Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News TUESDAY, MAY 16 1905. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 22734, 16 May 1905, Page 2

Te Aroha AND Ohinemuri News TUESDAY, MAY 16 1905. NOTES AND COMMENTS.

2his above all—to thine own self be true. And it mnut follow an the night the day Ihou canst not then be false to any man Shakespeare.

Forty years ago, fifty thousand inhabitants of the. British Isles were

Treatment of Insanity.

regit-t *red as lunatics ; today these numbers have increased to one hundred and fifty thousand’

Allowing even for the increase of populaiion, and th|t many people are now sent to asylums who were formerly looked after by rela i/ee at home, the numbers arealarifbing, and justly give rise to much anxi ety and thought. If the number of suicides dui ing the period were added to the list of persons; who ut the . pre. sent day are not legally certified insane simply because they are able to afford private treatment, the figures would be largely increased. At any rate, it is computed that at the very lowest estimate, one hundred thousand citizens are on the borderland of insanity, persons whom medical men might, if required, certify as fit inmates for asylums. Alcoholism has recently bulked largely in the public miud as one of the causes of insanity, and upon which undue stress has been laid by many of our most eminent asylum authorities. These medical superintendents of asylums deserve commendation for drawing attention to the evils associated with excessive alcoholism, but it is apparent that their daily contact duti .-s with the insaue only have tended to the magnifying of a condition associat ed with insanity into a cause. No sane person is unalive to the vice and misery attending the evil, but why, it may be asked, single out excessive alcoholic indulgence, when any othor excess of vice or strain or worry would produce a similar effect. Enlarge upon the evils if you will emphasise, its degenerating influences on the victim, and still more s> on his progeny, but do not let us accept an associated condition of alcoholism as a cause—when the cause lies much deeper, .VVe can * not ignore the fact that millions of I people drink heavily, and neither they nor their offspring show signs of finsanity, Medical science allows an adult two ounces of alcohol per dav; and yet, while this quantity woull readily upset some, on others it has no appreciable effect. This clearly proves that an underlying oauss exists unong'those who are easily affected. In other words, it means that nature —at the very outset —has deprived these persons of the n -cessary amount of nervous stability, which predisposes them to an early breakdown, and it is, with them, merely a question of how they are able to hold out. Indiscriminate teaching in whereby the child is forced to assimilate ,r the same knowledge as the more rodust children, presents another fertile cause, and undoubte Ily increases the tendency to break down nnd become a burden either to the State, or to those upon whom they are dependent. Physical weakness or nervous instability is here a very important factor in fostering insanity, and ■m> which has hitherto been treated with appalling neglect. Anothei vitally important cause is the intermarrying of near relatives, notably in country districts wifi) adecaying popu lation, and where the ranges of choice become diminished through the efflux of the stronger nature into the large cities.

A strikingly potent cause is enviionh:ent, not of pover’y, where that is honest, but where it is steej ed in vice, ife misery, and in crime, and where

the sunshine of Illness, goodness, and nobility o chavacer never pe etrates, Many other causes are to be found, j||<nt the majority of actual causes are Sgdiilicuk to ascertain—particularly where heredity is concerned —as some Relatives are naturally very chary of fpnswering questions affecting patients, land others are really ignorant of th?ir j lineal history. The main direct causes in aslyum reports are ale iholism immorality, and epilepsy.