The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1895-11-20
FRENCH NERVOUSNESS.
Increase of a Disease known Neuras-
thenic Anxiety.

thenic Anxiety.
French doctors say that the increase
of the neurasthenic condition threatens
to become the great scourge Of society,
and they are bound to admit that some
of the phenomena arising from 1t are
such as science can throw but little light
upon. Moreover, it is often impossible
to say where mere nervous disorder ends
and downright lunacy begins. The case
of Mile. Amelot, who shot the Able de
Broglie, is one in point. She has been
pronounced insane by committee OF
medical men, but had she not commit
ted q criminal act they could not posi-
bly, have come to any such conclusion
from her conversation and general con-
duct. A doctor has made the conSoling
statement that we brush shoulders with
such people almost every hour, but that
so long as they refrain from doing mis-
chief their state of mind cannot be char
acterized as dementia.
There is later case, respecting which
the Partisan mind is still much eXercis-
ed. 1t is that of the youth of 20 who
indulged a propensity for stabbing
young women with penknife as they
passed him in the street. In, doing so he
used some prudence and reflection, for
he stabbed them all i'll the same place
one where such an injury was not like
ly to be dangerous After his arrest he
declared that he could not account for
the impulse under which be had acted.
Dr.. GILES de la Tourette, who is taking
the position occupied by the late DR..
Charcot, places this young man IN the
Jack the Ripper category of modern
maniacs-those whose ruling propensity
is to do mischief to women. He declares
that such desequilibres are by no means
rare, bat that in q general way it is i'm
possible 20 treat them as maniacs. They
know quite well that they are evil do
ers, for when arrested they invariably
deny with much energy the charge
brought against them until the evidence
Of their guilt becomes too strong. DR..
GILES de la Tou1ette maintains that
they should be dealt with as criminals,
for there is nothing like the dread Of
punishment to rescue them from the
fascination of their vice" There is
some conflict Ct ideas here, for if such
people are truly maniacs they ought not
to be punished to cure them of the
"vice," but in their case it is so diff
cult to distinguish madness from bad
ness that to spend compassion on them
would be probably to waste it.
The fact to be faced is that, whether
from causes of the physical or the NOR
al order, or Of both, the bizarreries Of
the human mind are becoming more
perplexing every day in France and
they are beginning to interfere very Sc
riously with the normal course Of life.
We hear Of dragons who are seized
with an unaccountable terror when they
mount q horse, SO that they fall from
sheer panic; of consulting doctors-yes,
even doctors-who are ready to tear the
hair from their heads when the patient
has gone for fear that they have made
some terrible blunder in the prescrip-
ton; of railway employees who are trou-
bled in similar manner by an appall-
ing dread of having done something
wrong; of preachers who dare not put
their foot on the first step leading to
the pulpit; of persons who are terror
stricken while crossing bridge, al
though they may have perfect command
over their will in all other respects,
and of nervous conditions still more
distressing Such a state is described as
one of "neurasthenic anxiety" and ex-
cessive concentrations Of the mind on
certain points is generally supposed to
be the cause of it. But, whatever may
be the explanation, the nerves of mod
ern society appear to be getting serious
ly out of repair.-Paris Cor. st. James
Gazette.