Tobacco and madness.

One reads in the Siècle of April 15, 1865:

"Cases of paralysis and of mental alienation are increasing in France, in direct ratio to the yield of the tax on tobacco. From 1812 to 1832, the resources brought to the budget by the tax on tobacco amounted to 28 million, and the asylums for the insane counted 8,000 demented persons. Today, the figure of the tax reaches 180 million and there are counted 44,000 alienated or paralytic persons in the specialized hospitals.

"These parallels, furnished by Mr. Jolly at the last session of the Academy of Sciences, ought to make the lovers of nicotinized vapors reflect. Mr. Jolly ended his study with this sentence, threatening for the present generation: The immoderate use of tobacco, especially of the pipe, occasions a debility in the brain and the spinal cord, whence results madness."

If it were still necessary to refute, after all that has been said, the allegations of those who claim that Spiritism fills the asylums of the insane, the figures would furnish an unanswerable argument, because they not only rest upon a material fact and a logical scientific principle, but they establish that the increase in the number of the alienated dates back to more than twenty years before Spiritism was thought of. Now, it is not logical to admit that the effect preceded the cause. Spiritists are not preserved from the material causes that can disturb the brain, any more than from the accidents capable of breaking arms and legs. It is not, then, to be wondered at that there should be Spiritists among the mad. But, alongside the material causes, there are moral causes; it is against these that Spiritists have a powerful preservative in their beliefs. Thus, if one day it becomes possible to have an exact, conscientious statistic, made without prejudice, of the cases of madness due to moral causes, one will incontestably see their number diminish with the development of Spiritism. There will also diminish the number of cases occasioned by excess and abuse of alcoholic beverages, but this will not prevent burning fever, accompanied by delirium, and many other causes of disorders of reason. It is well known that certain men of letters of renown die mad in consequence of the immoderate use of absinthe, whose deleterious effects upon the brain and the spinal cord are today demonstrated. If these men had occupied themselves with Spiritism, they would not have failed to hold the doctrine responsible for it. As for us, we do not fear to affirm that if they had occupied themselves with it seriously, they would have been more moderate in everything, and would not have exposed themselves to these sad consequences of intemperance. A parallel similar to the one Dr. Jolly draws could perhaps, with as much or more reason, be drawn between the proportion of the alienated and the consumption of absinthe.

But here is another cause put in evidence by the Siècle of April 21, in the following fact:

One reads in the Droit: "Joséphine-Sophie D…, nineteen years old, a workwoman polishing metals, resides like her parents on the Rue Bourbon-Villeneuve. She devotes herself with incredible ardor to the reading of the novels contained in the so-called popular publications, costing five centimes. The exaggerated sentiments, the scandalous characters, the implausible events, with which these works are generally filled, influence her intelligence in a deplorable manner. She believed herself called to the highest destinies. Her parents, although in a somewhat difficult position, had made every possible sacrifice to give her instruction; nevertheless, in her eyes they were but poor creatures, incapable of understanding her and of rising to the sphere to which she aspired.

"For a long time Sophie D… had been giving herself over to these romantic thoughts. Seeing, at last, that no spiritual being occupied itself with her and that her life must pass, like that of the other workwomen, amid labor and the cares of the family, she resolved to put an end to her days, no doubt in the expectation that her dreams would be realized in another world.

"Yesterday morning, as they were surprised not to see her appear at the hour when she was to set out for work, her young sister went to call her. On opening the door she was seized by a nervous agitation, on seeing her sister hanged: she had hung herself from the hook that fitted the beam of the bed. She called the parents, who hastened to cut the cord; however, all attempts to recall the daughter to life were fruitless."

Here, then, is a case of madness and of suicide caused by those very persons who accuse Spiritism of filling the asylums of the insane. Can novels, then, exalt the imagination to such a point that reason is disturbed? One could cite a good number of similar cases, without counting the mad produced by the fear of the devil over weak spirits. But Spiritism arose and each one hastened to make of it the scapegoat for his own faults.