DEBATES OF CONSCIENCE ON ARDENT SPIRITS 16 [O]

BARNES ON TRAFFIC IN ARDENT SPIRITS 24 [P]

THE FOOLS' PENCE 8 [Q]

THE POOR MAN'S HOUSE REPAIRED 12 [R]

JAMIE; OR A WORD FROM IRELAND FOR TEMPERANCE 16 [S]

THE WONDERFUL ESCAPE 4 [T]

THE EVENTFUL TWELVE HOURS 16 [U]

THE LOST MECHANIC RESTORED 4 [V]

REFORMATION OF DRUNKARDS 4 [W]

TOM STARBOARD AND JACK HALYARD 24 [X]

THE OX SERMON 8 [Y]

* * * * *

THE EFFECTS OF ARDENT SPIRITS
UPON THE HUMAN BODY AND MIND.

BY BENJAMIN RUSH, M. D.

By ardent spirits, I mean those liquors only which are obtained by
distillation from fermented substances of any kind. To their effects
upon the bodies and minds of men, the following inquiry shall be
exclusively confined.

The effects of ardent spirits divide themselves into such as are of a
prompt, and such as are of a chronic nature. The former discover
themselves in drunkenness; and the latter in a numerous train of
diseases and vices of the body and mind.

I. I shall begin by briefly describing their prompt or immediate effects
in a fit of drunkenness.

This odious disease--for by that name it should be called--appears with
more or less of the following symptoms, and most commonly in the order
in which I shall enumerate them.

1. Unusual garrulity.

2. Unusual silence.

3. Captiousness, and a disposition to quarrel.

4. Uncommon good-humor, and an insipid simpering, or laugh.

5. Profane swearing and cursing.

6. A disclosure of their own or other people's secrets.

7. A rude disposition to tell those persons in company whom they know,
their faults.

8. Certain immodest actions. I am sorry to say this sign of the first
stage of drunkenness sometimes appears in women, who, when sober, are
uniformly remarkable for chaste and decent manners.

9. A clipping of words.

10. Fighting; a black eye, or a swelled nose, often mark this grade of
drunkenness.

11. Certain extravagant acts which indicate a temporary fit of madness.
Those are singing, hallooing, roaring, imitating the noises of brute
animals, jumping, tearing off clo