The organ showed every indication of
chronic disease. It was greatly shrunken, its very texture being changed
into a hard substance. That alcoholism is the commonest cause of
cirrhosis is well known, but in Beethoven's case some other cause for
the disease must be found. He was in the habit of taking wine with his
meals, a practice so common in Vienna at that time that not to have done
so would have been regarded as an eccentricity, but he never indulged in
it to excess, except possibly on a few occasions when in the company of
Holz. It can hardly be brought about by the use of wines, but is
produced by the inordinate use of spirituous liquors, something for
which Beethoven did not care. Cirrhosis was probably the cause of his
father's death, as he was a confirmed inebriate; but this cannot be
connected with the cirrhosis of the son; the disease is not
transmissible.
Beethoven's deafness probably began with a "cold in the head" which was
neglected. The inflammatory process then extended to the Eustachian
tubes. When it reached this point it was considered out of the reach of
treatment in his time, and for long after.
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