The Liberator (newspaper)/September 18, 1857/Uncle Toby on Tobacco
Uncle Toby on Tobacco.
Death in it. A boy, named West, living in Swansey, picked up a piece of cigar, and, putting it in a pipe, smoked it. As a consequence, he was taken suddenly ill, and died in a few hours.
Uncle Toby.
Tobacco has Spoiled Thousdands of fine boys, (inducing a dangerous precocity, developing the passions, softening the bones, and injuring the spinal marrow and whole nervous fluid.) A boy who early and freely uses tobacco never is known to make a man, in the true sense; he generally lacks energy of body and mind. Boys, if you wish to be anybody, despite tobacco, name and thing.
Uncle Toby.
Answer a Fool according to his Folly. ‘Can’t I do what I please with my money, sir?’ ‘Of course you can, sir. Anybody can be as big a fool as he pleases.
Tobacco and Rum are the annoyance of modesty—the spoiler of civility—the destroyer of reason—the brewer’s agent—the wife’s sorrow—the chidren’s transmitted curse—and ‘Satan’s seed corn.’
Uncle Toby.
Its Uses. A Good Disinfectant! A pert girl said to a venerable lady, ‘I am told, madam, you have lost one of your five senses, by snuff-taking—that of smell.’ ‘True, my dear,’ said the old crone, with a smile, ‘but there are advantages in that; for, as I smell nothing, I avoid all bad smells.’
It aids Virility, or makes Boys Men!—Said a man to little boy, strutting up Cornhill, with a cigar, before breakfast, ‘My boy, you would look better with bread and butter in your mouth, than with his cigar.’ ‘I know it,’ said the urchin, ‘but it would not be half so glorious!’Uncle Toby.
From whence come Fires? ‘My father’s house,’ said a man, on hearing a lecture on the evils of tobacco, ‘was destroyed by fire which fell from his pipe; a fact well known at the time. And this audience,’ he continued ‘are familiar with a dreadful fire, of more recent occurrence, in our South village—a fire which sprang from the same vile habit, and consumed nearly fifty thousand dollars’ worth of property.’
A church in Chicago, which cost some thirty thousand dollars, was laid in ashes by the same cause. A carpenter went upon its roof with his pipe, and in an hour after he came down, the upper portion of the noble edifice was wrapt in flames beyond control.Uncle Toby.
The Claims of Religion on its Professors. Religion bids you to be cleanly and gentlemanly in demeanor. But, tell me, is the common use of tobacco a cleanly and becoming practice? Snuff it, and it makes your nose a mere dust-pan; chew it, and it soils your lips and teeth, and makes your month a nauseous distillery; smoke it, and it pollutes flesh and breath, earth and air; makes the chest a sort of volcano, and the mouth a crater venting smoke and fire. Is this gentlemanly or decent? When Gouverneur Morris returned from France, a Doctor of Divinity, notorious as a smoker, said to him, ‘Mr. Morris, do gentlemen smoke in Paris?’ ‘Gentlemen,’ said Mr. Morris, ‘Gentlemen, Doctor, smoke nowhere!’Uncle Toby.
Cigars! Christian Use of Money! Religion bids you, as a steward of God, to make a proper use of money. Your habit is expensive, and worse than useless. If you are well, this poison can do you no good; hence, every cent you spend for it is a waste which dishonors God; it is ‘money for that which is not bread.’ If you have used it for some time, a child can show you that you have sqandered an enormous amount of money—money needed to raise drooping hearts, and to fill the world with light and love.Uncle Toby.
An Anathema on the Smoker.
‘May never lady press his lips,
His proffered love returning,
Who makes a furnace of his mouth,
And keeps its chimney burning!
May each true woman shun his sight,
For fear his fumes might choke her;
And none but those who smoke themselves
Have kisses for a smoker!’
