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function resembles the ignition of metals, and the firing of gases, the decomposition of water, and the subversion of the strongest chemical affinities ?" p. 165–172.

The author goes on to state his opinion, that this fiction of an invisible matter to explain the vital motions must have originated from that universal propensity of mankind to account for those phenomena, of which the causes are not obvious, by the mysterious aid of imaginary beings. Whence the ancients had gods for every operation of nature, to hurl the thunderbolt, and agitate the waves;-the people have their elves and fairies, and the theorist his Archeus, his anima, his vital fluid. These fictions are not out of place in the regions of poetry; but they deserve the reprobation which they have here received, when brought forward in the array of philosophical induction.

II.

Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis, and other Nervous Affec tions. By JOHN REID, M. D. Member of the Royal College of Physicians, London; and late Physician to the Finsbury Dispensary. 8vo, pp. 272. Longman and Co. 1816.

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N order to give our readers some notion of the nature and character of these essays, it will be necessary to recal to their recollection the amusement which some of them may have formerly experienced from the perusal of a series of Medical Reports, as they were called, which appeared for a course of years in a popular journal, the Monthly Magazine of London, with the name of our author appended. As they were not addressed to the profession, so they uniformly discarded all grave medical discussion, and dwelt much upon the aberrations and derangements of the intellect, upon hypochondriacal and nervous disorders, and all the train of real and imaginary evils, which indolence, intemperance, and various moral and physical irregularities, committed chiefly by persons of leisure and cultivated minds, are liable to produce. Many of them, therefore, were rather moral disquisitions, than medical reports; and were delivered in brilliant metaphorical language, calculated to impress readers of this class, who would ha e shrunk from the perusal of mere didactic medical details. This was well enough,

under the circumstances in which these reports were originally published. They served to amuse and instruct common readers, although there was often more of dazzling impression, than just and solid information, conveyed by them. But in a work, which, from its title at least, appears to be addressed to medical men, surely something more serious and methodical, something more distinctly applicable to the study and practice of the art, was to be expected, and not a series of moral apothegms, laboured with epigrammatic terseness, and clothed in all the metaphorical splendour that poetical language can bestow. No doubt the author has evinced himself a powerful, and in many instances an elegant writer; and had his work been addressed to the readers of the Monthly Magazine, with an appropriate title, it would have merited and met with its due share of applause.

It is but just to observe, however, that Dr Reid apologizes for having committed these essays to the press in this form; as he had considered them merely as materials towards the formation of a larger and more methodical work, which he had intended to complete, on the subject of mental diseases. But some domestic circumstances, with which the public are not interested, have interfered with the prosecution of that object.

After what we have said, it will scarcely be expected that we should enter into any thing like an analysis of the contents of this volume. It will be sufficient to state the nature of them generally, and to adduce a few specimens of the style of the author, and of his manner of treating the different subjects.

There are seven and twenty essays within the compass of this thin volume, which follow each other in a desultory manner, without any immediate connection, and the subjects of which are necessarily treated with a light and sweeping pen. The first is "on the Influence of the Mind on the Body;" and it is followed by others thus headed. "2. The Power of Volition." "3. The Fear of Death."—" 4. On Pride.”—“ 5. Remorse.” -"6. On Solitude."-" 7. Excessive Study."-" 8. Vicissitude," &c. &c. In the treatment of these subjects there is generally as little that is truly medical, as in the titles of the chapters themselves. There is, however, a considerable degree of point and smartness in the statement of the objections to several popular errors, which often stands in the place of more methodical logic. Thus in the chapter" on the Power of Volition," the absurdity of attempting to laugh nervous patients out of their maladies, is pretty well exhibited.

"Nothing surely can surpass the inhumanity, as well as folly, with which patients of this class are too frequently treated. We of

ten act upon the ill-founded idea that such complaints are altogether dependent upon the power of the will; a notion which, in paradoxical extravagance, scarcely yields to the doctrine of a modern, though now obsolete writer, on the philosophy of morals; who asserted, that no one need die, if, with a sufficient energy, he determined to live. To command, or to advise a person labouring under nervous depression, to be cheerful and alert, is no less idle and absurd, than it would be to command or advise a person, under the direct and most intense influence of the sun's rays, to shiver with cold, or one who iswallowing naked in December's snows," to perspire from a sensation of excessive heat. The practice of laughing at, or scolding a patient of this class, is equally cruel and ineffectual. No one was ever laughed or scolded out of hypochondriasis. It is scarcely likely that we should clevate a person's spirits by insulting his understanding. The malady of the nerves is in general of too obstinate a nature to yield to a sarcasm or a sneer. It would scarcely be more preposterous to think of dissipating a dropsy of the chest, than a distemper of the mind, by the force of ridicule or rebuke. The hypochondriac may feel indeed the edge of satire as keenly as he would that of a sword; but although its point should penetrate his bosom, it would not be likely to let out from it any portion of that noxious matter, by which it is so painfully oppressed." pp. 7-9.

