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INSANITY; ITS CAUSE AND CURE. S
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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• __ -«©> . , .. ,^ Y V'. • I "We Are Al...
lyanacy Commissioners , stated before a select committee of the House of Commons a few months ago , that a large proportion of
the cases of lunacy is ascribable to intoxication . He refers to various medical authorities on the point . Dr . Corsellis , of the Wakefield
Lunatic Asylum , says , " I am led to believe that intemperance is the exciting" cause of insanity in about one-third of the cases of this
institution . " The proportion at Glasgow is about twenty-six per centand at Aberdeen eighteen per cent . Dr . Browne , of the
, Crichton Asylum , _Dumfries , says , _" The applications for the introduction of individuals who have lost their reason from excessive
drinking continue to be very numerous . " In Scotland they have establishments simply and solely for persons who have brought on
insanity hy intemperance . At Montrose , Dr . Poole , the head of the asylum , says , " Twenty-four per cent of insane cases from
intemperance . " At Northampton , the superintendent of the asylum _says" Amongst the causes of insanity , intemperance
predomi-, nates . " Dr . Pritchard says , " The medical writers of all countries reckon intemperance among the most influential exciting causes of
insanity . " Esquirol , who has been most celebrated on the continent for his researches into the statistics of madness , and who is
well known to have extended his inquiries into all countries , was of opinion that this cause gives rise to one half of the causes of
insanity that occur in Great Britain . It was found in an asylum in Liverpool , to which four hundred and ninety-five patients had
been admitted , that not less than two hundred and fifty-seven had beconie insane through intemperance . It is needless to multiply
authorities . The effects of intemperance are no doubt connected with a previous predisposition to insanity , yet the predisposition
would not have been developed but for the intemperance . As soon as the means of obtaining drink are taken away , the cure of such
cases is rapid , but a recurrence to the habit of drinking produces a recurrence of the disorder , and that recurrence is what the unhappy
beings are unable to avoid . There have been instances of one man having been brought back twenty times in a state of mania in
consequence of drink , till the constant recurrence of the disorder became settledand the man became a chronic madman . " We visit them , "
, says Lord Shaftesbury , " and find them in a state of sanity , yet we know from long * experience that those persons , be they men or women ,
upon being discharged , will in the course probably of one hour go to the nearest gin-shop , and drink to excess , and be furiously mad
before the end of the day . " Of aH sanitary conditions that of a sane mind is surely the most
important . Aiid in what does a perfectly healthy mind consist ? In the vigor of the reasoning facultiesin the subordination of the
, passions and emotions , in the supremacy of the judgment , in the balance of all the powers . And if these things constitute the state of
perfect sanity , then there is a good deal of insanity in the world at large not taken cognisance of "by Ilex Majesty ' s Commissioners in
vox . iv . b 2
Insanity; Its Cause And Cure. S
_INSANITY ; ITS CAUSE AND CURE . S
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Sept. 1, 1859, page 3, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01091859/page/3/
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