Lexington weekly intelligencer. (Lexington, Mo.) 1871-1887, 1873-09-03
The Literature Of Smoking.

Nothing has been moro bclaudcd,
nothing more abused, than smoking.
At one time 1t has been oil the fash
ion, at another IL has been altogether
taboocd; ignored In the pages OF
Shak espearc; idolized by DIR. Pnrr,
cast off as rutl,lcssly rs blackstone
cast of the MUSES. he had woocd.
Poets, divines, orators, ana hisio-
rians have waXcd eloquent Ill It's
praises, and not less eloquent have
been tho furious invectives hurled
against II. II has been one OF those
things.-therc are not many-on which
every one has had definite opinions.
Those who have written or spoken
for or against it have been
equally unmeasurcd in the phraseoi-
ogy they employ. King James the
First thuudered the first vollcy III his
famous "Countcrblast to Tobacco,
and this was followed by "Voiley
from Parnassus," by an anonymous
writer, whose wrath seems to have
outstripped his power of expression.
An undertonc of grumbling In the
shape of epigrams, occasional pam
pallets, sarcastic notes. &C., is some
times discernible to the curious in
such things all through our itera-
ature, but these grumblers arc
mostly of the subtcrranean order,
mere croakers in the ncthermost mud.
one renegade, ,howeycr,we mustnoticc
n man who ought to have known
bctter-Charlcs Lamb. His "Farc-
we'll to Tobacco is the expression
of the only piece Of ingratitude that
gentle nature was guilty Off in
gratitude it was. Cattullus, we
know, alwav discovered when Lesbia
was fondest of him by the hcartless
wav in which she abused him. Per-
haps the same pardoxical sentiment
was guiding the infatuated Lamb
when he penntd the line"Fiith O.
the mouth and foso' the mlnd-a
plagiarism, by tho way, from a grea,
smoker, who calls silence "Frost o.
the mouth and thaw u the mind
One ofthc greatest of modern poets,
tolerant OF everything beside, has the
bad taste to bc intolerant on tins one
subject, and hates pipe or cigar as
he would be ashamed to hate any
thing or anybody else in the world.
But smokers can afford to smile at
these black swans, rs they glance over
the goodly list of those who have
been guilty of the same weakness
as themselves. The great DIR. Isaac
called his pipe his PanphnrIhacon: or
cure for everything Bishop Hall
and DIR. Hooker were by no mean
proof against II quiet clay. We can
see Ben johnson and Drummond
with the white vapor wreathing itself
around them, and are by no means
certain that my Lord Bacon did not
know from experience the truth OF his
own words, "iobacco comforteth the
spirits and dischargeth weariness
which it workcth partly by opening
but chiefly by the opiate virtue
| which condenseth the spirits. "
Fletcher had many quiet pipe will,
Beaumont and Sir Thomas Overbury
often suothed himself in u pause OF
his troubled life with that dclectable
pastime." Scholars and students of
every kind have been faithful votaries
of the weed. BOxhore, the great
Dutch scholar, was such a slave to il
that he wore broad-brimed hat
pierced a hole through 1t, and SO sup
ported his pipe while his hands were
Tree, aud smoked umimpeded day and
night. Bentley could never sutfi'
GENTLY thank Cumberland for i'll.
itiatimg him into the delightful mys
terv of enjoying q pipe, and only re-
orctted he had not begun earlier tC
learn il: he was over seventy whci
he had his first lesson. Porsol
used to dogmatically assert that whel
smoking went out of fashion, learning
did so too, and old DIR. Parr insisted
on taking his pipe with him where
ever lie went. No pipe, no Parr,,
was IL snwppish and ungaliant speccf
to a lady who objected 10 the iuinaSa
ton of her urnwlng-room Inc
only rest poor old Hobbies got i'll thai
stormy, contentious existence OF his
was when he could light his pipe III
comfort, and forget all about Dr
Eachard or Wallis. Who cannot see
in nmlagiuation john Milton smoking
his regular evening pipe and talking
bctwec whiffs TO gentle ElwOod, OF
step over to the Rose" and survey
the author of "lludibrass," silent
absent. and reserved, with n history
im.-vcry line OF that hard, coarse face,
now lit up with the flare of the liv.
coal he has put into the bowl OF his
pipe? Fielding was n great smoker
and many scene of those harum-
sc;u.um comedies of his were dashed
Off Oh his tobacco paper. Tillotsor
was not attached TO his evening pipe
and Jeremy Taylor nirditaled not Il
few Of his golden pages through the
wreath of curling mist which was
born not Of the meadows" Old Bur-
ton, the anthor of the immortal AN
atoiny of Melancholy, has written O
curious passage on the divine plant
it :-"Tobacco, divine. rare, super
excellent tobacco, which goes beyond
all their panaccas, portable gold, and
philosoher's stones "a asovereian REM
cdy TO all diseases but, as it is com
monty abuse by most men, which
take il as tink ers do ale, tits plague
II mischief, violent purger OF goods
lands. hcaltn." Que may read i'll thl'
/! the expert; nee Of many ''merric, fa'
cete, aud Juvenile" hours with old
John Rouse, OF the BOdleian, in tho
back quad OF Christ Church, for 1t
like Burton, was IL hero OF the weed
Mathematicians have generally beer
great smokers, though we hope fol
tho hunOr Of the name they did not
like Sir Isaac Newton, use the fingers
of their lady lovers for shoppers
All the wits of Queen Anncs's time
were nothing without their pipes
Steele wrote with pipe in his
mouth, and il was when wreathed il
smoke that Addison shone most
Dryden, alter his snuffbox. loved q
whitf, and The great Mr.. Congieve
scorucd not a "chhrLhwarden >
Ambrose Phillips was eloquent in itt
praises, and his nAmesuke John has
written delightful a!caic ode in its
praise. Who can forget honest DIR
Browns Little pipe? The "Specta
tor" always devoted an hour in the
evening to absorbing a clay land ifeve,
his quaninity was disturbed
it was when the dancing
Frenchman broke his pipes. In la
ter times tobacco has not been SO pop
ulur with literary men; Shelly could
not endure a pipe, nor could Edgar
Poe nor Moole. Neither Macaulay
nor DE Quincy were smokers. Ii
report speaks truly, however,a geud
many distinguished writers of our
own day keep up the traditions of old
times. The novels of Dickens did no,
suffer, nor perhaps do the poems OF
Mr.. Teuuys"n, from their devotion
TO the "sweete habite."-Londoi
Globe.
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