Page:Confessions of an English opium-eater (IA confessionsofeng00dequrich).pdf/206

 nature of the suffering disposes me to think that it was true: for, if it had been any mere irregular affection of the stomach, it should naturally have intermitted occasionally, and constantly fluctuated as to degree. The intention of nature, as manifested in the healthy state, obviously is—to withdraw from our notice all the vital motions, such as the circulation of the blood, the expansion and contraction of the lungs, the peristaltic action of the stomach, &c.; and opium, it seems, is able in this as in other instances to counteract her purposes.—By the advice of the surgeon I tried bitters: for a short time these greatly mitigated the feelings under which I laboured: but about the forty-second day of the experiment the symptoms already noticed began to retire, and new ones to arise of a different and far more tormenting class: under these, but with a few intervals of remission, I have since continued to suffer. But I dismiss them undescribed for two reasons: 1st, because the mind revolts from retracing circumstantially any sufferings from which it is removed by too short or by