COLOURS AND "NERVES."

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9990, 9 March 1910, Page 4

COLOURS AND "NERVES."

It has never been brought to a point of exact certainty what effects different colours exercise upon the temperaments of different individuals, although it has been long ascertained that there is a very intimate association between them. Efforts to define the nature of this connection have been continuously exerted for many years, and it would seem as though scientific research had now approached within measurable distance of a working basis. Chromotherapy lays down what is already known in a general way, that red is an excitant. Orange and yellow excite in a much smaller degree. In the arena of political thought, however, they have been known to excel even the most virulent crimson in their tempestuous effects; but that by the way. Violet, indigo and blue are of calming effect, which probably accounts for their continuous popularity [as tintings for feminine apparel. Green is said to convey tranquil joy —a sense fo peace. Hence the poet's exaltation derived from green field's and forests' cool shades, With«so much ascertained, colours are now largely employed in combating nervous disorders. In neurasthenia, for example, the effects of the colouredlight treatment are especially encouraging when the light is applied progressively and without abrupt change, and when the patient is placed under the rays of coloured light during a given time. Deschamps, a French scientist, states that the first effect of an increase of light is to augment the activity of the subject, but that the nervous system is affected almost at once. Victims of obesity are the first to prove the bad effects of an excess of light. It is curious to note in passing that blondes are mofe affected by light and colour than brunettes. Sufferers from nervous trquble of any kin d are recommended to paper and cur tain their rooms with green, blue, J or violet, as most likely to exercise 1 a calming effect upon them. Desehamps declares experiments have proved that Jits of impatience or of melancholia may be singularly moderated, if not wholly corrected," by accommodating the wall-paper and hangings'of the living rooms of sufferers from nervous disorders to the temperaments of the subjects Apparently all that is required of the wisdom of the future is the knowledge, duly attested by medical authority, of what colours beat suited to the peculiar idiosyncrasies of each individual's mentality. Though such a process might involve the provision of multi-coloured t material surroundings, it would at least ensure that everybody in the community was promoted to a delectable frame of mind, guaranteed to continue for so long as prevalence of the curative I tonal effects could be relied upon.