Health and Temperance

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Sep 9, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 35.

Health and Temperance.

IN THE EMBRACE OF SATAN.

DR. JOHN MURPHY, in 1888, received, at the commencement of the Ohio Medical College, a gold medal for excellence in all departments. He was one of the brightest of men and one of the best of students. On the 25th day of last month he was in a cell at the police station among the vilest wretches whom the police of Cincinnati take in. He had become an opium-eater, beginning its use to give sleep after over-taxing his nerves. Opium is worse than alcohol in its effects upon the mind and body. The effects of excessive use are pernicious and permanent. It is a dangerous medicine, often prescribed merely to give ease from pain which would be endured if the deadener of the sensibilities were not at hand. Dr. Murphy's name is now telegraphed all over the world on account of the sensation created by his arrest and subsequent conduct. Man's effort to gain powers denied him by nature, or to procure immunity by the use of drugs from the consequences of violated law, is ever a failure. To be all we can be normally is a noble ambition; but he who takes opium, cocaine, alcohol, or even quinine to stimulate himself beyond nature, invites a whole troop of devils to banquet with him. The strength he exerts is not his own strength, but Satan's. The rest he obtains is not "Gentle sleep, nature's sweet restorer," but poisoned dreams or the stupor of palsied nerves.—Christian Advocate.