TREATMENT OF THE INSANE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3202, 3 October 1881, Page 4

TREATMENT OF THE INSANE.

It may be of interest to our readers to know that we owe the great advance in the understanding and consequent treatment of insanity to two great French physicans, Esquirol and Pinal, whose names on this account alone will never cease to burn brightly among the luminaries of science. During the time of the Revolution, when Robespierre and his colleagues were in power, Esquirol was much struck by the condition of the BicStre, a large prison-like building in which all the mad folk were incarcerated, chained tip in the cells like so many wild beasts ; sleeping, when that luxury was possible, on stone floors, sprinkled with filthy straw; and whose food was thrown to them as to dogs, hj a surly jailer, only too ready to use the etout whip ■with which we always find him armed in old pictures. He applied to the government for power to introduce reforms into these dens of cruelty and darkness. By them he was given carte-blanche to do as he pleased. The authoi'ities at the time having other " fish to fry," never gave the subject a thought; so Esquirol unloosing their chains, gave them liberty, food and light; and found, as he expected, that not only did they refrain from at once tearing themselves to pieces, as Iheir keepers protested they would, but that a gradual and manifest improvement took place in their mental state. Thus began a new era for those visited with the greatest of all human afflictions. It would be interesting to trace the gradual spread of the new principle, inaugurated by Esquoirol, all over the world ; biit space forbids: suffice it to say, that from that day to this, steady increase and improvement in our knowledge and treatment of insanity has gone on, until, at the present moment, hundreds are devoting their energies and lives to this cause. 'It may not be generally known that towards the close of the last centux'y the public were admitted to a well-known London Asylum to view the lunatics at the modeet charge of a penny a head. From this the asylum derived an income of upwards of £400 a year, until the revolting practice was put a stop to.—Chambers's Journal.