This is the oldest known pamphlet against smoking,
and it was written by King James.
Okay, you know, King James, the guy who authorized
the Bible to be translated back in the early 1600s.
King James, it turns out, hated smoking.
So he wrote a pamphlet against smoking.
Now, I can't read for you the whole thing
just because it's so long,
but I'm just gonna read for you some highlights
from King James' Pamphlet Against Smoking.
And you know, the language is kinda old,
so you gotta really pay attention.
It says, and surely in my opinion,
there cannot be a more base
and yet hurtful corruption in a country
than is the vile use or other abuse
of taking tobacco in this kingdom,
which has moved me shortly to discover the abuses thereof
in this following little pamphlet.
And I'm gonna jump to the very end of the pamphlet.
But herein is not only a great vanity,
but a great contempt of God's goods gifts,
that the sweetness of man's breath
being a good gift of God,
should be willfully corrupted by this stinking smoke,
wherein I must confess it hath too strong a virtue.
And so that which is an ornament of nature,
and can neither by any artifice be at the first acquired,
nor once lost be recovered again,
shall be filthily corrupted with an incurable stink,
which vile quality as is directly contrary
to that wrong opinion,
which is holden of the wholesomeness thereof,
as the venom of putrefaction
is contrary to the virtue preservative.
Now, that's kind of a tongue twister.
This guy's writing style,
I'm glad that he wasn't the one that translated the Bible,
'cause his writing style's a little elevated.
But look, you gotta hear this.
This next point cracks me up.
Moreover, which is a great iniquity,
and against all humanity,
the husband shall not be ashamed
to reduce thereby his delicate, wholesome, and clean,
complexioned wife to that extremity
that either she must also corrupt
her sweet breath therewith,
or else resolve to live in a perpetual stinking torment.
(audience laughs)
So, you know, what he's saying is,
you know, if you're a man who smokes,
you're either forcing your wife to smoke too
and mess up her breath and mess up her complexion,
or you're forcing her to just live with the stinking torment
of your smell and your smoke.
Listen to the last paragraph.
Have you not reasoned then to be ashamed
and to forbear this filthy novelty,
so basely grounded, so foolishly received,
and so grossly mistaken in the right use thereof?
In your abuse thereof, sinning against God,
harming yourselves, both in person and goods,
and raking also thereby the marks and notes of vanity upon you,
by the custom thereof, making yourselves to be wondered at,
by all foreign civil nations, and by all strangers that come
among you, to be scorned and contempt,
accustomed loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose,
harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs,
and the black, stinking fume thereof,
nearest resembling the horrible, stygian smoke of the pit that
That is bottomless!