Insanity tested by science, and shown to be a disease rarely connected with permanent organic lesion of the brain. And on that account far more susceptible of cure than has hitherto been supposed / [Charles Mountford Burnett].

  • Burnett, C. M. (Charles Mountford), 1807-1866
Date:
1848
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Insanity tested by science, and shown to be a disease rarely connected with permanent organic lesion of the brain. And on that account far more susceptible of cure than has hitherto been supposed / [Charles Mountford Burnett]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Mental prin- ciple is de- pendent on the blood. Also the bodily func- tions. Majendie’s experiment. The brain is not only af- fected by the blood, but by other organs remote from it. & PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. and vital energy the brain requires than other organs to enable it to execute its office. Without going into the question of identity between the vital and the mental principle, but supposing the manifestation of the mental principle to be dependent upon the normal condition of the brain, and the brain to be dependent upon the vital condition of the blood, we may with little difficulty trace the origin of much evil in the brain to the actual condition of that fluid. Many facts go to prove that the mental principle, whether it be latent in the blood or not, cannot be manifested through any other organization in the body but the brain. Yet any arrest in the vital fluid con- veyed to that organ, produces a loss of mental as well as corporeal power, as much as if the structure of the organ had been injured. Majendie’s experiment on a dog, which he bled five times, at intervals of a day, injecting water after each bleeding into the vein, showed that it was to the blood the animal owed its instinct, and indeed its whole cerebral function.* Moreover the healthy action of the brain is not only impeded by causes which affect its immediate organi- zation through the blood, but it is also greatly in- fluenced, accelerated, or impeded by the relative state of other organs. Pathology proves this in many ways. The balance, and even the action of the mind is often arrested, sometimes temporarily, and even permanently so, from the presence of disease in a distant organ. The intimate communion between the brain and the stomach is most remarkable. The function of digestion is often entirely suspended by the morbid action of the brain, so that, after violent grief and great fear, food has been known to have remained for days in the stomach unchanged. Sorrows of the mind act power- * Physiology.