The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1867-03-15
Alcoholic Drinks as Medicine an
Food.

We gave yesterday some extracts
from the testimony lately taken before
the Massachusetts Legislature in re-
gard to the temperance question in all
its phases of prohibition and restric.
ton. From the details Of the testi.
mony we make some further extracts.
The following is the substance of the
testimony of several eminent profess
sional gentlemen. 1t is proper to sug.
gest that they should not be under
stood as favoring the use under any
| circumstances of the vile stuff COM
monty drank in this country, or the
excessive use of liquor. This testi-
mony should be taken only as relating
to pure wines and liquors.
Dr.. Edward Il. Clarke, of Boston, one
of the medical professors in Harvard
college, said that for three years he had
lived in wine-growing countries, and
had seen very little intemperance in
any OF them. Alcoholic drinks are ad-
ninistered by the profession generally.
out they vary with the condition of the
person who takes them. Oftentimes
the drinking of wines Of tue country
supplies the place of food, but this, he
said, depended on the condition of the
person who takes them, and for all
practical purposes, these wines NAV be
considered as food in certain cases.
There is certain class of narcotic
agents which tend to increase the term
of life by checking the change of tissues.
There are often cases where a person
apparently in good health is much
aided and built up by the use of alco-
holic agents, and he had found il neces-
sary 10 give Information specially on
this subject. Men should use liquors
according to their own Judgment. the
same as they wOuld tobacco, tea, cof-
fee, &c. He considered opium to be the
greatest danger to this community:
drinking to excess he also considered
an evil, and the use of liquors he be-
iieved should be restricted.
DR.. James c. White, professor in the
Harvard medical school, said that he
disagreed with the French chemists in
the notion that alcohol did not assimi-
late with the system, and stated at
some length the manner in which aIco-
mol acts benefcially as stimulant and
recOnstructant.
DR.. Oliver Wendell Holmes said that
he believed alcoholic combinations to
act dietetically upon the human sys-
tenn as well as medically.
DR.. ]. b. S. Jackson, professor of
morbid anatomy, testified that in GER
tain cases of lung diseases alcohol was
used medically.
Professor Horsford of Cambridge tes-
titled that he considered alcohol as a
food, because it preserved the tissues of
the body, and thus virtually supplied
tissues, as animal food would do. He
did not think alcohol in purity was
poisonous. Alcohol might be used too
freely, in consequence of which tissue
would be preserved in too great a meas
ure, ana needful dIsintegration be pre-
vented.
Dr. Henry ]. Bigelow, of Boston.
stated as the result of observation in
wine growing countries in Europe, that
he did not think the effects of the wine
freely used IN those countries injurious;
he thought the wine acted as food. II
alcohol was taken as stimulant. he
should not expect to find disease re-
sulting from such use, but if taken to
excess II would act as a narcotic, and
produce disease. DR.. Bigelow said that
as rule physicians did not abstain
from wine. He thought that in cases
where an Individual was obliged to
exert himself, being already in an ex-
hausted condition, stimulus was use
ful, and on the whole beneficial.
DIR. Charles 7. jackson, chemist, said
that alcoholic liquors act as respiratory
food, and when alcohol in the form of
wine or distilled spirits goes into the
system it takes the place OF SO much fat
in the respiration. Whisky contains
fusil oil, and operates upon the lungs
and liver, and gin acts upon the kid
neysi and alcoholic drinks, when taken
moderately, instead of doing harm, are
conservative or beneficial in their action
upon the system Concerning the mat
ter OF the assimilation of alcohol with
the body, DR.. Jackson said that the
general opinion of scientific men was
that it did assimilate; he said that the
breath OF a drinking man could not be
smelled without detecting scetic acid,
the presence of which demonstrated
that transformation in 1.-THE alcohol must
have taken place.