The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1878-01-26
How 1 Nan closes His Grip"...Is II
81 Insanity4

How Nan "Lsses His Grip'...Is 1t
q Insanitys
The Keokuk Uowa) Constitution
says: The following is an interesting
extract from lecture on insanity, deliv-
cred yesterday, before the students Of
the College Of Physicians and Surgeons
by J. NJ. Shaffer: A''''@-
In every community there are men
who, by patient industry, intelligent eff
fort and honest endeavor, have accumu-
lated q certain amount of property, and
have gained certain social influence and
position. Their business has not been
speculative, but on firm basis. But, in
the twirling of the whirligig of time, a
reverse sets in; somehow matters no
longer thrive with them. The store is
no longer frequented by a throng.
Somebody else secures his custom, and,
without any seeming fault of his, his
business goes to pieces, and his proper
ty vanishes as quickly as vapOr is dis
sipated. Before he knows it, or before
his friends are certainly aware of it, he
has nothing left-except life. And life
is poor boon without energy, tact, skill,
health and combativeness. The man has
lost his grip .g
He goes late to his work and retires
early from it. He don't advertise. He
don't care whether he buys or whether
he sells. He has lost something. Scholar
ly minds call it ambition. Let us call
| it "Grip.' He has let 60 his
hold on his work, and his hand IS pow
erless and graspless. He don't care any
more for the things which once gave
him employment, delight and compe-
tence. Perhaps you will find at the bot
tom of all this o whisky-bottle-or some
domestic infelicity, or some confidence
destroyed, or some failure to reach the
blessings to which his longing soul as
pired. The man gets I" blue that is a
good word; he sees every thing with a
jaundiced vision, and he has lost his
grip. His friends may attempt to arouse
him; they might as well try to kindle a
fire with water-soaked elm. He is per-
fectly content to have nothing and to do
nothing. He hardly cares if he do but
compass enough to satisfy him for din
ner, whether or not he shall ever have a
supper again.
There is something wrong with such
man. He is sick man. He is an un-
usual man. He has departed from his
usual method of acting. He is an insane
mamie has made a departure from his
usual method of thinking. He "has
lost his grip
If you surrounded such one with the
proper elements he may be restored to
health. Money will utterly fail to do
it. First of all can you secure his con-
fidence? Will he tell you fairly and
squarely why he has lost his interest in
his business? The way to a remedy is
very short and easy. alf'
Many a broken farmer, or merchant,
or banker, or tradesman, or worker in
any Of the branches of the busy markets
of the world, has ''lOst his grip" be-
because he is suck, and there is no ply
stefan with skill enough to cure him.
There is no doctor who has that init
mate knowledge of the close connection
of the brain with all the other parts of
the body, that can prescribe remedy
that shall break up his morbid habit of
thought and restore him to his healthy
method of thinking. Such remedies
there are-not mental or moral reme-
dies, but physical and natural means
thst has reached man who has "lost
his grip" and bring him back to health
and to consequent usefulness.
This form Of insanity is far too COM
mon; because it is not clearly appre-
ciated. The physician should attack
such case with vigor and decision, and
should first of all discover the cause of
the malady, and then set about to apply
a remedy. 1t may be said-you can not
cure causes of domestic insanity with
blue pills, and tonics, and powders, and
potions. Yes,you can-when you come
to get the incest appreciation of the re-
lation of the work of the brain, to the
work of every other part of the human
organism. The physical-the natural
conditions have more TO do with this
very question than all the moralities
and theologies. in the universe. If
there is bad boy, or a recusant girl in
tie family; if he or she is the element
of discord, begin right at that point.
Who is at fault? Has the child its char
acter of badness from hereditary pre-
disposition? Is it like its father or
mother? "Did this man sin or its par
ents, that he was born .blind?" Did
physical evil fall upon the child because
of the sin of the parentsp We believe
it. Now, to effect cure, and to bring
this man back that he may recover his
grip, you must take into account all
those things which attach to his ances-
try and that of his children. Then ply
steal remedies can come into play; and
skill, tact and common sense will sug-
gest what is necessary to be done for a
man who is sick because he has fallen
into bad line in stipiculture. You can
hardly go back and eradicate the dis
-ease-the faults of character of the dead
ancestry; but you can so teach, enforce
and indoctrinate him that he will see
this universal sweep of law, and seeing
it, obey it, and profit by his obedience.
What you want to know in the treat
ment of this case, is the foundation prin-
ciple from which they have sprung. By
educating the man who has "lost his
grip" and showing him all these i'm
portant relations, you have gone a long
way in bringing him back to health, to
sanity, to soundness of mind.
A Boys Presence Of Mind.
The Dayton (Ohio) Democrat of the
18th inst. says: yesterday some boys
were skating on the ice on the river, be-
low the city, when one of them, whose
name is Robinson, broke through the