Oops, I thought it was just a confused gardening metaphor. On Marx's opium quote, my father used to say that to me a lot when I was a kid during any newsreports on religious fundamentalist movements. I would always think, isn't opium "the opium" of the masses? I guess in generalizing from the person to the masses it makes sense, opium is to the person as what religion is to the masses, but I always thought it was a weird way to put it. I didn't understand what it would make the real opium users in relation to the masses, true believers? Would this qualify as a nonsensical metaphor? Maybe I just have a low metaphor appitude.
Arash
^^^^^^ CB: When the FBI fomented the heroine epidemic in the early 70's and after, I actually used to say something like what you say "now opium is the opium of the masses." I think in the era Marx said what he said , large groups of people, masses, did not have opium available to them, so opium was not opiating masses, except in specific times and places , as perhaps China in the period the Brits were pushers of opium.