very different from the grosser forms of drunkenness
which prevail among some modern nations.

The physician in modern times would restrict the old man's use of wine
within narrow limits. He would tell us that you cannot restore strength
by a stimulus. Wine may call back the vital powers in disease, but
cannot reinvigorate old age. In his maxims of health and longevity,
though aware of the importance of a simple diet, Plato has omitted to
dwell on the perfect rule of moderation. His commendation of wine is
probably a passing fancy, and may have arisen out of his own habits
or tastes. If so, he is not the only philosopher whose theory has been
based upon his practice.

Plato's denial of wine to the young and his approval of it for
their elders has some points of view which may be illustrated by the
temperance controversy of our own times. Wine may be allowed to have a
religious as well as a festive use; it is commended both in the Old and
New Testament; it has been sung of by nearly all poets; and it may be
truly said to have a healing influence both on body and mind. Yet it is
also very liable to excess and abuse, and for this reason is prohibited
by Mahometans, as well as of late years by many Christians, no less than
by the ancient Spartans; and to sound its praises seriously seems to
partake of the nature of a paradox. But we may rejoin with Plato that
the abuse of a good thing does not take away the use of it. Total
abstinence, as we often say, is not the best rule, but moderate
indulgence; and it is probably true that a temperate use of wine may
contribute some elements of character to social life which we can ill
afford to lose. It draws men out of their reserve; it helps them to
forget themselves and to appear as they by nature are when not on their
guard, and therefore to make them more human and greater friends to
their fellow-men. It gives them a new experience; it teaches them to
combine self-control with a measure of indulgence; it may sometimes
restore to them the simplicity of childhood. We entirely agree with
Plato in forbidding the use of wine to the young; but when we are
of mature age there are occasions on which we derive refreshment and
strength from moderate potations. It is well to make abstinence the
rule, but the rule may sometimes admit of an exception. We are in a
higher, as well as in a lower sense, the better for the use of wine.
The question runs up into wider ones--What is the general effe