he whole animal being, but that which begins in the
inferior departments of our being is the most entire degradation and
sensualizing of the soul.

Now it is from this point of thought that we learn to extend the
apostle's principle. Wine is but a specimen of a class of stimulants.
All that begins from _without_ belongs to the same class. The stimulus
may be afforded by almost any enjoyment of the senses. Drunkenness may
come from anything wherein is excess: from over-indulgence in society,
in pleasure, in music, and in the delight of listening to oratory,
nay, even from the excitement of sermons and religious meetings. The
prophet tells us of those who are drunken, and not with wine.

The other point of difference is one of effect. Fulness of the Spirit
calms; fulness produced by excitement satiates and exhausts. They who
know the world of fashion tell us that the tone adopted there is,
either to be, or to affect to be, sated with enjoyment, to be proof
against surprise, to have lost all keenness of enjoyment, and to have
all keenness of wonder gone. That which ought to be men's shame
becomes their boast--unsusceptibility of any fresh emotion.

Whether this be real or affected matters not; it is, in truth, the
real result of the indulgence of the senses. The law is this: the
"crime of sense is avenged by sense which wears with time;" for it has
been well remarked that the terrific punishment attached to the
habitual indulgence of the senses is, that the incitements to
enjoyment increase in proportion as the power of enjoyment fades.

Experience at last forbids even the hope of enjoyment; the sin of the
intoxicated soul is loathed, detested, abhorred; yet it is done. The
irritated sense, like an avenging fury, goads on with a restlessness
of craving, and compels a reiteration of the guilt though it has
ceased to charm.

To this danger our own age is peculiarly exposed. In the earlier and
simpler ages, the need of keen feeling finds a natural and safe outlet
in compulsory exertions. For instance, in the excitement of real
warfare, and in the necessity of providing the sustenance of life,
warlike habits and healthy labour stimulate, without exhausting life.
But in proportion as civilization advances, a large class of the
community are exempted from the necessity of these, and thrown upon a
life of leisure. Then it is that artificial life begins, and
artificial expedients become ne