should have," says Dr. Dodge, "institutions for the reception of
inebriates, where total abstinence can be rigidly, but judiciously
enforced for a sufficient length of time, to test the curative powers of
absolute restraint from all intoxicating drinks. When the craving for
stimulants is irresistible, it is useless to make an attempt to reclaim
and cure the drunkard, _unless the detention is compulsory_, and
there is complete restraint from all spirituous or alcoholic
stimulants."


REMOVAL FROM TEMPTATION.

In regard to the compulsory power that should inhere in asylums for the
cure of drunkenness, there is little difference of opinion among those
who have had experience in their management. They have more faith in
time than in medicine, and think it as much the duty of the State to
establish asylums for the treatment of drunkenness as for the treatment
of insanity. "The length of time necessary to cure inebriation," says
Dr. Dodge, "is a very important consideration. A habit covering five,
ten, fifteen or twenty years, cannot be expected to be permanently
eradicated in a week or a month. The fact that the excessive use of
stimulants for a long period of time has caused a radical change,
physically, mentally and morally, is not only the strongest possible
proof that its entire absence is necessary, but, also, that it requires
a liberal allowance of time to effect a return to a normal condition.
The shortest period of continuous restraint and treatment, as a general
rule, should not be less than six months in the most hopeful cases, and
extending from one to two years with the less hopeful, and more
especially for the class of periodical drinkers, and those with an
hereditary tendency."