e act in relieving pain is another article,
that well deserves our attention. There are many pains that originate from
defect as well as from excess of stimulus; of these are those of the six
appetites of hunger, thirst, lust, the want of heat, of distention, and of
fresh air. Thus if our cutaneous capillaries cease to act from the
diminished stimulus of heat, when we are exposed to cold weather, or our
stomach is uneasy for want of food; these are both pains from defect of
stimulus, and in consequence opium, which stimulates all the moving system
into increased action, must relieve them. But this is not the case in those
pains, which arise from excess of stimulus, as in violent inflammations: in
these the exhibition of opium is frequently injurious by increasing the
action of the system already too great, as in inflammation of the bowels
mortification is often produced by the stimulus of opium. Where, however,
no such bad consequences follow; the stimulus of opium, by increasing all
the motions of the system, expends so much of the sensorial power, that the
actions of the whole system soon become feebler, and in consequence those
which produced the pain and inflammation.

4. When intoxication proceeds a little further, the quantity of pleasurable
sensation is so far increased, that all desire ceases, for there is no pain
in the system to excite it. Hence the voluntary exertions are diminished,
staggering and stammering succeed; and the trains of ideas become more and
more inconsistent from this defect of voluntary exertion, as explained in
the sections on sleep and reverie, whilst those passions which are unmixed
with volition are more vividly felt, and shewn with less reserve; hence
pining love, or superstitious fear, and the maudling tear dropped on the
remembrance of the most trifling distress.

5. At length all these circumstances are increased; the quantity of
pleasure introduced into the system by the increased irritative muscular
motions of the whole sanguiferous, and glandular, and absorbent systems,
becomes so great, that the organs of sense are more forcibly excited into
action by this internal pleasurable sensation, than by the irritation from
the stimulus of external objects. Hence the drunkard ceases to attend to
external stimuli, and as volition is now also suspended, the trains of his
ideas become totally inconsistent as in dreams, or delirium: and at length
a stupor succeeds from the great exhaustion of