The various degrees and modes in which mental associations appear in the sick room, require of course the exercise of discretion and tact, in managing them to good purpose. There is often much injury done by failure in this respect. If, for example, the patient have great irritability of stomach, and if some medicine which has been doing him good, at length become exceedingly offensive to him, the continuance of that medicine might do him essential harm, by the mere influence of mental association; though, aside from this, it may be still an exceedingly appropriate remedy for his disease. Under such circumstances a change must be made, or the patient will be injured, it may be fatally. It will not do to call the patient whimsical, and to go right on with the course. The mental association connected with the medicine is practically one of the _ingredients_ in it, and as such has so modified its nature as to render it inappropriate to the case. The physician can often do much in curing disease by _diverting_ the mind of his patient. Disease is frequently broken up by producing a new action in the system. This is a principle in medical practice which is familiar to others, as well as to the physician. And this change may sometimes be brought about in the system, by a corresponding change effected in the mind, especially in those cases where the state of the mind is particularly influenced by the disease. The husband of a poor woman, who in a feeble state of health had fallen into a settled melancholy, broke his thigh. The whole current of her thoughts and feelings was now diverted into another channel, from her own sorrows to the care of him and the relief of his pains, and she recovered her sanity, and with it, for the most part, her health, long before the fracture was united. The misfortune of her husband was a severe remedy, but an effectual one. A physician of my acquaintance some years since became thoroughly impressed with the idea, that some symptoms which he had, indicated the existence of an organic disease which was certain to end fatally. At his request I made a full examination of his case, and found the symptoms to be purely of a nervous character. The expression of my opinion relieved him for the time of his anxiety. But as he brooded over his feelings when alone, the same idea returned again. I examined him repeatedly with the same result, but the comfort which he received from me was only temporary. Knowing that he was paying his addresses to a lady who was not only cheerful herself, but who had the power of making every body else cheerful about her, I recommended to him to be married at once, and told him that if he would be, we never should hear any more about his aneurism. My prescription was followed, and was entirely successful. The idea, which had so long haunted him like an evil spirit, was cast out never to return.