Hark to the appalling words of wisdom uttered by the good man whose name
I never miss mentioning because I wish all gentle souls to refresh
themselves with his ineffable sweetness and tender fun! "Could the youth
to whom the flavour of his first wine is delicious as the opening scenes
of life or the entering upon some newly-discovered paradise look upon my
desolation, and be made to understand what a dreary thing it is when a
man shall feel himself going down a precipice with open eyes and a
passive will--to see his destruction and have no power to stop it, and
yet to feel it all the way emanating from himself--to perceive all
goodness emptied out of him, and yet not be able to forget a time when
it was otherwise--to hear about the piteous spectacle of his own
self-ruin--could he see my fevered eye, feverish with last night's
drinking and feverishly looking for this night's repetition of the
folly--could he feel the body of the death out of which I cry hourly,
with feebler and feebler outcry, to be delivered--it were enough to make
him dash the sparkling beverage to the earth in all the pride of its
mantling temptation, to make him clasp his teeth,
And not undo 'em
To suffer wet damnation to run thro' 'em.
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