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THE OPIUM HABIT,
WITH
SUGGESTIONS AS TO THE REMEDY.
"After my death, I earnestly entreat that a full and unqualifiednarrative of my wretchedness, and of its guilty cause, may be madepublic, that at least some little good may be effected by the direfulexample."—COLERIDGE.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
A SUCCESSFUL ATTEMPT TO ABANDON OPIUM
DE QUINCEY'S "CONFESSIONS OF AN ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER"
OPIUM REMINISCENCES OF COLERIDGE
WILLIAM BLAIR
OPIUM AND ALCOHOL COMPARED
INSANITY AND SUICIDE FROM AN ATTEMPT TO ABANDON MORPHINE
A MORPHINE HABIT OVERCOME
ROBERT HALL—JOHN RANDOLPH—WILLIAM WILBERFORCE
WHAT SHALL THEY DO TO BE SAVED?
OUTLINES OF THE OPIUM-CURE
INTRODUCTION.
This volume has been compiled chiefly for the benefit ofopium-eaters. Its subject is one indeed which might be made alikeattractive to medical men who have a fancy for books that areprofessional only in an accidental way; to general readers who wouldlike to see gathered into a single volume the scattered records of theconsequences attendant upon the indulgence of a pernicious habit; andto moralists and philanthropists to whom its sad stories of infirmityand suffering might be suggestive of new themes and new objects uponwhich to bestow their reflections or their sympathies. But for noneof these classes of readers has the book been prepared. In strictnessof language little medical information is communicated by it.Incidentally, indeed, facts are stated which a thoughtful physicianmay easily turn to professional account. The literary man willnaturally feel how much more attractive the book might have been madehad these separate and sometimes disjoined threads of mournfulpersonal histories been woven into a more coherent whole; but the bookhas not been made for literary men. The philanthropist, whether atheoretical or a practical one, will find in its pages littlepreaching after his particular vein, either upon the vice or thedanger of opium-eating. Possibly, as he peruses these various records,he may do much preaching for himself, but he will not find a greatdeal furnished to his hand, always excepting the rather inopportunereflections of Mr. Joseph Cottle over the case of his unhappy friendColeridge. The book has been compiled for opium-eaters, and to theirnotice it is urgently commended. Sufferers from protracted andapparently hopeless disorders profit little by scientific informationas to the nature of their complaints, yet they listen with profoundinterest to the experience of fellow-sufferers, even when thisexperience is unprofessionally and unconnectedly told. Medicalempirics understand this and profit by it. In place of the generalstatements of the educated practitioner of medicine, the empiricencourages the drooping hopes of his patient by narrating in detailthe minute particulars of analagous cases in which his skill hasbrought relief.
Before the victim of opium-eating is prepared for the services of anintelligent physician he requires some stimulus to rouse him to thepossibility of recovery. It is not the dicta of the medicalman, but the experience of the relieved patient, that the opium-eater,desiring—nobody but he knows how ardently—