[Illustration]
In the Bellevue Hospital Medical College, when I was a student, I
performed an experiment that vividly impressed upon my mind the naked
fact that nicotin is a deadly poison. A large, healthy cat had become
such a nuisance that it was decided to kill it. This I proceeded to do
by the following method: I soaked enough tobacco in water to make an
ordinary cigarette. Then I injected under the cat’s skin a hypodermic
syringe full of this tobacco juice. In a few moments the cat began to
quiver, then to tremble more violently, then it had cramps, and in less
than twenty minutes it died in violent convulsions.
I take no pride in relating this experiment, for I know a shorter as
well as a more merciful method of ending a cat’s life.
But what interests me now is the truth that thousands of young men and
boys are waking up to the fact that tobacco in any form, and cigarettes
in particular, are unmitigated evils. And that for their own sakes,
they cannot afford to introduce into their bodies that which only
makes them weak, sickly, and useless.
I will tell you, briefly, how the burden of this terrible curse was
rolled upon my heart. God used a never-to-be-forgotten incident to burn
into my soul the tremendous importance of this cigarette evil.
One day, an old lady, with a faded red shawl thrown over her stooping
shoulders, came into my office, and asked if I could see her boy.
Two strong men then brought before me a poor boy of seventeen years,
wild-eyed and insane. The mother asked if he could be cured.
After investigating the case, I was compelled to tell her that the
outlook was hopeless, and that she might just as well send him to the
lunatic asylum. She broke down and sobbed as though her heart would
break. I asked her what had brought this terrible condition upon her
son, and she said:--
“Oh, it was cigarettes. He began to smoke more and more, until he used
fifty a day, and then his mind gave way.”
That day I became thoroughly enlisted in the anti-cigarette war. O that
our souls might become saturated with the importance of fighting this
awful evil! Cigarettes are making our boys weak and puny and unmanly.
They are sapping the strength from their muscles, and making them
unable to win their way in the world.
I care not how intelligent or brainy a boy may naturally be, a short
period of cigarette smoking will tell on him. He may not notice this
himself, at once, but others will. And I wish the young men and
boys to remember that if there is work to be done in the world which
requires much effort, either of brain or muscle, the cigarette smoker
is not chosen for the job. Why?--Because when the time comes to use the
brain or the muscles for some supreme effort, the poor, poison-soaked
muscles fail to respond, and the benumbed brain cannot do its best
work. I think if the boys only understood that cigarettes and tobacco
were ruining them physically and mentally, and preparing them for
certain defeat in life, they would shun both as they would the plague.
_The Cigarette Fiend is an Object of Pity_
When I talk on the cigarette evil in the Chicago public schools, I
ask how many of the children know of some poor crippled boy whose leg
was cut off by a street-car accident. Such a boy, if he has brains
and character, may yet fill a position of trust and usefulness in the
world, but the boy who begins to smoke cigarettes early enough, can
never be of any use in this world, and unless he repents, there will be
no place for him in the next. To try to put knowledge into his brain,
is as hopeless a task as to try to fill a basket with water.
The cigarette-smoking boy is looked upon by other people as an object
of pity. There is nothing truly brave or heroic about him. There may
have been naturally, but nature has been doped and stupefied and
abused, until there is nothing left in the poor lad that is manly
at all. If he wants to be a great hunter or a fine marksman or
sharpshooter, he must either give up this ambition, or else let the
cigarette alone forever. If he would like to be a famous doctor or
a skillful surgeon, he must not ruin his nerves, or he cannot trust
himself to hold a surgeon’s knife. No one would be willing to risk his
life in such hands.
[Illustration: _Listless Cigarette Smoker_]
[Illustration: _Pumping Water into Basket_]
Hang a half dozen brick around a boy’s neck, and ask him to swim a race
with you. Would that be fair? But the cigarette habit pulls one under
in life’s struggle, just the same.
What would the boys think if they saw a lad vigorously rubbing sand
into his eyes? They would think him crazy. Is it any more foolish to
rub sand into the eyes than it is to rub poison into the brain?
