On some further conditions of neurasthenia : a psychological study / by Dennis de Berdt Hovell.

  • Hovell, Dennis de Berdt.
Date:
1887
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On some further conditions of neurasthenia : a psychological study / by Dennis de Berdt Hovell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    and even denied. ISTo wonder, then, that the result has been so unsatisfactory. Dr. Wilks remarks in the Lancet^ November 18, 1870: For my part, I know nothing of any influ- ences exeiied by man upon man, except those that are boimd up in his material body ; and I am in accord with those who know of no forces in nature except such as are intimately associated with matter. To this I reply, that it is impossible to comprehend the various causes and conditions of neurasthenia if the effects of not only physical but moral influences are not recognized. A labouring man meets with an accident, and, when extricated, asks for his wife; he becomes emotional—miscalled hysterical. Prince Alex- ander, on his return to Bulgaria, becomes emotional, his whole nervous system having been quite prostrated by the ill-treatment he has received. Emotion is neither physical nor intellectual—it is a moral influence ; its effect upon the human frame is palpable; but Dr. Wilks, by his own admission, ignores it, because it is not boimd up in his material body. As a matter of course, Dr. Wilks does not allow that hope deferred maketh the heart sick. Since hope is not bound up in his material body nor intimately associated with matter, neither can he recognize courage, fortitude, and resolution, because they are not bound up in matter. It would be well if they were. It will be my object to shoAv that the effect of shock is to impair the power of these qualities, also that the object of treatment should be to restore it. The doctrine of materialism, advocated not only by Dr. Wilks, but by Lawnmce, Huxley, Tyndall, Dr. H.