The Anatomy of Tobacco
Capnobates, where shall be found much wholesome doctrine of a just mean between dogmatism and scepticism. Which observation applies equally to the downright acapnists, who deny all virtue whatsoever to tobacco, in whatsoever form it may be taken. For, they maintain, if there be any real savour in tobacco it must exist independently of the smoker, chewer, or snuffer, and be perceived in the same manner by all who use it. But what is more common than to hear two smokers of the same tobacco express directly contradictory judgments thereon? One will say it is mild, another strong, and if a third enter to them he will probably pronounce it neither mild nor strong, but of a medium flavour. Whence it is evident the virtue exists only in the mind of the smoker, and not at all in the tobacco itself. And who is ignorant that a single puff of tobacco-smoke appears a very different thing to an aphis vastator than to a man, inasmuch as to the insect it is death, but to the man a pleasure; but if the virtue really existed in the tobacco or the smoke
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