He gave to his
remark a relative and limited value, for he only denied that the
abuse of liquor was the most active cause of crime. After him M.
Fournier de Flaix, maintaining the same proposition with the same
statistical arguments, and admitting that ``alcohol is a special
scourge for the individual who indulges in it,'' yet concluded
that ``alcoholism is not a scourge which menaces the European
race.'' And he repeated that the nations which consumed the
greatest quantity of alcohol show a slighter frequency of crime,
especially against the person. Lastly M. Colajanni enlarged upon
the same proposition, using the statistical data so fully set out
by M. Kummer, and drew a still more positive conclusion, that
``there is a lack of constancy, regularity, and universality in
the relations, coincidence, and sequence, as between alcoholism
and crime and suicide; so that it is impossible to establish any
statistical relation of cause and effect between these
phenomena.''
Passing over the grave errors of fact in M. Colajanni's brochure,
I will only observe that this proposition is a pure
misapprehension of statistical logic.
If we once admit (and unfortunately it cannot be denied) the bad
influence of alcohol on bodily and mental health, in the form of
spirits as well as of wine--as to which it is not correct to say
that the southern departments are not consumers of alcohol--it
cannot be maintained that alcohol, which is physically and morally
injurious to individuals, is not hurtful to nations, which are but
aggregates of individuals.
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