ABSTRACT
To discuss the subject of drunkenness at length, would require a large volume. Its physiology, the diseases to which it gives rise, and its treatment, are of so extensive a character, that any attempt to detail them fully, within the compass of an ordinary essay, would be fruitless. Some become drunkards from excess of indulgence in youth. There are parents who have a common custom of treating their children to wine, punch, and other intoxicating liquors. This, in reality, is regularly bringing them up in an apprenticeship to drunkenness. Drunkenness appears to be in some measure hereditary. The consequences of drunkenness are dreadful, but the pleasures of getting drunk are certainly ecstatic. While the illusion lasts, happiness is complete; care and melancholy are thrown to the wind, and Elysium, with all its glories, descends upon the dazzled imagination of the drinker.
