Opium, which came from the mysterious and attractive East, was surrounded in the 19th century by a halo of miraculous potion. De Quincy simultaneously destroyed and strengthened this legendariness, because, perhaps, since the time of Robinson Crusoe, there has not been a work in English literature with a touch of unusualness that readers would so obediently trust. "Confession" (1822) begins with memories of De Quincy's youth. "A child who saw hell," - so described De Quincy T. Carlyle, who met him in his advanced years and was amazed at his physical miniature, fragility combined with the scope of his mind, fortitude. "Confession" influenced E. Poe, S. Baudelaire, J.K. Huysmans, Russian decadents. The "Supplement" published De Quincy's study "Murder as One of the Fine Arts."