Psychological medicine in John Hunter's time : and the progress it has since made : being the oration for 1891 delivered before the Hunterian Society / by Fletcher Beach.

  • Beach, Fletcher, 1845-1929.
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Psychological medicine in John Hunter's time : and the progress it has since made : being the oration for 1891 delivered before the Hunterian Society / by Fletcher Beach. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    Professor Ladd defines psychology as that science which has for its primary subject of investigation all the phenomena of human consciousness, or of the sentient life of man. Hunter treats of consciousness, the mind, reason, ideas from sensation, fear, deceit, appetites mental operations, sympathies, appetite and passion, instinct, and many other subjects too numerous to mention, and the remarks he makes are well thought out and ably expressed. Hunter was eminently a practical man, and, hadhe lived, he would no doubt have appliod his psychology to the elucidation of many points in surgery and medicine. It therefore occurred to me that the condition of psychological medicine in Hunter's time and its subsequent progress might be a profitable subject whereon to discourse to yon, and although I have since found that you, Sir, in your masterly address last year treated medicine in a similar way and in a manner which I cannot hope to emulate, yet I have thought I might, be able to present to you some facts which may perhaps prove interesting. For many of these I am indebted to my friends, Drs. Hack Tuke, Blandford, and Ireland, who hnve indicated to me the writings wherein I might obtain information on the snbjpct. It appears that during the earlier years of Hunter's life the belief that the insane were possessed of the devil had not entirely passed away and ignorance and supersti- tion guided the treatment. Ducking the lunatic was practised in some parts of Cornwall, and at St. Nun's Pool, situated at Altarnum, eight miles from Lauuces- ton, the practice was as follows :—The water from the pool was allowed to flow into an enclosed place, and on the surrounding wall the patient was made to stand with his back to the water, and then by a sudden blow thrown backwards into it. Then (to quote a graphic description which has been given of it) a strong fellowe, provided for the nonce, tcoke him and tossed him up and downe