Professor Huxley on Smoking

Feilding Star, Volume VI, Issue 109, 28 February 1885, Page 3

Professor Huxley on Smoking

At a certain debate on smoking, among the members of the British Association Professor Huxley told the story of his early struggles after tobacco in a way which utterly put the anti-tobacconists to confusion : - •' For forty years of my life (he said) tobacco had been a deadly poison to me. In my youth, as a medical student, I tried to smoke, in vain ! At every fresh attempt my imidious foe stretched me prostrate on the floor. I entered the navy. Again 1 tried to to smoke, and again I met with defeat. I hated tobacqp, - I could ' almost have lent my support to any institution that had for its object the putting of tobacco smokers to death. A few years ago I was in Brittany with some friends. We went to an inn. They began to smoke. They looked very happy, and outside it was very wet and dismal. I thought I would try a cigar. I did so. I smoked that cigar, and it was delicious. From that -moment I was a changed man ; and I now feel that smoking in moderation is a comfortable and andlandable practice, andis productive of good. There is no more harm in a pipe than there is in a cup of tea. You may poison yourself by drinking too much green tea, and kill yourself by eating too many beefstakes. For my own part, I consider that tobacco, in moderation, is a sweetener and equaliser of the temper."