Curiosities of Medical ExperienceMillingen, J. G. (John Gideon)
Philosophy
Curiosities of Medical Experience
Millingen, J. G. (John Gideon)
Medicine
The introduction of French cookery in every part of England amongst the
wealthy will render attention to dietetic rules still more important than
in former days; although Dean Swift, in his time, observed, "That modern
epicurism had become so prevalent, that the world must be encompassed,
before a washerwoman can sit down to breakfast."
INFLUENCE OF IMAGINATION.
Innumerable are the diseases that arise from our busy fancy. We are all
subject to the tyrannic sway of imagination's empire. Under this mighty
influence man displays energies which lead him boldly to dare danger and
complicated sufferings, or he is reduced to the most degraded state of
miserable despondency. These diseases are the more fearful, since they
rarely yield to physical aid, and it is seldom that moral influence is
sufficiently persuasive to combat their inveteracy. It is idle to tell the
timid hypochondriac that he is not ill; the mere circumstance of his
believing himself sick, constitutes a serious disorder. His constant
apprehensions derange his functions until an organic affection arises. The
patient who fancies that he labours under an affection of the heart
disturbs the circulation, which is ever influenced by our moral emotions,
till at last this disturbance occasions the very malady which he dreaded.
These aberrations of the mind arise from various causes,--mental emotions,
constitution, climate, diet, hereditary disposition, education. Tertullian
called philosophy and medicine twin sisters; both may become powerful
agents in controlling our imagination.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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