Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1906-02-11
GAY LIFE HOLDS
ITS DIRE PERILS
LONDON DOCTOR SCORES
ENGLISH SOCIETY WOMEN
Fast Pace Wrecks Nerves-Deelares
That the Whole Country Is
Thre atened by the Effects
Of Neurasthenia

Special Cable to The Herald.
LONDON, Feb. 10.-"Breakdown of
the nervous system is no mere society
craze which it is fashionable to surfer
from. but is becoming national ca
lamity which bids fair to rob our de-
scendants of many Of those qualities
which have done so much to make this
empire what it is"
This prognostication forms striking
passage in an article in the Contempt
rary Review by DR.. Guthrie RANKIN,
London physician This article Is IN
terestinp to American readers from the
fact that I believe that the neurasthe-
MIA or nervous breakdown was first
COMPLETELY described by DIR. Beard OF
New York I'm 1872
Reviewing the causes of the malady,
DR.. Rankin observes that the old order
of life is changed in dietic usages ana
keener and fiercer competition, towns
and cities are becoming more crowded
and the demand is for more ener-
getic and exciting life The same spirit
Of restlessness has impaired to all Vo-
cations a more active character than
they formerly possessed. A holiday
to many people is no longer the rest 1t
once was.
Women Frequent Victims
Up to the present large proportion
of patients who suffer from functional
disorders of the nervous system spring
from among the opuent classes, but
they are to be met with in all grades
of society, women being the sufferers
more frequently than men. Evidently
the wear and tear plus luxury is telling
its story more rapidly than wear and
tear plus unsuitable food and INSULT
Gent rest.
1.-THE day is rapidly coming" says
DR.. Rankin, when every class Will
suffer-the rich because they are too
easily circumstance and too self-in-
dulgent, the poor because they are in
sufficiently fed and regardless of every
rudimentary law of health, and the
members of the great middle class be-
cause they break themselves in their
unceasing endeavors to outstrip their
neighbors and to amass money"
DR.. Rankin declares that it is among
the women who allow themselves to
become neurasthenic from causes with
in their control that nervous debility
in the meantime is most rampant
Raps Higher Classes
"Those who belong to the cultured
and leisured classes of society" he
proceeds, "are the greatest sinners.
half of their womanhood, swept into the
whirl of social ambition, of the many
sacrifices, not only to their health, but
their duty to the remorseless demands
of the wooden image at whose shrine
they worship.
"They have neither the time nor the
desire for the ordinary affairs of life.
Domestic obligations have little claim
upon their attention. They find no OPP
portunity for the practice of the old
fashioned homely virtues. Their lives
have become dreary worship of MAN.
mon and the restless search after So
cial novelty and physical excitement
Children seriously interfere with the
numerous engagements of such women,
and are regarded as undesirable acct
dents which at all hazards are to be
avoided
Several changes of custom and habit
are mentioned by the writer in exami
nation of the means of prevention
namely, a more rigid adherence to sim
plicity of life; a pronounced social dis
approval of the immoderate use of al
cohol and tobacco and the forbidding
of both to children under age, and some
form of compulsory military service,
exacted from every healthy young
man,