Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 83.djvu/267

Rh, are greater and he feels more the need of the harmonizing action of alcohol.

Again, we can understand why even the primitive man finds alcohol a relief, for the tension of his life is great as compared with the lower animals and we can understand why the desire increases with the progress of civilization and the corresponding increase of tension. The stress of life is greatest among the Anglo-Saxon people and greatest of all perhaps in American cities at the present time. In this country especially, the intense life of concentration, of effort, of endeavor, of struggle, of rapid development, has for its correlate an intense longing, not for stimulants,—for our life, our climate, our environment are surely stimulating enough,—but for rest, for relaxation, for harmony, for something to still temporarily the eternal turmoil.

Does the fact that the desire for alcohol is increased by the indulgence in it and the apparent fact that those who fall victims to its excessive use are not always those most in need of its harmonizing action present any difficulty in this theory? Probably not. The desire for relaxation is not necessarily increased by the use of alcohol but only the ever renewed demand for that which produces the longed for effect, and, again, it is not certain that those who fall victims to its excessive use are not those most in need of its harmonizing action. Here the element of prudence and self-control must be taken into account. Excessive users may be those having lesser control or greater opportunity, not those experiencing stronger desire. While the desire for alcohol is increasing with the complexity of society, it is actually true that drunkenness is decreasing and it is possibly true that the number of total abstainers is increasing. These things are determined by custom, by individual environment and education and by the power of self control. But the steady increase in the desire for alcohol is shown not merely in the steady increase in its consumption but still more in the fact that it increases in the face of public and private sentiment, legal statute and social effort.

We see also why the use of alcohol has commonly followed the law of rhythm. Among primitive tribes drinking was periodic, wild orgies of intoxication following considerable periods of the plodding life. This periodicity is seen in convivial drinking of all times and is a familiar fact in every community at the present. The power of self-restraint, strengthened by public sentiment and private prudence, deters from the use of alcohol up to a certain point, when the cumulative force of the desire, which is the cumulative need of release from painful tension, overthrows all barriers and excess and complete relaxation follow for a season.

So it appears that the effect of alcohol is a kind of "catharsis." We recall Aristotle's theory of the drama, which, he says, purifies the mind by giving free expression to certain of the emotions. In a way, therefore, the significance of alcohol is that it is an escape. It is not