Insanity: Its Causes and PreventionStearns, Henry Putnam
Science
Insanity: Its Causes and Prevention
Stearns, Henry Putnam
Psychiatry -- Early works to 1900
2. One of the conditions of savage life, is that of _a community of
interests and supplies_, to a large extent. Families and tribes seek for
and possess supplies in common; the weaker depend upon the strong, and the
strong aid the weak, so that when privations, from failure in the chase
and other causes, may come, they affect all together, and generally in
like degree. The passion of avarice is in a latent state; those who are
strong do not thrive at the expense of those who are less so, while the
latter depend upon aid from the former. Wealth and poverty and such
distinctions as arise from these civil conditions are unknown.
Under the conditions and customs which pertain to civilized life, how
great the contrast! All, or nearly all, is changed. Individuality appears
at once. Each and every person, or family, is expected to rely upon his,
or its, individual effort for success in obtaining such things as are
necessary to comfort and well-being. In this he stands, in a large sense,
isolated, and fails, or succeeds, by himself, alone, or with his family.
In other words, _community of interests_, except in some very indefinite
and limited measure, is lost sight of, and swallowed up in those of the
individual. In the conduct of life, the strong are almost sure, not only
to neglect the weak, but often to tyrannize over them; they become selfish
and not unfrequently covetous, and require much for little. The
distinctions and conditions of society incident to wealth and poverty,
knowledge and ignorance, appear, and the latter too often surrounds its
unfortunate victim with such hardships and exposure, as tend rapidly, in
too many cases, toward bodily and mental disease.
In this way the struggle incident to the conditions of civilized life,
becomes tenfold greater than in savage life, for one portion of the
community, and in this struggle, the weaker ones, sooner or later, tend
toward the wall. The strong become stronger from the very conditions and
influences which surround them, while the weak tend to become weaker, and
many are almost sure to fall by the way. Ignorance, poverty, and unhealth
are long-time companions, and lean strongly toward immortality.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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