_Answ._ None but some sot, that had first drank away his own understanding. I have known physicians that have been drunkards themselves, and they have been apt to plead for their own vice; but they quickly killed themselves, and all their skill could not save their lives from the effects of their own bestiality; even as the knowledge and doctrine of a wicked preacher will not save his soul, if he live contrary to his profession. And what if the vomiting of a drunkard did him some good with all the harm? Are there not easier, safer, lawfuller means enough to do the same good without the harm? He is a brute himself, and not a physician, that knoweth no better remedy than this. But thy conscience telleth thee, this is but a false excuse.
_Object._ III. But I wrong nobody in my drink; the hurt is my own.
_Answ._ No thanks to thee if thou wrong nobody: but read over the former aggravations, and then justify thyself in this if thou canst. It seems thou makest nothing of wronging God by disobedience. But suppose it be no one's hurt but thy own: dost thou hate thyself? is thy own hurt nothing to thee? what! dost make nothing of the damning of thy own soul? whom wilt thou love if thou hate thyself? It is the aggravation of this sin, as well as fornication, 1 Cor. vi. 18, that it is against your own bodies, and much more as against your own souls.
_Object._ IV. But I was but merry, I was not drunken.
_Answ._ It were well for you if God would stand to your names and definitions, and take none for a sinner that taketh not himself for one. There are several degrees of drunkenness short of the highest degree. And if your reason was not disturbed, yet the excess of drink only, and tippling, and gulosity, will prove a greater sin than you suppose.
_Object._ V. But I drink but a little; but my head is weak and a little overturneth it.
_Answ._ If you know that beforehand, you are the more unexcusable, that will not avoid that measure which you know you cannot bear. If you knew that less poison will kill you than another, you would be the more fearful of it, and not the less.
_Object._ VI. But I have a thirst upon me, and I take no more than will quench it.
_Answ._ So the whoremonger saith, he hath a lust upon him, and he taketh no more than will quench it. And the malicious man that beateth you or undoes you, may say, that he hath a passion upon him, and he taketh no more revenge on you than satisfieth it. But if you add drunkenness to thirst, read your doom again, Deut. xxix. 19. If it be a natural, moderate thirst, moderation will satisfy it; if it be a diseased thirst, as in a fever or dropsy, the physician must direct you in the cure; and small drink is fitter for a thirst than strong: but if it be the thirst of a drunkard's raging appetite, that hath been used to be pleased, and therefore is loth to be denied, you had best quench it upon better and cheaper terms, than the displeasing God and damning your souls; lest you find it more troublesome in the flames of hell, to want a drop of water for your tongues, than it would have been to have bridled a beastly appetite.[444] And lest you then cry out as Lysimachus, when thirst forced him to yield to the Scythians for a little drink, _Quam brevis voluptatis gratia, quantum felicitatis amisi_! For how short a pleasure did I lose so great felicity! Take heed of reasoning your souls into impenitence.
_Quest._ I. Is it not lawful to drink when we are thirsty, and know of no harm that it is like to do us, seeing thirst telleth us what the stomach needeth?