Confessions of an English Opium-Eater

In 1804, while a student at Oxford, Thomas De Quincey was looking for relief from excruciating pain when a college acquaintance recommended opium.

Opium De Quincey wrote.

Dread agent of unimaginable pleasure and pain I had heard of it as I had of manna or of ambrosia, but no further: how unmeaning a sound it was at tha