The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-04-13

sciousness the perpetual noises ana the
various sights in the streets Of a large
town. our suspense pending the pro-
gresS Of events, the constant ex-
pecting of the newspaper, of the
postman, of visitors. cost our
brains wear and tear. In the last
fifty years the population of Europe has
not doubled. whereas the sum of Its
mental labors has Increased tenfold,
in some directions even flftyfold.
Every civilized man furnishes at the
present time from five to twenty-five
times as much mental work as was de-
manded of him half a century ago.
1T is next pointed out that this enor-
nous increase in organic expenditures
has not. and cannot have, corre-
spending Increase Of supply. Euro
peans now eat little more and little
better food than they did fifty years
ago. but by no means In proportion to
the increase OF mental effort which to-
day Is required of them. Even II they
had the choicest food in the greatest
abundance, 1t could do nothing toward
helping them. for they would be in
capable of digesting 1t. Our stomachs
cannot keep pace with the brain and
nervous system. The latter demand
very much more than the former are
able to furnish. So there follows what
always happens when great expenses
are met by small incomes: first, the
savings are consumed, then comes
bankruptcy In word, their own new
dicoveries and progress have taken
,txy lxt,
have had no time to adapt themselves
to their changed conditions Of life. I'm
questionably our organs acquire by ex-
ercise an ever greater functional ca
pacity, developed by their own activity,
and can eventually respond to nearly
every demand made upon them; but
only under one condition. that the de-
mand increases gradually and that
time be allowed to them. II they are
summoned to fulfil without transition
a multiple Of their usual task, they soon
give out entirely.
mo time was left to our fathers, that
Is to say, to the generation born In the
fourth decade of this century. Be-
tween one day and the next. as 1t were.
without preparation, with murderous
suddenness. they were obliged to
change the comfortable. creeping gait
of former existence for the stormy
strides Of modern life. Their heart and
lungs could not bear 1t. The strongest
could keep up, no doubt, but the less
vigorous soon fell out right and left,
and fill today the ditches on the road
of progress. Statistics indicate in what
measure the sum Of work Of civilized
mankind has increased during the last
half century. 1t had not grown up to
this increased effort. 1t became IA
tigued and exhausted, and this fatigue
and exhaustion showed themselves in
the first generation under the form of
acquired hysteria. The new aesthetic
schools constitute, according to Nor
dau, form of this general hysteria
but they are far from being the only
one. Analogous phenomena are recog-
nizable in the increase of alcoholism,
crime. madness. and suicide; of nervous
disorders. including such new afrec-
tions as the railway spine and rail-
way BRAIN the increase Of heart dis
ease; the prevalence Of precocious dem
tai decay and badness, of nearsighted-
ness and deafness. and premature old
age.
Why Franco Is ART Crazy.
"AlI the pathological symptoms emu
merated are the consequence of states
of fatigue and exhaustion, and these
again, are the effects of contemporary
civilization, of the vertigo and whirl
of our frenzied life. the vastly increased
number of sense impressions and or.
ganic reactions. and, therefore, of per.
ceptions. judgments, and motor i'm
pulses. which at present are forced into
given unit of time. To these general
causes of contemporary pathological
phenomena is coupled one special tC
France. BY the frightful loss Of blood
which the body of the French people
suffered during the twenty years Of the
Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars
and by the violent moral upheavals tc
which they were subjected during the
same period, they found themselves IL
prepared for the impact of the grea
discoveries Of the century and sus
tained from these more violent
shock than did other nations more ro
bust and more capable of resistance.
Upon this nation, nervously strained
and predestined to morbid derange
ment, broke the awful catastrophe o.
which almost attained to megalomania
believed itself the first nation in tn,
world; 1t now saw itself suddenly hu
INFLATED and crushed. All it's convic
tlons abruptly crumbled to pieces. ev
cry single Frenchman suffered reverse
of fortune. lost some members of hi
family, and felt himself PERSONAL!
robbed of his dearest conceptions, nay
even Of his honor. The whole peopl
fell into the condition of a man sudden
ly visited by shattering blow of des
tiny In his fortune. his position, hi
family, his reputation. even in his self
respect. Thousands lost their reason
and even those who did not at ono
succumb to mental arrangement suf
fered lasting injury to their nervous
system. Thus would Mr.. Nordau ex
plain why bysteria and neurastheni,
are much more frequent In France. ant
appear under greater variety Of form
than they do anywhere else. The opera
tion of the same special cause. adde,
to the general causes Of fatigue. woul,
explain, too, why 1t is precisely II
France that the craziest fashions Il
art and literature arise, and why It 1
there that the morbid exhaustion else
where less acutely experienced became
for the first time, sufficiently distinc
to allow a special name to be coine
for 1t. the designation. namely. Of fl
de Steele" 3D.
She Wns Too Good.
| From, Toyna CIfflnua