The immediate occasion of this practice was the lowness of wages, which at that time would not allow them to indulge in ale or spirits, and wages ris… - Thomas De Quincey

I do not readily believe that any man having once tasted the divine luxuries of opium will afterwards descend to the gross and mortal enjoyments of alcohol,

I do not readily believe that any man having once tasted the divine luxuries of opium will afterwards descend to the gross and mortal enjoyments of alcohol, I take it for granted

I question whether any Turk, of all that have entered the Paradise of Opium-eaters, can have had half the pleasure I had. But, indeed, I hounour the barbarians too much by supposing them capable of any pleasures approaching to the intellectual ones of an Englishman.

I assured her that she would meet with immediate attention; and that English justice, which was no respecter of persons, would speedily and amply avenge her on the brutal ruffian who had plundered her little property. She promised me that she would; but she delayed taking steps the steps I pointed out from time to time: for she was timid and dejected to a degree which showed how deeply sorrow had taken hold of her young heart: and perhaps she thought justly that the most upright judge, and the most righteous tribunals, could do nothing to repair her heaviest wrongs.

So blended and intertwisted in this life are occasions of laughter and of tears,