We have accidentally seen the manuscript copy of an address pronounced
lately before your society, by Dr. McAllister. The research on which it
is founded, and its perspicuity and arrangement, entitle it to a form
more permanent than manuscript. But if the results are true, which it
attempts to substantiate, they present imperious considerations for the
publication of the address.
We are not disposed to contract the circle of enjoyment; but if mischief
crouches under the covert of any pleasure, propriety requires a
notification to the unwary. Even should experience warrant the
conclusion that habit enables us to use tobacco with physical impunity,
(a conclusion Dr. McAllister powerfully controverts,) we must concede,
that its use is disgusting to persons not infected with the habit.
Civilization is composed of innumerable acts of self-denial; while the
gratification of appetites, regardless of others, is the strongest
feature of barbarism. We see then, even as a dictate of refinement, that
the use of tobacco should be abandoned; and it has been abandoned by all
the polite circles of Europe.
But tobacco possesses that strong characteristic of a bad habit; it
seldom leaves its votaries the liberty of abandonment. All which the
address can effect, is an admonition to youth, over whom tobacco has not
yet acquired its bad supremacy. As parents, then, anxious to see our
children uncontaminated by disgustful practices; as citizens, emulous
that our country shall not be surpassed in refinement by the nations of
Europe, we are solicitous that the address of Dr. McAllister should be
published, and in a pamphlet form, under the authority of your society.
We are aware that this request involves a departure from your general
disposition of the periodical addresses of your members, but we beg to
suggest that the general interest of the present production renders a
departure from your usual course not invidious, but a duty which we
humbly think you owe to philanthropy. In support of our opinion, we take
the liberty of enclosing you a letter from a distinguished
fellow-citizen in Albany, who also accidentally saw the address: and we
are, Gentlemen,
With very great respect, your ob't serv'ts,
A. B. JOHNSON,
D. C. LANSING,
HIRAM DENIO,
R. R. LANSING,
EDM'D A. WETMORE,
WILLIAM WILLIAMS,
SAM'L D. DAKIN.
UTICA, Feb. 27, 1830.
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Lydius Street, Albany, }
Friday Evening, January 22d, 1830. }