So far as the body is concerned, there is much in my experience which
induces me to give a general assent to the opinion expressed by a
medical man of great reputation whom I repeatedly consulted in
reference to the discouraging slowness of my own restoration to
perfect health. "I can not see," he said, "that your constitution has
been permanently injured; but you were a great many years getting into
this state, and I think it will take nearly as many to get you out of
it."

It may not be amiss to add that those opium-eaters whose circumstances
exempt them from harassing cares, who meet only with kindness and
sympathy from friends, and who have resources for enjoyment within
themselves, have in respect to these subsequent inconveniences greatly
the advantage of those whose position and circumstances are less
fortunate.

These free and almost confidential personal statements have been made,
not without doing some violence to that instinctive sense of propriety
which prompts men to shrink from giving publicity to their weaknesses
and from the vanity of seeming to imply that their individual
experience of life is of special value to others. Leaving undecided
the question whether under any circumstances a departure from the
general rule of good sense and good taste in such matters is
justifiable, I have, nevertheless, done what I could to give to
opium-eaters a truthful statement of the consequences that may ensue
from their abandonment of the habit. The path toward perfect recovery
is certainly a weary one to travel; but in all these long years, with
nervous sensibilities unnaturally active, in much pain of body,
through innumerable sleepless nights, with hope deferred and the