Smoking and thinking / [a student of physiology].

  • Student of physiology.
Date:
[1867?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Smoking and thinking / [a student of physiology]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    22500834568 fumes of tobacco necessarily leads to rapid changes in them ; they lose their round shape, they become oval and irregular, and instead of having a mutual attraction for each other, and running together—a good sign of their physical health—they lie loosely scattered before the eye, and indicate to the learned observer as clearly as though they spoke to him and said the words, that the man from whom they were taken is physically depressed and deplorably deficient both in muscular and mental energy.” Tobacco modifies the circulation in the brain, as in other portions of the body. Hence it would be remarkable indeed if it did not exercise some influence upon the mechanism of thought. M. Meunier, says “A sincere self observing smoker cannot fail, to recognise that tobacco creates a new being more disposed to dreaming than action.” Although a great smoker himself he considered that the habit was inimical to the national mind. His frequent diatribes against this mort aux peuples excited much raillery, but the habit of 20 years was long too strong for him. So close was the connection between work and smoke with M. Meunier, that the amount of intellectual labour he had performed was chronicled by the extent of his consumption of tobacco. When at last, after many fruitless attempts, he put his conduct in harmony with his opinions, it required several weeks of undivided attention to break the chain of habit which bound him. The mode by which nicotine acts upon the blood-vessels explains the apparent contradiction, that it should be able to excite into momentary activity an organ which it has enfeebled and stupefied. The excitement and over-activity which it causes in the contractile apparatus of the walls of the blood-vessels are quickly followed by general fatigue, which is only a modified paralysis. Thinking, as we have seen, is closely related with the cerebral circu¬ lation. When, by continual usage, the muscular tissue of the blood¬ vessels has become gradually benumbed, the blood, in place of its natural rapid flow, circulates slowly and sluggishly, and the functional energy of the brain is diminished. But with a new exhibition of the stimulant the muscular contractility is again excited, the circulation becomes quicker, the brain, abundantly and regularly bathed by the life-blood, takes up again its functions, the brain power increases, ideas flow with greater rapidity. But the activity thus produced cannot last. With this stimulation, disappear the brilliant results which it had produced, and the organ falls into a relaxed condition from which only increased doses can temporarily rescue it. One of the results upon the brain is the loss of memory. Many authors have noticed this fact. The case of l’Abbe Moigno, the celebrated editor of Les Mondes, is very curious. He had often been in the habit of taking snuff, which had always led to prejudicial results. After various temporary renunciations he had returned to its use. In 1861, whilst engaged in some mathematical labours, he took from 20 to 25 grammes daily, and found himself continually having recourse to the snuff-box. The effect was a rapid extinction of the faculty of memory. He had learned several languages, by their root words, of which he knew from 1,200 to 1,500 of each tongue, but he found that his power of 3’ecalling these words was gradually diminishing. Struck with this fact he resolved to abandon