22. THE INEBRIATE; Hereditary and Grandma

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I have elsewhere stated my own case with but slight reserve, because, out of the mystery of this iniquity, one may not with safety speak positively of another’s. I have described myself as a “congenital periodical” inebriate, and have endeavored to make it clear to the reader as to myself that my tor­ment was inherited.

There is a little Dionysus in all of us

And yet I am of a family scrupulously abstemious in both sexes for several generations. Here is an apparent contradiction, apt to mislead the common mind, because it overlies a grave fact in our American social system. There is a disease of the nervous organism, almost peculiar to this people, which sprang from seeds of self-indulgence sown in the moral, social, and physical lives of our great- grandparents, and ‘which has acquired fearful aggravations of extension and virulence with each succeeding genera­tion. It assumes a form painfully fa­miliar to the physician and the moralist, in that craving for intellectual and physical “sensation ” which expresses itself; without a blush or a tremor, in the pop­ular performances, displays, and dis­closures, of the pulpit and the theatre, literature and art, the press and the criminal courts, the costumes of the women, the prodigality and license of private entertainment, and the graphic eccentricities of popular sports.

It does not necessarily take the direction of rum, – it may find relief in the intemperate, passionate pursuit of a vocation or an agitation. Its form of expression may be determined by the bent of the intellectual twig, or an early peep into “openings.” If God, in his mercy, had not suffered me to escape by the stormy Jordan of rum, I might have been a spasmodic editor, a fanatical dema­gogue, a champion revivalist, a plug- ugly, a lecturer for the Washingtonian Total Abstinence Society, or a – Fe­nian martyr.

If you would abolish the inebriate, you must begin with his grandmother.

Even a little Dionysus in Grandma

THANK YOU TO THE INEBRIATE – – – Whoever he was

 

 

 

 

 

21. THE INEBRIATE; Waiting for Family

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An Article Previously Written by our treasured author.
From THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, April 1869

In my paper preliminary to the present, in the April number of this magazine, I have entered my weary protest against that “sagacious pharisaism of the fam­ily, which consigns the poor prodigal heart, that has nothing left but its remnant of imperishable love, to the isolation of a Refuge such as this; and then, maintaining a savage silence, keeps it for weeks on the red-hot grid­iron of a longing suspense, in one pro­tracted nightmare and horror of devilish fancies and fears.”

Dispair

Since that was printed, one poor prodigal heart, – the gentlest, humblest, among us, impatient only with itself, – robbed of its remnant of imperishable love, and given over by that same savage silence to its loneli­ness and longing and despair, has taken its pitiful tax and trouble in its hand, and fled from the cruel respectability of fastidious Pharisees to the indiscrim­inate consolations of the Publican’s Christ.

20. THE INEBRIATE; One Last Quote from “The Report”

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A TYPICAL REPORT TO THE STATE

{The Inebriate quotes from a report to the state of NY}

“In this aspect of the subject it is of vital importance that the enterprise should be kept pure, and true to its original intention, by the exclusion, as far as possible, of involuntary patients, or at least of such as are brutally in‑sensible and rebellious. This Asylum, I take it, is designed to appeal confi­dently to the reason and conscience of a class neither mad nor utterly de­praved ; and, from the best of these, to restore to society and the state so Much of usefulness and ornament, hon­est productiveness and intellectual in­fluence, as will repay the Common­wealth tenfold for the cost of the experiment. To introduce, therefore, the element of confinement and coer­cion is to degrade the Institution from its true character, as a saving and en­nobling home of faith and inspiration, into a mere house of correction or a jail.”

“So, also, to receive within our walls the forced commitments of a court or the common seizures of the police is at once to impair, if not destroy, the phil­osophical value of the experiment, and, what is worse, to embarrass the disci­pline and lower the moral tone of our probationary household.”

