Practical observations on mental and nervous disorders / by Alfred Beaumont Maddock ; illustrated with cases.

  • Maddock, Alfred Beaumont.
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Practical observations on mental and nervous disorders / by Alfred Beaumont Maddock ; illustrated with cases. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

    114/256 (page 102)
    Such patients frequently talk passionately and wildly upon whatever subject the current of their thoughts, and their previous modes of life, have rendered them most disposed to dwell; they contemplate them erroneously, mistaking some day-dream for a reahty; and the emotions which this false impression excites, are imagined by their friends and relatives, to be the exciting cause of their disordered condition, whereas the whole phenomena of their derangement, are consequent upon an aflFec- tion of the brain produced by physical causes—although the indulgence of strong mental emotions may, in a constitution predisposed to insanity, give rise to the actual appearance of the disease. These considerations will materially enable the physician to reduce the aggregate number of maniacal cases, usually referred to moral causes. Especial care and attention should be bestowed upon the physical and mental development of young persons whose relatives have been the subjects of mental derangement; the former will be promoted by healthy occupation and exercise in the open air, and the latter by the inculcation of sound religious and moral principles, care being taken to avoid the indulgence of the passions, caprices, and selfish feehngs. The judgment should be early and judiciously informed, without fatiguing the mind; and the intellectual instruction of such childi-en should not be forced or premature, and the most careful surveillance should be maintained for a considerable period after puberty, until the mind, constitution, and conduct ai'e fully estabUshed. Case—Mental Excitement—Cutaneous Eruptions. A gentleman, aged 49, of a tall and spare form, yellowish cast of countenance, and nervous temperament, consulted me upon his case. For eighteen months he had sufl^ered greatly from