stopping of the ague, whenever under this discipline, it is stopped, supplies an example of the cure of disease by the employment of a mental feeling.-So did the prevention of obstinately returning epileptic fits, throughout the hospital at Harlaem, by the operation of terror,when Boerhaave, having caused a cauldron of fire to be placed in the hall where the children were assembled, issued, with stern countenance, the dreadful mandate that the child who should be seized with a fit, was to be burned to the bone with an iron red hot from said cauldron. Through the force of imitation it had long so happened, that, when one child fell down in an epileptic fit, nearly the whole complement of children dropped also under similar attack. But, after the device of the red hot iron, no more fits were witnessed. Examples of the power and agency of mind over the functions and mechanism of the body, might be multiplied to an indefinite length; and we might close by reminding the reader, that occasions of a transport of sudden joy, and a shock of sudden grief, have alike induced a fatal catastrophe. We may hence learn to appreciate the strength and the authority of mental energies, though we cannot conceive the proximate mode of their operation. I know that the illustrious Cullen thought, and, if I am not mistaken, he also taught, that a state of disease, purely and exclusively mental, might exist. The remark is worthy of communication and remembrance, because we may draw from it the sentiment of that great physiologist on the question of an immaterial principle in man. If we admit that a condition of disease, purely mental, may exist: surely no physiological difficulty can oppose itself to our conclusion, that a state of health, or recovery from disease, may be influenced and regulated by a similar commanding agency: therefore, that an immaterial essence, or mind, lives and operates in man. This topic, so physically curious and interesting, but in its resolution morally unimportantfor reasons briefly assigned in the first essay of this little work,-must not here be returned to, and discussed. But, I will just notice, that, from the glimpses which have already been caught, and communicated, of the phenomena of the human mind, by men of observation and acuteness of penetrating thought; of active spirit: from the length of time which has been afforded for contemplating the character and genius of R that mind: from these recollections alone, it is disheartening to contemplate what slender adaptation has been made, to useful purposes, of our stock of information; and that, more than all, the science of pneumatology, or mind, has with wondrous small qualification of the remark, been forgotten, or, turned to no account, in the exercise and management of the healing art: and yet, too early as it may be to look for a pneumatological system of medical practice, 'tis far from being premature for the advantageous application of the powers and aptitudes of the mind, to the prevention and cure of diseases; whether by the dexterous management of its quicker and higher passions, or by a recourse to its more steady, fixed, and graver properties. And here, let not that distinguishing faculty of its nature be forgotten, by which, whatever it may be, the mind seems privileged to exercise an authority over the laws and movements of the animal economy; and capable, by ways and means, to us incomprehensible, of giving a direction to physical and even to mechanical action. Such appears to be one characteristic property of its nature, as long as itself is supported by the rooted, the firm, and the despotic power of persuasion. |