Medical jurisprudence; or a code of ethics and institutes, adapted to the professions of physic and surgery.

Date:
[1794]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical jurisprudence; or a code of ethics and institutes, adapted to the professions of physic and surgery. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    XXVII. Asylums for INSANITY poflefs ac- commodations and advantages, of which the poor mud, in all circumftances, be deftitute; and which no private family, however opulent, can provide. Of thefe fchemes of benevolence all claffes of men may have equal occafion to par- ticipate the benefits; for human nature itfelf be- comes the mournful objedt of fuch inftitutions. Other difeafes leaVe man a rational and moral agent, and fometimes improve both the faculties of the head, and the affedlions of the heart. But lunacy fubverts the whole rational and moral charadler j extinguilhes every tender charity; and excludes the degraded fufferer from all the enjoy- ments and advantages of fociab intercourle. Painful is the office of a phyfician, when he is called upon to minifter to fuch humiliating ob- jedls of diftrefs : Yet great muft be his felicity, when he can render himfelf inftrumental, under providence, in the refloration of reafon, and in the renewal of the loft image of God. Let no one, however, promife himfelf this divine privi- lege, if he be not deeply fkilled in the philofo- phy of human nature. For though cafual fuccefs may fometimes be the refult of empirical prac- tice, the medkina mentis can only be adtniniftered with fteady efficiency by him, who, to a know- ledge of the animal oeconomy, and of the phyfical caufes which derange or regulate its movements, unites