hen I recognize many other diseases in regard to which excess
in alcoholics acts as a powerful predisposing cause, such as
gout, gravel, aneurism, paralysis, apoplexy, epilepsy, cystitis,
premature incontinence of urine, erysipelas, spreading cellular
inflammation, tendency of wounds and sores to gangrene,
inability of the constitution to resist the attacks of
epidemics. I have had a fearful amount of experience of
continued fever in our infirmary during many epidemics, and in
all my experience I have only once known an intemperate man of
forty and upwards to recover."

Professor Christison also claims that three-fourths, or even
four-fifths, of Bright's disease in Scotland is produced by alcohol.

Dr. C. Murchison, in speaking of alcohol as a preventive of disease,
says:--

"There is no greater error than to imagine that a liberal
allowance of alcoholic liquids fortifies the system against
contagious diseases."

In a paper read before the Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society, Oct.
22, 1872, Dr. W. Dickinson gave the following conclusions:--

"Alcohol causes fatty infiltration and fibrous encroachments; it
engenders tubercles; encourages suppuration, and retards
healing; it produces untimely atheroma (a form of fatty
degeneration of the inner coats of the arteries), invites
hemorrhage, and anticipates old age. The most constant fatty
changes, replacement by oil of the material of epithelial cells
and muscular fibres, though probably nearly universal, is most
noticeable in the liver, the heart and the kidneys. _Drink
causes tuberculosis_, which is evident not only in the lungs,
but in every amenable organ."

Dr. William Hargreaves says:--

"Brandy is not a prophylactic. To the temperate it is an active,
exciting cause. It is well known that a single act of
intemperance during the prevalence of cholera, will often
produce a fatal attack. The sense of warmth and irritation
(called stimulation) produced by alcoholic liquors, has led to
the erroneous notion that they may prevent cholera. But the
contrary we have seen is the truth, for the effects of
alcoholics are to reduce the temperature of the body, and
instead of stimulating, they narcotize, and reduce the
life-forces, and predispose the system to all kinds of disease."

The following testimonies are culled from the writings of emine