By the sixteenth century, alcohol had developed into a serious social problem.  Worthies from Martin Luther to King James I of England condemned drunkenness.  And yet society at large continued to see alcohol as a gift from God.  Attempts to control its use invariably failed, and authorities were limited to regulating and taxing its sale.

Around 1650, a new leap was taken by the Dutch in the form of inexpensive distilled grain flavored with the berries of the juniper bush:  genever or, in English, gin.  It was an immediate success in England as well.

But new forms of psychoactive substances were pouring in from all over the world.  Coffee, for example, was introduced into Europe from Arabia, where they had invented coffee roasting centuries before.  Although Moslem religious figures condemned it, it was so popular among Moslems as a substitute for alcohol that it was dubbed "the wine of the Arabs."

Coffee was considered by Europeans and Arabs alike as healthful and therapeutic.  It also wound up being the focal point of a new social institution, the coffee house or café.  It was particularly praised as the long-sought substitute for the evils of alcohol.

In the latter part of this era, the East India Company and other trading companies began importing tea from China and India.  It, too, was praised as a medicinal drink, but would not compete with coffee for some time to come.

One of the first things that Columbus and his emulators discovered, after they discovered America itself, was tobacco.  The first seeds were brought to Europe by a French adventurer named André Thevet.  It was deemed a potent medicine, good for a great number of ailments, especially those involving the lungs, by Jean Nicot of France -- from whose name we get nicotine.

Tobacco seeds came to England ten years later, and spread throughout the upper classes through the salesmanship of a certain Sir Walter Raleigh.  It was praised as a panacea, and became a major crop for settlers in Virginia and other New World locales.  In an effort to control its use, it was heavily taxed.

Smoking also spread throughout Asia, from Turkey to China.  The response was far more negative than in Europe:  Selling tobacco was punishable by decapitation in China, for example, and carried the death penalty in the Ottoman Empire.  In Russia, one could be tortured and exiled for using it.  And the pope made excommunication the punishment for clergy who took up the habit.

None of this, of course, actually did any good.

Another major drug to enter the Western arena in this period is coca. Coca leaves had been chewed for ages in South America, especially among the Incas.  After Pizarro destroyed the Inca Empire in 1553, a Spanish adventurer named Monardes brought the plant to Europe, but it failed to catch on -- at this point!