Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-07-08
is LOVE A DISEASE?
GALEN CITED A CASE IN WHICH
IT WAS so TREATED.
London Physician Declares That if a
Malady It is a Modern One,
Whatever Ancients Say.
From the London Lancet.

From the London Lancet.
rs love a dsease?" Galen, one of the
fathers of medicine" proclaimed it to be
such eighteen centuries ago and modern
London is inclined to take the same view
of the matter being engaged in heated
discussion of the question.
According to one doctor, Galen, in his
medical writings, cites the first case on
record where love was treated by a physi-
clan as a recognized form of Illness This
treatment was given by Galen in the sec
ond century to Roman lady, wife of the
patrician Menppus. All the medical men
of the fashionable world failed to touch
her ailment, and gave up her case as in
durable.
Nine Menppus, a last resort, sum
moned Galen. who had recently arrived
from the schools of Asia Minor. He
promptly diagnosed the complaint as love
sickness" Pylades. handsome young
knight whom the woman had seen once
or twice. but did not know, was declared
to be the cause of the disease. The beat
ing of the patients pulse is given by Galen
as the only means he had of judging the
nature of her affection. He fails to state,
however, what remedies he recommended
other than to say that by his professional
discretion he was able to restore her to
better state of mind" He follows this re-
cital with statement that Cleopatra used
one OF his cosmetics ana 1OunO IL exCeilent,
thus furnishing the first voluntary pat
ent medicine testimonial known to his
tory.
Antiquity Sanctions Theory.
The theory that love is disease has
the sanction of venerable antiquity Apart
from the Greek and Roman classics, 1t is q
commonplace of the seventeenth century.
The learned German Gregorius Horst'us
published a long thesis in favor of the
contention in 1911, and in 1914 Lamandus
supported him in a neatly entitled Latin
ESSAY on The Nature of Love and the
Cures for Love Madness" Ten years later
Ferrand. in Paris. printed book on Ihe
Malady of Love; or, Erotic Melancholy.
The Dutch and Flemish Painters of the
last half of the same century found in
''love sickness a favorfte subject some
of the paintings of women suffering from
this disease are scientifically accurate por.
trayals OF the anaemic condition Ot
course none OF these writers and painters
had as yet suspected that there Is ba-
ctIlus of love, though Cupid's arrow. which
Is as old as mythology, is certainly It's anti
type.
At Gissen, in Germany, in the sixteenth
century Horstius and the savants of Eu-
rope engaged in a long dispute upon the
nature of love before large audience OF
the nobility and gentry. Both sides ad-
mitted that the affiiction was certainly
disease, the only question being the form II
assumed. Horstius maintained That II was
q mental disorder, while one OF his oppo-
nents showed that magic was not yet
dead art by stoutly asserting that it was
the result of poisoning by love philters
and charms" Still another learned doctor
was sure that love was an illness that re-
sembled indigestion and could be diagnosed
by the irregular and heightened beat OF the
pulse.
Hindoos Agree on Symptoms.
A British officer in India added fuel to tho
INV,
of symptoms Of ''love sickness agreed
upon by ancient Hindoo writers. These
signs were said to be "a peculiar sideiong
stare, languid gait, difficult breathing.
stoppage of the hearts action, whitening OF
limbs. cold shivers up and down the back,
feverS and SwoonS.
All the Indian poets consider the appear
ance of drops of perspiration on the cheeks
and other parts of the body as one of the
most dangerous Indications Of the presence
of the malady.
officer "a royal lover is afraid to take q
birch bark message in his hand lest the
perspiration from his palms wash away
the message there. All the cures tried by
lovesck patients proved ineffective. In the
drama 1.-The Bhavabhutf the hero, Mad
hava. tries snow, moonlight. camphor. To-
tus roots, pearls and sandal oil as RENEE
dies but without effect. The Hindoos were
able sickness that they permitted suf-
ferer to do almost anything to prevent him
self from dying of 1t.
Disease One of Civilization.
Few English physicians were found who
believed that love was a sickness, al
though one Londoner said. IF it is a dis
ease, it is as modern appendicitis, in
spite of what the ancients have to say upon
the subject
In support of this claim he brings for
ward the customs of the less-developed
races of the world to prove that love in its
higher sense is unknown to them He points
out that among the savage tribes of Au-
stralia one girl is as good as another in the
sight of a wooer. because they "all look
alike" and have the same degree of intelli-
gence. The Dyaks imprison their young
girls for seven years m cage, so that they
may be bleached to light yellow by the
sun and come cut with small feet and
hands. The bushmen and their wretched
women are so brutalized by the hardships
of their life that the sexes come to resem-
BILE each other, and love for an individual
is not known.
Therefore concludes the writer, .'if
love is a sickness it is a development of
civilization. because, in spite of fairy stories
to the contrary, the savages cannot and
do not fall In love as more refined peoples
do Love sickness is certainly mental
complaint in any event, and a low intclli-
gence cannot suffer much from it,