He will assent and gravely pour out his poison.
Then say to him:
"Just dip the tip of your finger in that whiskey and put the
finger to your eye-ball."
If he does so he will feel the eye smart. The eyeball will
become inflamed, and sight for a moment will be difficult.
Then let him dilute the whiskey with water--four or five parts
water to one of whiskey. That dilution, rubbed into the other
eye, instead of irritating it, will act as a gentle stimulant.
It will produce an agreeable effect.
When your friend has experimented with the whiskey "straight" and
diluted, deliver to him this little lecture:
"One drop of pure whiskey on your eyeball makes it hard to use
the eye. That glass of whiskey that you are now pouring into
yourself would blind you absolutely, at least for a time. If
straight whiskey has such an effect on the covering of the
eyeball, must not its effect be equally injurious to the covering
of the stomach and intestines, which is the same as that of the
eye?
"If diluting your whiskey makes it so much better as an eye-wash,
would not diluting it make it better also as a 'stomach-wash'?"
One other thing: When you argue with a drunkard don't tell him
that any man can cure himself if he will "only be a man." The
drunkard knows that that is not so.
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