It is a most striking fact that, although these beverages have been drunk by the race for centuries, we _have never developed an instinct or natural appetite for them_! No child ever yet was born with an appetite or natural liking for beer or whiskey; and very few children really like the taste of tea or coffee the first time, although they soon learn to drink them on account of the sugar and cream in them.

Thus, nature has clearly marked them off from all the _real_ foods on our tables, showing that they are not essential to either life or health; and that they are absolutely unnecessary, and almost always harmful in childhood and during the period of growth.

If no child ever drank alcohol until he really craved it, as he craves milk, sugar, and bread and butter, there would be no drunkards in the world.

Our other food-instincts have shown themselves worthy to be trusted--why not trust this one, and let these beverages, especially alcohol, absolutely alone?
Statistics from the alcoholic wards of our great hospitals show that of those who become drunkards, nearly ninety per cent _begin to drink before they are twenty years old_.

Of that ninety per cent, over two-thirds took their first drink, not because they felt any craving for it, or even thought it would taste good, but because they saw others doing it; or thought it would be a "manly" thing to do; or were afraid that they would be laughed at if they didn't! Whatever vices and bad habits our natural appetites, and so-called "animal instincts," may lead us into, drunkenness is not one of them.
This striking hint on the part of nature, that alcoholic beverages are unnecessary, is fully confirmed by the overwhelming majority of hundreds of tests which have been made in the laboratory, showing clearly that, while these beverages may give off trifling amounts of energy in the body, their real effects and the sole reason for their use are their stimulating, or their discomfort-deadening (_narcotic_) effect.