We are disposed to think, however, that this is not the right way of meeting this disposition to laugh and bully nervous patients into health and complacency. For we cannot fully accord with the doctrine here delivered, and commonly maintained, that," in the class of what are called nervous affections, it unfortunately happens, that the very essence of the disease often consists in a debility of the resolution; that the ailment of body arises from an impotency of spirit, a palsy of the palsy of the power of resistance. A malady occasioned by the weakness of the mind is not likely to be cured by its energy," &c. p. 17. We have little doubt, on the contrary, that this impotency of spirit, and the other symptoms called nervous, are invariably the result of actual corporeal disease, sometimes of structure, but commonly of function; and upon that ground principally we deem the disposition to deride the sufferers equally preposterous, as it would be to attempt to laugh them out of a cough or a colic. Every practitioner must be aware of the long and fruitless attempts that he has often made to rouse this "impotency of spirit" by volatiles and stimulants; and how few sleepless nights he has prevented by his opiates and anodynes; while some, on the other hand, will have marked how unnecessary were such substances, when certain disturbed functions, be they of the stomach, of the bowels, of the liver, or of the uterus, &c., were by any means restored to health. Morbid sensation or morbid ir

ritation, which are the result of diseased function, as well as of diseased structure, give rise in all probability to the various symptoms, corporeal and mental, that are usually denominated nervous. How small an irritation may produce the most formidable nervous disease, it is impossible for us to calculate; since the motions of an ascaris in the rectum will excite a general convulsion, and a graze of the cutis even tetanus itself. How easily therefore may all the numberless miserics and disturbances of nervous patients be accounted for, from the continued minute irritations of some labouring organ or ill-performed function!

The other essays, the titles of which we have mentioned above, are amusing little moral disquisitions, interspersed with a few slight notices of cases, which are never given in detail, but told rather in the way of anecdotes, to enliven the narrative, than related as examples in illustration of medical precepts. The following will serve as specimens of this story-telling style, as well as of the passion for metaphor which abounds to excess, and the occasional quaint conceits which occur in the midst of otherwise good writing.

In the chapter" on Excessive Study," the author says,

"Many years ago I was consulted with respect to an idiotic man of erudition. It was a case of idiocy arising from an overstrained intellect. The understanding had been broken down, in consequence of having been overloaded. The head of the patient, in its best estate, might have been compared to a pawn-broker's shop, which is furnish. ed principally with other people's goods; a repository merely for ideas, not a soil out of which an idea ever grew.”

p. 63.

This is the whole case; and again, in the essay "on Vicissi- ( tude," he says,

"I recollect the case of an unfortunate young man who became a victim to the disastrous issue of a variety of mercantile adventures. The same blow which deranged his affairs, produced a disorder of his reason. His finances and his faculties fell together. The phantoms of imagination indeed survived, and seemed to hover over the ashes of his understanding. The demon of speculation, which had before misled his mind, now possessed it entirely. His projecting spirit, which was always more than moderately intrepid, took, in the maniacal exaltation of his fancy, a still bolder and sublimer flight." p. 70.

Possibly we may have more than satisfied our readers of the justice of the strictures with which we set out. As there are some chapters, however, which bear more of a medical aspect, in the subjects which they present to us, we may inquire if any thing more practical is to be obtained under the heads, " Want

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of Sleep"-" Intemperance" "Morbid Affections of the Organs of Sense"-" Physical Malady, the occasion of Mental Disorder."-" Dyspeptic and Hepatic Diseases"-" Palsy, Idiocy, Spasmodic and Convulsive Affections," &c.

In the Essay on Want of Sleep, which is brief, we meet with the same general phraseology, and only one piece of medical advice; viz. a recommendation of "the use of cold or warm bath," as a remedy for wakefulness, when all the medicinal and dietetic opiates had been resorted to in vain. The Essay "on Intemperance," which is long, exhibits a picturesque account of the effects of stimulation on the frame, which may be useful to those who have not already drank deep in the cup. The author observes, "the idea of a short life and a merry one," is plausible enough, if it could be generally realized. But unfortunately what shortens existence is calculated also to make it melancholy." The slope towards the grave, these victims of indiscretion find no easy descent. The scene is darkened long before the curtain falls. Having exhausted prematurely all that is delicious in the cup of life, they are obliged to swallow afterwards the bitter dregs. Death is the last, but not the worst result of intemperance," p. 83. He remarks that intemperance, however, is in a certain sense a relative thing. "Pope said that more than one glass of wine was to him a debauch." The mischief varies according to the constitution of the individual. In treating of the " Morbid Affections of the Organs of Sense," there is the same absence of medical information and practical precept; indeed the author seems to confound cause and effect, and is rather disposed to refer general nervous diseases to the derangements of the organs of sense, instead of ascribing both to disordered health.

"Inflammation or debility of the eye," he says, "cannot but be produced by the excessive or unreasonable exercise of it, and the diseased state of that organ is likely to be communicated by sympathy to the brain in particular, and in many instances, even to the whole nervous system. Hence from an injury, often apparently unimportant, inflicted upon the delicate instrument of vision, hysteria, epilepsy, hypochondriasis, and even absolute and obstinate melan. choly, have not unfrequently originated." p. 122.

This piece of extraordinary pathology, together with a few desultory anecdotes respecting impaired hearing, constitutes the essay in question. The fourteenth Essay, entitled "Physical Malady, the occasion of Mental Disorder," merely informs us, that a poor woman, at a certain critical period, was for short time delirious," fancied that she saw her bed encompassed with

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