Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father of the United States, famously observed that the existence of wine was ‘proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy.” But in the same letter he made a significant observation about human anatomy:
*To confirm still more your piety and gratitude to Divine Providence, reflect upon the situation which it has given to the elbow. You see in animals who are intended to drink the waters that flow upon the earth, that if they have long legs, they have also a long neck, so that they can get at their drink without kneeling down. But man, who was destined to drink wine, is framed in a manner that he may raise the glass to his mouth. If the elbow had been placed nearer the hand, the part in advance would have been too short to bring the glass up to the mouth; and if it had been nearer the shoulder, that part would have been so long, that when it attempted to carry the wine to the mouth it would have overshot the mark, and gone beyond the head… But from the actual situation of the elbow we are enabled to drink at our ease, the glass going directly to the mouth. Let us, then, with glass in hand, adore this benevolent wisdom; - let us adore and drink!*
Franklin also argued that Noah’s Flood was intended to punish mankind for drinking water, by trying to drown us in the stuff.
Source:
Forsyth, Mark. “Evolution.” A Short History of Drunkenness. Three Rivers Press, 2017. 15, 16. Print.
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