Lessons from an English Opium Eater: Thomas De Quincey Reconsidered

Abstract

Thomas De Quincey published his autobiographical Confessions of an English Opium Eater in 1821. The publication both fascinated and outraged its 19th-century readers. Heated debate followed on such topics as: the causality of opiate use; self-inflicted suffering and responsibility; the impact of availability and environment; therapeutic addiction; controlled use; the emergence of dependence; tolerance; withdrawal techniques; hazards; the impact of advertising. Many of these topics remain subjects of debate and causes for concern today. We would be well advised to study the questions and debates of a century and a half ago.

I do by no means deny that some truths have been delivered to the world in regard to opium: thus it has been repeatedly affirmed by the learned that opium is a dusky brown in colour, and this, take notice, I grant: secondly that it is rather dear, which I also grant (for in my time East India opium has been three quineas a pound and Turkey eight): and thirdly that if you eat a good deal of it, most probably you must do (what is particularly disagreeable to any man of regular habits) viz die. These weighty propositions are all and singular true: I cannot gainsay them, and truth ever was and will be commendable. But in these three theorems, I believe we have exhausted the stock of knowledge as yet accumulated by man on the subject of opium. and therefore, worthy doctors, as there seems to be room for further discoveries, stand aside and allow me to come forward and lecture on this matter. (Thomas De Quincey, 1821 [1])