een used. "Like
opium, it calms the agitations of our corporeal frame, and soothes the
anxieties and distresses of the mind." Its powers are felt and its
fascinations acknowledged, by all the intermediate grades of society,
from the sot who wallows in the mire of your streets, to the clergyman
who stands forth a pattern of moral excellence, and who ministers at the
altar of God. For it the Arab will traverse, unwearied, his burning
deserts; and the Icelander risk his life amidst perpetual snows. Its
charms are experienced alike, by the savage who roams the wilds of an
American forest, and the courtier who rolls in luxury and prescribes
rules of refinement to the civilized world; by the miscreant who wrings
from the cold hand of charity the pittance that sustains his life, and
the monarch who sways his sceptre over half the globe; by him who is
bent with woes and years, and him whose cheek is covered yet with
boyhood's down. Hence we might conclude it capable of giving strength to
the weary, vivacity to the stupid, and wisdom to men void of
understanding; capable of soothing the sorrows of the afflicted, of
healing the wounds of the spirit, and assuaging the anguish of a broken
heart. But how it fulfils these desirable indications, will be our next
business to inquire.

Tobacco, as a luxury, has been used for the two last centuries over all
the civilized, and the greater portion of the uncivilized world. The
modes have been _snuffing_, _smoking_, and _chewing_. Its effects, when
habitually used in each of these modes, will now be examined. As far as
my observations extend, few, if any, of all the devotees to this
stupefying substance, ever resort to its use without some supposed
necessity; and often, alas _too often_, by the advice of physicians.

The benefit to be derived from the exhibition of a medicine in the cure
of disease, should not alone induce us to prescribe it, without due
regard to the injury which may result to the constitution. Had this rule
been observed relative to the subject under consideration, I apprehend
the use of this baneful drug would have been less extensive.

Snuff has been prescribed for a variety of complaints, among which are
headache, catarrh, and some species of opthalmia, and no doubt sometimes
with very good effect; as I have, in a very few instances, witnessed.
But the fact seems to have been overlooked, that its only power to
relieve these complaints arises from the copious discharg