by the young, who seek in vain for an adequate reply. The student grappling with the early difficulties of science and literature, wishes to know whether he will be wiser to use or to abstain from stimulants.

The theoretical aspect of the question has perhaps been sufficiently discussed; but there still remains the practical inquiry,--"What has been the experience of those engaged in intellectual work?" Have men of science--the inventors, the statesmen, the essayists, and novelists of our own day--found advantage or the reverse in the use of alcohol and tobacco?

The problem has for years exercised my thoughts, and with the hope of arriving at _data_ which would be trustworthy and decisive, I entered upon an independent inquiry among the representatives of literature, science, and art, in Europe and America. The replies were not only numerous, but in most cases covered wider ground than that originally contemplated. Many of the writers give details of their habits of work, and thus, in addition to the value of the testimony on this special topic, the letters throw great light upon the methods of the intellectual life.

To each writer, and especially to Dr. Alex. Bain, Mr. R. E.

Francillon, Mark Twain, Mr. E. O'Donovan, Mr. J E. Boehm, Professor Dowden, the Rev. Dr. Martineau, Count Gubernatis, the Abbe Moigno, and Professor Magnus, who have shown hearty interest in the enquiry, I tender my best thanks for contributing to the solution of the important problem of the value of stimulants; also to Mr. W. E. A.

Axon for suggestive and much appreciated help. I should, however, be glad of further testimonies for use in a second edition.

_January_, 1883.

STUDY AND STIMULANTS

THE REV. DR. ABBOT, EDITOR OF THE "CHRISTIAN UNION," NEW YORK.

I have no experience whatever respecting tobacco: my general opinion is adverse to its use by a healthy man; but that opinion is not founded on any personal experience, nor on any scientific knowledge, as to give it any value for others. My opinion respecting alcohol is that it is a valuable and necessary ingredient in forming and preserving some articles of diet--yeast bread, for example, which can only be produced by fermentation--and that its value in the lighter wines, those in which it is found in, a ratio of from 5 to 10 per cent., is of the same character. It preserves for use other elements in the juice of the grape. As a stimulant, alcohol is, in my opinion, at once a deadly poison and a valuable medicine, to be ranked with belladonna, a.r.s.enic, prussic acid, and other toxical agents, which can never be safely dispensed with by the medical faculty, nor safely used by laymen as a stimulant, except under medical advice. As to my experience, it is very limited; and, in my judgment, it is quite unsafe in this matter to make one man's experience another man's guide: too much depends upon temperamental and const.i.tutional peculiarities, and upon special conditions of climate and the like.

1. I have no experience respecting distilled spirits; I regard them as highly dangerous, and have never used them except under medical advice, and then only in rare and serious cases of illness. 2. Beers and the lighter wines, if taken before mental work, always--in my experience--impair the working powers. They do not facilitate, but impede brain action. 3. After an exceptionally hard day's work, when the nervous power is exhausted, and the stomach is not able to digest and a.s.similate the food which the system needs, a gla.s.s of light wine, taken with the dinner, is a better aid to digestion than any other medicine that I know. To serve this purpose, its use--in my opinion-- should be exceptional, not habitual: it is a medicine, not a beverage.

4. After nervous excitement in the evening, especially public speaking, a gla.s.s of light beer serves a useful purpose as a sedative, and ensures at times a good sleep, when without it the night would be one of imperfect sleep.

I must repeat that my experience is very limited; that in my judgment the cases which justify a man in so overtaxing his system that he requires a medicine to enable him to digest his dinner or enjoy his sleep must be rare; and that my own use of either wine or beer is very exceptional. Though I am not in strictness of speech a total abstinence man, I am ordinarily a water drinker.

LYMAN ABBOT.

March 11, 1882.

MR. S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE, NEW YORK.

I have no doubt that the use of alcohol as a rule is very injurious to all persons--authors included. In about 17 years (1853-1870), in which I was engaged on the "Dictionary of English Literature and Authors," I never took it but for medicine, and very seldom. Moderate smoking after meals I think useful to those who use their brains much; and this seems to have been the opinion of the majority of the physicians who took part in the controversy in the _Lancet_ about ten or twelve years since. An energetic non-smoker is in haste to rush to his work soon after dinner. A smoker is willing to rest (it should be for an hour), because he can enjoy his cigar, and his conscience is satisfied, which is a great thing for digestion; the brain is soothed also.