 

19. THE INEBRIATE; Protection from the Law

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1849 gold rush, 1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Ability to pay, Admission Form, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, bar graph, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Committed patients, confined, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, criminal, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Female kin, Free Patients, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Involuntary Patients, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Legal Status, Legislative Body, Literary Exercises, Lunatic, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Mrs. Frank Ward, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Paying Patients, Phenomena, Philanthropic Societies, physicians, poets, police, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Room and Board, Rules of Admission, Sages, San Fran Cisco, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Vine Hall, Wit, writers

Quantity of Inmates

Therefore the inebriate has his rights; but they are the rights of an occasional madman, however long and lucid his intervals may be ; and no man knows this bet­ter than himself. He knows that, un­der certain distracting circumstances of provocation or temptation, he may first or last almost certainly be­come an offence, if not a fear, to him­self and others, even when at large on his honorable parole, of which, at wiser times, when seated at the feet of the Gamaliel of his own prudence and duty, he is so tenderly jealous. Then the rude hand of the law, insensible to sen­timent and scornful of psychological analyses, will be laid upon him, a policeman’s coarse paw shall bruise the raw of his fierce sensitiveness. Just there his rights begin, and he naturally turns for them to the Asy­lum, which, as a mere matter of money not less than of morals, owes him a rescue; for she is his guardian under bonds, and has accepted in respect of him, for a consideration, certain posi­tive responsibilities and obligations._• Whether he can or cannot be trusted beyond bounds, is a question for the discretion of those having him in moral and medical charge, – a nice question, I grant, its safe decision implying the possession of a rare and fine combina­tion of experience with tact ; and occa­sional errors of judgment are inevitable. But it is certain the decision does not rest with him, nor is he responsible for the consequences of a blunder. His Asylum owes it to his friends, as well as to himself, to stand between him and the police, and to demand that he be restored, the moment his arrest be­comes necessary, to the custody of his appointed guardian and physician, the superintendent, whose demand should be a habeas corpus in this matter, – all charges to be paid by the Asylum, and collected from the patient. Just there his rights cease; he certainly has no right, in reason or feeling, to complain of the preventive punishment he may receive. But if he is not in an Asylum for this very protection, for what, in the name of common sense and busi­ness is he there? A passage from the Report will follow.

 

18. THE INEBRIATE; Gone are the Days

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1849 gold rush, 1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Ability to pay, Admission Form, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Committed patients, confined, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, criminal, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Female kin, Free Patients, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Involuntary Patients, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Legal Status, Legislative Body, Literary Exercises, Lunatic, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Mrs. Frank Ward, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Paying Patients, Phenomena, Philanthropic Societies, physicians, poets, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Room and Board, Rules of Admission, Sages, San Fran Cisco, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Vine Hall, Wit, writers

Involuntary Patient of Yore

It is to be hoped that, lest legislative bodies and philanthropic communities, inspired by the assured success of this Binghamton experiment, should become prematurely engaged in this specialty of benevolent enterprise, the legal sta­tus of the inebriate may be clearly de­fined without loss of time. He is no longer to be coerced as a criminal or confined as a lunatic : once for all, that question has been settled, by those who have the matter most at heart, and have given it the most intelligent and anxious consideration ; it is, in fact, the foun­dation upon which the whole amiable structure has been erected.

17. THE INEBRIATE; Classifications – Voluntary or Incarceration?

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1849 gold rush, 1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Ability to pay, Admission Form, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Committed patients, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Female kin, Free Patients, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Involuntary Patients, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Literary Exercises, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Mrs. Frank Ward, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Paying Patients, Phenomena, physicians, poets, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Room and Board, Rules of Admission, Sages, San Fran Cisco, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Vine Hall, Wit, writers

Rules for Voluntary and Involuntary Entry

It can be honestly claimed for any well-managed Inebriate Asylum that it “reforms ” a man by helping him to reform himself ; it presupposes in him a sincere longing and an earnest effort, and it offers him wise moral conditions of patience, encouragement with kindly admonition, trust with well-timed warn­ing, refuge from care and from tempta­tion, cheerful and sympathetic compan­ionship, improving and diverting mental exercise, and all the devices of sagacity and tact which his temper or his trou­ble demand; sound physical conditions, also, of rest (for there’s no such tired wretch as your worn-out inebriate), reg­ularity of habit, wholesome and substan­tial diet, pure air, free motion, animating games, hearty songs, and jolly laughter. And that is all – that is not humbug.

