THE ART OF DRINKING.
Transcriber’s Note
The cover image was created by the transcriber, and is placed in the public domain.
Minor printer's errors have been corrected, but variant and irregularspellings are retained.
THE ART OF DRINKING.
A HISTORICAL SKETCH.
FROM THE GERMAN OF
G. G. GERVINUS.
TRANSLATED FOR THE
UNITED STATES BREWERS’ ASSOCIATION.
New York:
UNITED STATES BREWERS’ ASSOCIATION.
1890.
TRANSLATOR’S NOTE.
G. G. Gervinus (1805-1871) is recognized as one of theforemost historians of Germany. He was a man of marvelouserudition. His fame rests not only upon a great numberof profoundly learned works, but also upon his brilliant advocacyof the constitutional rights of the people, as against thereactionary tendency of the German princes during Metternich’sdespotic rule. He was one of the seven celebratedprofessors of the University of Göttingen who boldly protestedagainst the violation of the Constitution by the King ofHanover. His best-known works are “History of the PoeticalLiterature of the Germans,” “History of the NineteenthCentury,” and a voluminous commentary on Shakspeare,“made popular in England”—as the Encyclopædia Britannicastates—“by an excellent translation.”
The following sketch was designed by Gervinus as an outlineof what a history of potology would be, if conceived andexecuted by a philosophical mind.
An English translation of this sketch needs no justificationin our time.
THE ART OF DRINKING.
A HISTORICAL SKETCH.
A sketch of the art of drinking might seem to announce asubject unworthy of a man whose energies have been devotedto earnest purposes and serious aims in life. But it is not myintention to make the sketch a mere treasure-box of all sortsof curiosities, nor to gratify thereby the curiosity of idlereaders. When it is approached from a scientific standpoint,the dignity of science must necessarily exclude all frivoloustreatment, as well as all shallow and superficial purpose.Many would be satisfied if an insignificant sketch of thiskind simply bore some pathetic motto, as these words ofSeneca’s: Animum aliquando debemus relaxare et quibusdamoblectamentis reficere; sed ipsa oblectamenta opera sint.I, however, would scorn a justification of this kind, for I holdthat recreation ought to be recreation, and not work, andshould consider it far better if our labors were pleasures, ratherthan our pleasures, labors.
I wish in this sketch to point out the importance and serioussignificance of a work of this sort, and shall have, above all, toprove that the apparently somewhat jocular subject has a veryserious side, and may be contemplated from a grave standpoint.
If I succeed from the very first in inducing the reader toadopt the same historical view of the matter that I take myself,I shall have gained a great point, for he will then layaside all prejudice and preconceived opinion. The real historianmust be a stranger to all prejudice and preconceivedopinion; he cannot treat of any subject separately, but is attractedby everything in a certain order and connection. Hemust not choose any subject from personal inclination, butaccording to the needs and demands of his time and of humansociety; nor must he treat the chosen subject with that pathological...