S. AUSTIN ALLIBONE.

March 27, 1882.

THE DUKE OF ARGYLL, F. R. S.

In answer to your question, I can only say that during by far the greatest part of my life I never took alcohol in any form; and that only in recent years I have taken a small fixed quant.i.ty under medical advice, as a preventive of gout. Tobacco I have never touched.

ARGYLL.

October 2, 1882.

MR. MATTHEW ARNOLD.

In reply to your enquiry, I have to inform you that I have never smoked, and have always drunk wine, chiefly claret. As to the use of wine, I can only speak for myself. Of course, there is the danger of excess; but a healthy nature and the power of self-control being presupposed, one can hardly do better, I should think, than "follow nature" as to what one drinks, and its times and quant.i.ty. As a general rule, I drink water in the middle of the day; and a gla.s.s or two of sherry, and some light claret, mixed with water, at a late dinner; and this seems to suit me very well. I have given up beer in the middle of the day, not because I experienced that it did not suit me, but because the doctor a.s.sured me that it was bad for rheumatism, from which I sometimes suffer. I suppose most young people could do as much without wine as with it. Real brain-work of itself, I think, upsets the worker, and makes him bilious; wine will not cure this, nor will abstaining from wine prevent it. But, in general, wine used in moderation seems to add to the _agreeableness_ of life--for adults, at any rate; and whatever adds to the agreeableness of life adds to its resources and powers.

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

November 4, 1882.

PROFESSOR AYRTON

Has no very definite opinions as to the effects of tobacco and alcohol upon the mind and health, but as he is not in the habit of either taking alcohol or of smoking, he cannot regard those habits as essential to mental exertion.

April 21, 1882.

DR. ALEXANDER BAIN, LORD RECTOR OF ABERDEEN UNIVERSITY.

I am interested in the fact that anyone is engaged in a thorough investigation of the action of stimulants. Although the subject falls under my own studies in some degree, I am a very indifferent testimony as far as concerns personal experience. On the action of tobacco, I am disqualified to speak, from never having used it. As to the other stimulants--alcohol and the tea group--I find abstinence essential to intellectual effort. They induce a false excitement, not compatible with severe application to problems of difficulty. They come in well enough at the end of the day as soothing, or cheering, and also as diverting the thoughts into other channels. In my early intercourse with my friend; Dr. Carpenter, when he was a strict teetotaler, he used to discredit the effect of alcohol in soothing the excitement of prolonged intellectual work. I have always considered, however, that there is something in it. Excess of tea I have good reason to deprecate; I take it only once a day. The difficulty that presses upon me on the whole subject is this:--In organic influences, you are not at liberty to lay down the law of concomitant variations without exception, or to affirm that what is bad in large quant.i.ties, is simply less bad when the quant.i.ty is small. There may be proportions not only innocuous, but beneficial; reasoning from the a.n.a.logy of the action of many drugs which present the greatest opposition of effect in different quant.i.ties. I mean this--not with reference to the inutility for intellectual stimulation, in which I have a pretty clear opinion as regards myself--but as to the harmlessness in the long run, of the employment of stimulants for solace and pleasure when kept to what we call moderation. A friend of mine heard Thackeray say that he got some of his best thoughts when driving home from dining out, with his skin full of wine. That a man might get chance suggestions by the nervous excitement, I have no doubt; I speak of the serious work of composition. John Stuart Mill never used tobacco; I believe he had always a moderate quant.i.ty of wine to dinner. He frequently made the remark that he believed the giving up of wine would be apt to be followed by taking more food than was necessary, merely for the sake of stimulation. a.s.suming the use of stimulants after work to aid the subsidence of the brain, I can quite conceive that tobacco may operate in this way, as often averred; but I should have supposed that any single stimulant would be enough: as tobacco for those abstaining entirely from alcohol, and using little tea or coffee.

ALEXANDER BAIN.

March 6, 1882.

PROFESSOR ROBERT S. BALL, LL. D., F. R. S., ANDREWS PROFESSOR OF ASTRONOMY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF DUBLIN, AND ROYAL ASTRONOMER OF IRELAND.