Temperance > Autobiography and personal recollections of John B. Gough

120 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN B. GOUGH.
felt faint and sick, and before the lecture had proceeded
far, was obliged to leave the hall.
Now other persons are not thus affected. Some men ac¬
tually enjoy taking ether or laughing-gas. I think I would
endure almost any agony rather than inhale ether. I
once took it under the direction of Dr. Morton of Boston;
the sensation to me was as if my soul was being forcibly
driven out of my body, and was clinging and struggling
■to retain possession; the experience was awful, and I did
not recover in four weeks from the effect of the adminis-
! tration of ether. So with drink, on some temperaments;
j one glass will mount to the brain instantly, weakening
the power of will, affecting the self-control, stimulating
the perception, while it destroys its accuracy, and the man
is not the same. That one glass has caused partial in¬
sanity; and his judgment being perverted,—slightly, it
may be, but sensibly,—in a degree he is not so able to
resist the temptation, and the appetite being roused, takes
hold of him and drags him down in its fearful embrace.
The only safety for such a man is total abstinence; and to
a man who has been a victim, bound by the cords of this
| fierce desire, it will be a life-struggle, when at times the
j old appetite comes over him 'like a wave. Let him do
anything but drink, let him run,— it is not cowardly to
run.
I knew a man who was strongly tempted, and escaped.
He was a printer, and working near a window opposite
which was the “Shades,” he saw persons coming out
wiping their lips, having taken their “eleven o’clock.”
He began to want it, and grew nervous; the desire in¬
creased; every fibre of his system seemed to cry out for it,
when he dropped his form of type; and, in his vexation
at the accident, took off his apron, put on his coat, with
the intention of getting a drink; when, as he said, he