_INTRODUCTORY._
In individual cases of nerve-trouble, the illness is generally traced to
some cause, serious or trivial, real or imaginary, as the case may be.
Quite as much harm as good is wrought by the practice. If the patient
has suffered from some accident or malady leaving nerve-weakness as its
legacy, the large development of the supposed phrenological organ called
“Causality” on the part of the patient’s attendants will probably have
its uses. The invalid will not then be considered a criminal. If his
ailments cannot be cured, at all events he will meet with a certain
amount of consideration, and his sufferings will not be aggravated by
harshness. But if the cause of the mischief defy investigation, then a
false one will assuredly be invented to take its place; the natural love
of detraction, constantly recurring in consequence of the feeling of
superiority which indulgence in detraction gives us, will find an outlet
in action; and the sorrows of the patient, already great enough, will be
increased tenfold. Since all intelligent human beings like to know the
reason of the phenomena they observe, however imperfectly; since a
belief in non-existent causes brings with it disastrous results; it
behoves us to open our eyes to the true causes of nerve-deterioration in
our community, with a view to removing them as completely as lies in our
power.
In the first place, we must recognise the fact that we have contracted
the habit of transposing causes and symptoms. Evil practices, such as
drunkenness, for example, are blamed for the deterioration, instead of
being regarded as the outcome of nerve-instability; while, on the other
hand, nerve-instability itself is often regarded as criminality and the
outcome of an evil disposition, punishments and deterrents are resorted
to, time, money, and brains are wasted, criminal and lunatic classes are
perpetuated, jails and lunatic asylums are multiplied, simply because
we lack the knowledge to recognise that no amount of modification will
ever put right the nerve-structure which is radically wrong from the
birth. Excepting ignorance, the foundation of all woe, the first great
cause of neurasthenia which we must honestly face is HEREDITY.
We shall find, I think, that the second great cause is to be sought in
IMPERFECT SOCIAL CONDITIONS, and the third in AN IMPERFECT SYSTEM OF
EDUCATION.
Other minor causes we may easily enumerate, but they will all be more or
less secondary to these three, and dependent upon them. I propose,
therefore, to consider each of these in turn.