APPLICATION FOR ADMISSION

Such are they whom it truly helps and such the means whereby it helps them. For the incorrigible minority, the puerile, and the stupid, who remain “deaf to the voice of warning, and de­fiant of the claims of affection,” – the unstable and the stolid, who are yet to be “dead-beat,” – these are they whom the Asylum merely harbors. To the former it is, in very truth, a House of Refuge, rest, and redemption; to the latter, but a House of Detention and control. In this Institution, which, in all that is external to the personal feel­ings of the inmate, partakes notably of the freedom of a superior country hotel, we are fortunate in being able to meet on an equal footing of confidence and respectful consideration. But for causes seemingly inseparable from the experi­mental character of the enterprise, our social status is exceptionally superior and it is not to be expected that, when the plan and operation of inebriate re­form shall have become popularized, and every State shall have opened its asylums, kindred establishments will be commonly so fortunate. I think it will be found necessary to impart to their discipline a duplicate discretion, and to classify patients, however simply, as to character and privileges.

16. THE INEBRIATE; Shared Emotions and Concoctions

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1849 gold rush, 1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Female kin, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Literary Exercises, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Mrs. Frank Ward, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Phenomena, physicians, poets, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Sages, San Fran Cisco, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Vine Hall, Wit, writers

An example of the beautiful woodwork in the asylum

Emphatically, this clarifying machine is run by the force necessarily liberated from the impure material to be clarified nor can the experiment of inebriate reform, by communities associated in institutions such as this, be ever other­wise conducted to a satisfactory conclu­sion. It is in the very nature of the case, and a logical result of the progress toward success, that the inebriate in these conditions, as he yields to the process of reconstruction, shall become an agent in that process, and a law of reform unto himself and others. En­gineer the apparatus as they may, the superintendent and trustees must de­rive their motive-power from the multi­plied and concentered magnetism of the patients. Without this, the mech­anism, however complete, must be as insensible and dumb under their hands as a telegraphic key-board without a battery. It is the very merit of their theory of sympathy that this should be so; and this must be the measure of all the genuine, abiding good they can ever hope to do. To their honor, be it said, they claim no more. If I were asked wherein lies the peculiar healing of this place, I should answer in the profound impressions of its sympathet­ic intercourse ; for here my trembling trouble is met with unstudied appeals transcending the eloquence of Gough, and confronted with pictures of pain beyond the eager, tearful utterance of Vine Hall.

THE ABOV FROM “CLICK AMERICANA”

This anxious little world of ours is moved by the moral power of its own public opinion; and that finds expression in the purpose and character of the Ollapod Club.

15. THE INEBRIATE; Kindred Women

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1849 gold rush, 1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Female kin, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Literary Exercises, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Mrs. Frank Ward, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Phenomena, physicians, poets, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Sages, San Fran Cisco, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Wit, writers

That romantic deference and deli­cacy of sentiment, with which the natu­ral American, whom untoward circum­stances of birth and association have not rendered positively uncouth and morally deformed, never fails to ap­proach every tolerable woman, is devel­oped here, from even the most latent inclination, by the peculiar craving of our minds and hearts, and the rarity of its gratification. The presence of a true lady among us as potently refines our imaginations and elevates our as­pirations, as the lovely apparition of the “First Lady “(Mrs. Frank Ward) rebuked and calmed the fierce, turbulent selfishness of San Francisco in 1849:

