New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1858-06-26

We belong, we are GLAD 10 say, 10 tnst SCHOOL OF
thinkers and observers who believe that the world
is, on the whole, moving forward. We are free to
confess, what with barbarites in India and in Kan
sas, with tho saber supreme in Paris and the slave
whip in Washington, with the infnitesimality o.
the growth of tho little wisdom with which the
world is governed since Chancellor Oxenstiern le'
fly as an epgram that prOfoundest secret Of state
craft-what with all these things and msny more,
we must say that it has been sometimes hard to
keep our seat astride our hobby, and to hinder him
from throwing US over his head into the mire 1t
is in the by-w,ys and not the highways Of history,
in the paths aside from the military roads over
which historians generally delight to conduct the
stately march of their events with blocks and glib
bets and racks and fsgots at easy intervals to d.
versify the scene that we have learned to that
the race has made some progress md has gone for
ward and set up here and there q monument to
record it. Perhaps there is no better sign Of real
advancement in civilization in modern over ancieat
times than that displayed in the different treatment
the most unfortunate of human beings receive
now from what they did once, and that not long ago.
1t is comparatively but lately that systematic and
scientific efforts have been made toward mitigating
the lot of those to whom Nature, or rather human
sins and errors had denied the blessing Of reason
or Of the special senses.
Three quarters of q century ago, insane persons
were the objects Of supentitiOus terror, and were
treated with the cruelty which naturally springs
from fear in vulgar minds. And insanity was re.
garded by persons even of more than average intel
Igence, hundred pears since, as the evidence Of
demoniacd possession. 1t is clear from Cowper's
correspondence, that not merely the unhappy poet
himself and Mrs. Unwn, whose name viii be re-
membered as long az his own, but John Newton,
the hard. headed old slave trader turned parsoa,
believed that his madness was caused by direct ds.
bolical agency. Straw, and darkness, and chains,
and whips, were the chief remedies then imagined
as ct for . mind diseased. The only thought
seemed to be to put these occasions Of terror where
they could do no mischief. Cure was scarcely
thought of as possibility, except by supernatu-
raj operation of Divine power. Bedlam was one Of
the sights of London, and the private msdhouses
were the scenes Of the most horrid barbaritss.
Dr. Charles Cotton, whose minor poems are still
admitted into tho collections, was the first person
in England We remember who undertook the treat
ment of lunaties on humane and philosophicL prin,
ciples, about century ago. II was Cowper's
good fortune 70 fall into the benevolent hands Of
this wise and good man, to whom he owed his par
tal restoration, and we all owe his delightful poems
and incompatible letters. Afterward Dr.. Willis,
brought before tho public BY his connection with
King George III. madness, drew general attention
to the possibility Of IN improved treatment of this
fearful disease. This humane application of SCI
ence received great lmpulse in France at the time
of the French Revelation, and much Of its present
advanced state is owing to the wise humanity ofths
French physicians.
II was not until after the insane had received the
bl, s.pp, Of science thus informed By bepevolence,
that the blind, the deaf and dumb and the aiotc
were sought out aud couforted. The, were 'sft'
formerly, a. q general thing. helpless and hopeless
butdecs % tho charity Ct GieIt: or Of las word.