The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1883-03-10
Temperance Reading.
ALCOHOLIC STIMULANTS AS MEDI.
CINES,

Extract from Paper Read by r. Greene M.
D., of Boston, before One of the Medical So
cieties of that City.l ....
There seems to exist force of habit
or prevailing fashion, among physicians
to prescribe alcoholic stimulantS upon
nearly all occasions, and believe they
do so without considering the evils
which are likely to result from their
use, or realizing the responsibility which
reallyr rests upon them as individuals, and
as members of the medical profession.
All Intoxicating stimulaDts are inju-
rious, and when takeninto the human
system have the effect, first to excite,
then to depress, the entire vital force.
AS the habit of using intoxicauts is in
creased, the desire for food and the
power to .assimilate tits diminished. This
fact becomes more apparent as the
habit increases, and in the stages i'm
mediately preceding the delirium ire
mems the desire for food and the power
to digest and assimilate it are entirely
suspended. ..rs ....
Alcohol is neither food nor medicine.
1t cannot add one molecule to the plasm
out of which our bodies are daily built
up. On the contrary, it exerts upon
the whole animal economy a most dele-l
FERROUS influence. 1t does not supply,
but diminishes, vital force. 1t weakens
the nerves, deadens the sensibilities,
and lessons the power of the system to
/ resist disease, or to recover from It's
| effects
Alcoholic stimulants may serve pur-
pose in bridging over attacks of sinking
or prostration, and physicians may, and
often do, interpret such momentary ex-
altation as favorable to life and health.
and so continue their use. But the in
cited activity produced by such stimu-
lants does not last many hours, and
can not be extended for any great length
of time even by the continued use of the
stimulants, because the depressing
effects, which are sure to follow their
use, more than counterfeit their power
to stimulate. Alcohol may keep up an
excitement of the system for time, but
it can not nourish or sustain the vital
force. 1t infames the stomach, weak.
ems the power of digestion and assimila-
ton, and can not be long continued
without disastrous results.
Do you mean to say that you do not
approve of alcoholic stimulants under
any circumstances? is a question asked
me very frequently, and with real ear
nestness, by physicians and so-callef
Temperance men, who have not vet seer
| their way to total abstinence.
They have many examples to relate
of the good done by beer, wine, whisky
and brandy, but | believe their estimate
OF the good &C emphasized by these slim
ulants is erroneous.
have often witnessed cases where
alcoholic stimulants had been given for
days and even weeks, when the attend
ing physicians seemed to think that
their patients had been kept alive upon
such stimulants, when it seemed to me
evident they had survived in spite of the
liquors and would have recovered much
sooner without them; and l have seen
other patients succumb who it would
seem might have recovered from their
diseases but from the additional shock
produced by the use of such stimulants-
In the case of a patient rapidly sink
ing, 1 might perhaps administer whisky
or brandy, were nothing else at hand,
but with the firm belief that the object
would have been more satisfactorily
attained by harmless medicines.
As result of thirty years of pro-
fessional experience and practical OBJ
servation, l feel assured that alcoholic
stimulants are not required as medicines
and | believe that many, if not ma.
jority of physicians to day, of education
and experience, are satisfied that alco-
holic stimulants as medicines are worse
than useless, and physicians generally
have only to overcome the force of
habit, and the prevailing fashion in
medicine, to find a more excellent way,
when they will al look back with WON
der and surprise that they, as individuals
and as members of an honored profess
sion. should have been so far COM
promised.