To this it is replied that the distinction made between yayin and tirosh does not exist. Both parties are agreed that the former term is the generic one (corresponding with the Greek nines, the Latin yinuin, and the English wine, with all of which it is believed to be etymologically connected); but it is denied by the scriptural opponents of total absti nence that yayin means fermented, and tirosh, unfermented wines, exclusively. Not to trench upon the chemistry of the question, which, it is affirmed, wholly disproves the possibility of the " juice of the grape," being kept for any length of time without under going a process of fermentation, and thereby acquiring to a certain degree intoxicating properties, it is alleged that the etymology of tirosh does not favor the teetotal view. According to Gesenius, it is derived from the root ydrash, " to get possession of;" that is, of the brain. Dr. Lees, indeed, quotes Bythner as suggesting that it may have been so named because the vine was a "possession " in the eyes of the Hebrews; but this is extremely improbable, and iu the absence of other explanations, that of Gesenius is cer tainly to be preferred. Again tirosh is not exclusively used to denote the " fruit " (strictly so called) of the vine; the dreaded yayin performs the same harmless function —e.g., in Jer. xl. 10, where it is connected with a verb, significant of " gathering," and in Ps. civ. 14, 15, with another expressive of growth. It is even denied that tirosh is ordinarily to be so understood, for although, being mostly found in connection with "corn," the verb applied to the consumption of that article of food is by zeugma made to apply to the " wine" also, yet in the only passage where the act of consuming tirosh alone is mentioned (Is. lxii. 8, 9), the verb is shrtticailt, which invariably signifies the act of drinking. Lastly, it cannot be shown that tircish, when it does mean wine, means innocuous wine. No doubt, yayin is the one generally employed when wine:is denounced, and tirosh when it is praised, but this is not uniformly the case, for in Hos. iv. 11, "whoredom and wine (yayin) and new wine (tir'<;81i) take away the heart,"tirosh actually forms (as has been remarked) " the climax " of intoxicating influences. The conclusion, therefore, to be drawn from a consideration of Scripture is, that the distinction insisted on by total abstainers between the two terms—viz., that the one (yayin) means fermented, and the other (tirosh) unfermented wines, is one that cannot be maintained, Both must be held as referring to fermented intoxicating wine; and the praise of tirosh is simply to be considered a recommendation of the moderate use of ordinary wine, as the condem nation of ?min is to be regarded as a solemn prohibition of excess in the same.
The physiological argument in favor of total abstinence necessarily takes various shapes; for it is concerned with physiological questions which are yet, to a great extent, matter of opinion—of speculation and conjecture, not of science. A question arises upon three distinct points: 1st, the effects of alcoholic liquors in quantities sufficient to produce intoxication; 2d, their effects when habitually used in moderate quantities; 3d, the effect of abstaining from them altogether.
Upon the first point, teetotalers usually maintain that insanity, idiocy, almost every form of organic disease, many chronic, not a few acute disorders, are frequent results of habitual intoxication; that the children of drunkards are often idiotic, and have trans mitted to them various diseases, which are produced by excessive drinking—which, therefore, tends to the deterioration of the race; that drunkards are always the first victims of epidemics; and that it can be shown from tables of mortality that drinking has a marked effect iu shortening life. It is not disputed that many of these effects can be con
nected with the habitual use of liquors in excess; but as to some of the most striking of them, it is denied that they are physiological effects of such excess—being not direct results of hard drinking, but due to the bad conditions under which poor people who drink hard usually live. The question between teetotalers and those who differ from them, at this point, however, is only a matter of degree. The latter admit that alcohol, in narcotic or intoxicating quantities, produces only injurious results. In such quanti ties it has a deteriorating, a devitalizing influence upon the brain and nervous tissue, and habitual excess in its use is attended by a progressive impairment of nervous struc ture, indicated at length by such results as epilepsy or delirium. See INTOXICATION. But the results of excess differ greatly, it is said, in the case of different persons, so that, not unfrequently, many years of hard drinking do not affect the system of the drinker in a marked degree.
It is upon the second point—the habitual use of alcoholic drinks in moderation— that the opinion of teetotalers seriously conflicts with that of many physiologists. The teetotal argument—leaving out minor points, such as an alleged effect of alcohol in impairing the digestion—may be stated thus: 1. Alcohol can never have been intended by nature for the food of men. It is never produced spontaneously in nature. The vegetable world yields in abundance the principles which form the flesh, and those which keep up the heat of the body, but the healthy plant never produces alcohol. In the body too, in health, food is never converted into alcohol. And the body does not merely not produce alcohol; it treats it as a foreign element, and gets rid of it as fast as possible. 2. Alcohol in the body, by taking up the oxygen supplied through the lungs, checks the burning of tissue, upon which life and the production of energy, mus cular or mental, depend; and similarly it impedes the efforts of the body to get rid of the waste matters which are the products of the burning. It thus lowers vitality, viti ates the blood, and prevents the production of healthy fiber. Toddy or beer taken at bed-time, instead of being favorable to health, has just the same effect, according to Dr. Carpenter, with sleeping in a four-post bed with the curtains carefully tucked under the bed-clothes. In either case, that is, there is a diminution of the supply of oxygen required for vital processes, especially for burning the waste of the body. 3. The stimu lation produced by alcohol is succeeded by a recoil or reaction; and to produce a certain effect of stimulation, the quantity taken must constantly be increased. From this cause —to say nothing of social influences connected with drinking calculated to produce the same result—moderate drinking tends to pass into excessive drinking, about the evil con sequences of which there is no dispute.