Suppose I should hand a boy my watch, and presently he begins to pour
tar into its works. Would you think he had much sense?
O it is cruel and unmanly to ruin and clog up and destroy these
wonderful bodies of ours. What an astonishing piece of machinery the
brain is! Almost everything depends upon having the head clear,--the
reasoning powers sharp and acute. But the deadly cigarette destroys the
keen sensibility of the nerve and brain cells, and renders the victim
unable to think clearly or logically.
Men who train great wrestlers and athletes to perform almost
unbelievable feats of physical endurance, know better than to allow
them to poison and paralyze these muscles of iron. Who ever heard of an
athlete smoking half a dozen cigarettes just before starting in to win
his medal as champion?
[Illustration: “_The cigarette kills the boy in the same way._”]
_Destroys on the Installment Plan_
Who has not watched the old family cat and noticed how she kills a
mouse,--a little at a time,--crushing her teeth into the poor thing’s
body, then letting it limp away a short distance, then springing upon
it and crushing it some more. Now the cigarette kills the boy in just
the same way, or, in other words, on the installment plan.
Any experienced physician can pick out a cigarette slave almost as far
as he can see him; for no one can smoke cigarettes a very long time,
before he begins to have the devil’s trade-mark stamped upon him.
We must never forget that we only pass over this road once,--we have
but one life here to live; and when we reach the end of the journey,
if the _Master_ cannot say to us, “Well done,” our life has been a
hopeless failure.
_A Simple but Sure Cure_
But suppose you have in mind some poor fellow who has become enslaved
by the unmanly habit. Of course you pity him in his helpless bondage.
Well, you may assure him that he may be saved by living exclusively on
a fruit diet for several days, eating all he wishes of it three or four
times a day, drinking plenty of water, and availing himself of a sweat
bath or two if convenient. I know from experience that God is on the
side of the fellow who is trying to do right,--that he may look to Him
for special help. Then the poor cigarette slave will be astonished to
see that it _is_ possible to slip out from under the yoke of habit.
Now in conclusion I want to say a few words to grown people who use
tobacco. I have seen a father teach his boy to pray, to ride a bicycle,
and to spell; but I never yet have seen a sensible, respectable man
teach his boy to smoke. This is the best argument I know against
tobacco using. If a man really believed tobacco was good for him, he
would want his wife, or his sister, or his mother, and his child to
share with him in this blessing.
_The Real Truth about Tobacco_
Tobacco does give a certain amount of unearned felicity, just as
alcohol or morphin does; but it charges a terrific toll in the way of
high blood pressure, injury to the nervous system and the digestive
organs, and more or less impairment of the whole man. Every man who is
a tobacco user sacrifices some of the best that is in him, spiritually,
mentally, and physically. The intolerable craving for the after-dinner
cigarette is often produced by the juicy beefsteak, highly spiced
food, or tea and coffee, that compose the meal. Hence, he who would
be delivered from the tobacco habit, should religiously avoid such
articles of food as create a demand and an unnatural craving for
tobacco.
But some will ask, “is it worse for a child to smoke a cigarette than
it is for a man to smoke a cigar?”--Yes, for three reasons:--
_First_, a man may safely tolerate a quarter of a grain of morphin,
while we dare not give a child more than a sixteenth part of a grain.
A young person’s nervous system is peculiarly susceptible to the
influence of such narcotic drugs as nicotin and morphin, and hence an
introduction to either of them early in life, spells almost certain
disaster, mental or nervous, later in life.
_Second_, the loosely packed cigarette does not permit the nicotin to
condense to the same extent as when it is drawn through pipe or cigar;
hence the smoker gets the full benefit (?) of this virulent poison.
_Third_, the oxidation of the cigarette paper produces deadly poison
which is only second in its effects to that of nicotin itself.
Well, then, to sum up: Is it any wonder that so many thousands of
our brightest, smartest, keenest young men and boys are signing the
Cigarette Pledge? They are keen enough to see that cigarettes and
tobacco used in any form, mean weak brains, flabby muscles, diseased
heart, and a useless and unhappy life.