We all know that rum, when it has usurped the kingdom of a mind, reduces it to the slavery of ignoble passions and gross imaginations ; but we also know that the minds and hearts it most easily invades, finding them miserably defenseless, are precisely those which under happier circumstances are most sensitively susceptible  to emotions of grace and chivalry. By the hand of every gentle woman who brings her subtle sympathy among us, we reach back toward the hearts of our mothers and sisters and wives. “Our sched­ule,” says the Report, “will show that of the whole number admitted since the 1st of May, 1867, one hundred and forty-six have been married men. The moral advantage, the chance of life­long abstinence, is decidedly with the married, arteris paribus,

 {NOTE on meaning of arteris paribus: “on its face” or “as an accepted fact” or “through observations}

and the marriage being happy; for I need hardly say that there is no more po­tent, nor comparatively more common provocative to reckless debauchery than an ill-assorted, incompatible, wrang­ling marriage: nor any such incentive and inspiration to reform, any such support and cheer in the struggle of self-denial and self-control, any such source of fortitude and hope in the hour of temptation, as the devotion of a for­giving, faithful, patient wife, clinging fast to the wreck that the crew of self­ish kindred and friends have aban­doned. The women who have followed their husbands to this Asylum, and lin­gered near at hand, to watch and help and applaud them, are the pride of their own sex, and the prize of ours.”

14. THE INEBRIATE; Getting Along (During an Election)

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1868 Presidential Election, A list of patients, A School for Scandal, Albert Day, artists, asylum, Atlantic Monthly, Atlantic Monthy 1869, bankers, Billiards, Binghamton, Blair, Bowling, brokers, chess, clerks, Cornell's Making of America, cribbage, Curiosities, divines, Dr. Albert Day, Dr.Edward Turner, dramatists, Ethiopian Minstrel, euchre, Exercise Room, farmers, Honorable Ausburn Birdsall, Humor, Inebriates, Isaac Perry, Joseph Surface, Lady of Lyons, lawyers, Lectures, Literary Exercises, Macbeth, Meeting Room, merchants, Music, musicians, novelists, NY State Inebriate Asylum, Old presidential posters, Old Woodcuts, Opera, Pantomime, Phenomena, physicians, poets, priests, printers, Prodigal Son, Reading Room, Sages, scholars, Schuyler Colfax, Scientific American, Seymour, Still Water Runs Deep, teachers, Temperance, The Ollapod Club, Ulysses S. Grant, Wit, writers

Here is a free school of manners, equal rights, and common sense, where are taught the fair play of the Golden Rule, and the decorous deference of the Hindoo Vedas. Send hither your roughs, rustics, and boys, and we will teach them to keep their knives out of the mouths of their best behavior, and to stand on no toes but their own.

To the end of avoiding that danger­ous ground of debate in which “unpleasantnesses” are apt to grow, poli­tics and all forms of sectarianism are ignored with a unanimity which is al­ways cheerful and sometimes comical. We had an amusing example of the practical effect of this thoughtful blend­ing of prudence and delicacy on the day of the last Presidential election.

There were polls, with judges and clerks, who omitted no natural touch of brow-beat­ing or corruption ; there was a ballot-box, indiscriminately stuffed by such a run-mad compost of parties as would have defied the nomenclature of the “Pewter Mug”; there was a station house, with a “patent police,” delight­fully brutal and partial; there were free and independent voters, native or naturalized, in the familiar state of ig­norance, beer, imbecility, and helpless­ness; there were rough sport, and shouts of laughter, and sharp sallies of wit, and boisterous burlesque; but not one coarse buffet, nor an unkind word, although there were Radicals here dear to the heart of Ben Butler, and Copperheads lovely in the sight of Brick Pomeroy, Rebels who had raided with Mosby, and good sense have been enacted anywhere and Federal scouts who had followed in the hoof-prints of Sher­idan’s Ride. Could such a scene of generosity, on that day, but at an Inebriate Asylum?