Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-05-19
IMAGINARY ILLS.

l
 WHY MANY PERSONS SHOULD LET MEDICAL BOOKS ALONE.
 Not Best to Make Too Close . Study of Ones Physical 5Ailments-The Results
 of Brooding Over Matters-The- Faith It Is dangerous for many highly intellec- tua1 people to study or even read medical treatise, because it will surely undermine their comfort and peace, if not their health 1 have known several who were compelled to turn back from the study of medicine purely | because of their having this over powerful | imagination. l am myself unable to treat many contagious diseases without securing | mild attacks of the same myself. I believe the most serious effects on susceptible persons l is a sort of congestion of different organs, | most likely of bladder, kidneys and the heart. | That this is dangerous in many cases is not to be disputed.
 The very best possible advice to many per- sons is simply to let all medical books alone, | and to so employ their minds that they will not think of matters of health and disease. do not mean that on that account they must neglect all precautions against disease, and refuse to exercise common sense as to diet and physical protection. This can be done on general principles, with special attention, and so without morbid consequences What do mean is that there is one hundredfold more doctoring going on than is necessary; and all of this is tending to create false symptoms and an unhealthy self anatomy. It is precisely as in moral affairs. Wise teachers know that person can form no worse religious habit than study of his own nature. Edward Everett Hale makes the law of right living to be ito look upward, not downward; outward, not inward; forward, not backward, and to lend hand" would say that similar law should control us phys1cally-to look away from our petty ail- ments; to look up, and forward and out ward.
 EFFECTS OF IMAGINATION.
 Chronic medicine takers will soon develop every ill that they imagine. wish to em- phasize this side of the "faith" question. It is not only true that faith cures, but that faith also diseases; and it is the diseases of faith that faith is able to remove. There are natures in whom imagination is so dominant that they can make themselves ill or well as they decide to be. But let 1t be also un- derstood that we are all liable to be more or less similarly victims of our own impressions. In cases of insomnia, the one all important point is to convincs the patient that he is going to have a good night of it. He will then promptly fall asleep and rest undis- turbed probably all night. But if, just be- fore bedtime, he begins to worry and imagine that he shall be wakeful, the chances are he will be wide open eyed in spite of your drugs. It has been my custom in cases of nervous insomnia to administer sweetened water, favored with some harmless substance, and it works quite we'll as powerful soporif1c. What is needed is to arouse the confidence of the patient.
 It is an absolute necessity that we do not brood over any matter whatever, allowing it to make too deep an impression on the brain, or as we say, on our minds A large propor- tion of the women patients in insane asylums are there for no other reason but failure to restrain and curb their emotions. Dr. Conc nolly says, "through their habitual indul- gence of bad temper" This statement of the case must, however, be modified by the fact that bad temper is itself result of habitual excited nerves. A chronic tea drinker, hay ing established an irritated digestion tract, is also irritated and irritable cerebrally. Tho result is a chronic display of iu-temper, and then follows the need of confinement in
 
 diligence in irritability of an extreme and increasing sort, is great. It is incipient in- sanity. To brood over wrong, or to fall into Q frenzy of excitement over it, tends to increase the probability that we shall become victims to the excitement as we'll as the cause of the excitement.
 AN IRRATIONAL CORNER.
 Indeed, am inclined to think that each and every one of us has in some corner of the mind a susceptibility that is irrational. Our one oddity or susceptibility may never be strongly called out, or if it be it may very likely be 0 harmless affair, causing amuse- ment, but doing no harm. The large ma jority indulge such fancies mainly in connec- tion with their religion or theology, and never grow absurd, except in affairs of what we often term the "heart." Here they sus- tain realm of faith, and consider it right and rational to believe what they understand to be incredible and impossible on every ground but revelation and faith. This is not altogether harmless, however, and in periods of excitement leads to delusions and disorders of dangerous sort.
 Our minds should be trained habitually to turn away from whatever subject produces unhappiness, or irritation, or a morbid fancy. Expectation of a consequence, or fear of l.. is a potent cause to produce it. Or, to use
 
 will both induce and remove diseases. There is no question but that the application of kings hands did cure scrofula; but the cure was indeed by the expectant state of the patients mind. I have known warts re- moved by absolute nonsense-but this non- sense was sufficient to waken faith in the per- son afflicted. The oldest use of electric belts and similar appliances was found by certain distinguished surgeons and physicians to be working remarkable cures. They substituted wooden tractors, made to resemble the genu- inc, and obtained the same results. The patients faith did the work.-M. Maurice, M. D., in Globe-Democrat.
 The Multiplication of Monads.
 It is little curious that the report of Dr. Dallinger's experiments with monads, pub lished in The Royal Microscopical Journal, has been so generally passed over in silence in the more popular records of scientific ln- vestigation. There was nothing of a con- troversial character in Dr. Dallinger's un- dertaking A learned and jealous mem ber' of the Royal society, he merely wished to see whether the monad, the smallest and lowest embodiment of animal life visible to
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