Why do we drink alcohol if it is bad?

I was knocked down while I was walking along the Strand. 

I had had a number of glasses of whisky―I was not quite myself, and I did not see the bus. 

After the accident, I felt a little shaken, and seeing a crowd gather, got up and decided to hurry on to where I was expected. 

I knocked when I reached the door. 

To my surprise, my hand seemed to go through it.  

No one answered―I tried to push it open, but I had gone clean through.

My word! 

I am more drunk than I thought. 

Wonder if I had better go on. 

I found the man waiting at his desk and a clerk at a side table. 

I took off my hat and bowed, but the ill-mannered swab took no notice.

I have come to sign that agreement.

Again, he did not answer, and turning to his clerk said―

If that damned fool does not come in ten minutes, I will go off to that other appointment.

I am here, you fool!

He took no notice. 

Finally, he got up and went out.

I swore and cursed―

He is more drunk than I am.

I seemed to slip through the door. 

As I did so, I heard a fiendish chuckle. 

I turned round and saw old Billy, a former pal of mine.

Why, Billy, I thought you were dead.

And so I am, and so are you at last, old sport. 

You are dead at last. 

I thought we were never going to get you.

You damned liar―I am not dead―I am quite alive, only rather drunk.

Drunk! 

Even when drunk you cannot walk through doors.

I knew then that it was true.

Where am I? I cried to my guide.

Where would you like to be?

I want a drink.

Come along. 

We have one here who looks after all who thirst.

I do not know where Billy took me, but it was into an awful darkness. 

Soon I was aware of a vast crowd of other spirits. 

A being presided over this howling mob. 

How shall I describe him? 

He most closely resembled a drunken man―low, bestial, sodden with drink, foul in every way. 

There was nothing grand―or majestic about him, nothing of what Milton describes of ruined splendour. 

The nearest thing you can ever have seen is some drink-sodden wretch thrown out of a pub at closing time.

He leered, and we all yelled―

Drink, Drink! Give us drink!

He seemed to say―

Come with me, but you will have to work first.

Directly, we were in a large, low drinking den in the east end of London. 

It was crowded with low men and women, even children.

I wanted to get hold of a glass of beer, which was standing on the bar. 

I could not hold it. 

The desire for it grew stronger and stronger and I seemed to contort myself with a kind of mad fury. 

I looked at the drink guide. 

He was laughing and jeering and mocking me.

Work, you lazy brute.

How can I?

Look what the others are doing.

I noticed that many of the others were twining themselves round the men and women who were drinking. 

I cannot exactly describe how they did it,  but they seemed to be insinuating themselves into their carcasses.

I saw a man who was already fairly tipsy drop in a kind of drunken stupor. 

Immediately, a spirit who had been twining round began to fade into him and soon seemed to be absorbed into him.

The man staggered to his feet, and yelled―

More beer, you―!

The barmaid gave him more, but I could see that it was not the drunk man, but my spirit companion who was shining out of his eyes. 

He drank and drank and grew more and more violent until finally, the chucker-out seized him by the shoulder.  

Straight away, he seized a quart pot and felled the man. 

The blow was terrific and split the fellow’s skull.

There was pandemonium.

Many of the drinkers rushed out shouting, and with them went the spirits who had twined themselves round them. 

Others seemed to cast them off.

I noticed for the first time that these spirits were divisible into two groups—those who were men and those who were not. 

The latter had various forms―all bestial. 

I cannot describe them. 

They were foul, misshapen things, not human―or animal, sometimes composite, with animal heads and human bodies, some heads only, some foul monstrosities with no shape―or form, things one might see in D. T.

The drunkard who had felled the chucker-out stood waving his beer pot. 

I heard a fierce, wild yell of laughter, and saw our guide laughing and cheering. 

We all began to cheer too―I do not know why.

The companion who had taken possession of the drunkard began to disentangle himself from him, and the man collapsed in a heap. 

The drinking started again. 

I found I could get a sort of satisfaction by twining round a man. 

It was not exactly drinking, being more akin to the satisfaction one used to get from smelling alcoholic spirits. 

It was grand and yet unsatisfactory―a sort of Dead Sea fruit. 

We hung round that pub for many days, and I learnt to take possession.

The idea of the seven deadly sins is not so far out, but there are more than seven!

Our drink guide was not an elemental, nor was he the figure conjured up by the thoughts of men. 

He was created by the lust of all who desire drink to excess. 

If the entire world were to cease to desire strong drink tomorrow, he would gradually fade away―not immediately―we would be able to sustain him for a little but, as we should no longer be able to gratify, even in the shadowy way I have described our lust for drink, he would fade away, for want of sustenance.

Some parsons do much towards peopling Hell with devils!

The demons created by men’s imagination fade, as the men who created them move on. 

Unfortunately, they are always being re-created by other men.

The elementals are different. 

They exist of themselves, as much as we do. 

There are blithe, light-hearted spirits who haunt dells and woodland glades―the fairies of our childhood. 

There are many types of elementals and spirits who inhabit the winds. 

Sometimes, a dead man continues to take an interest in his family and tries to watch over it. 

He is able to give it premonitions and warnings, but often death warnings are given by elementals that come scenting death and hoping to draw some physical substance from the dying person.