Part 16

"A lawyer had been excessively perplexed about a very complicated question. An opinion was required from him, but the question was one of such difficulty that he felt very uncertain how he should render it. The decision had to be given at a certain time, and he awoke in the morning of that day with a feeling of great distress. He said to his wife, 'I had a dream, and the whole thing was clearly arranged before my mind, and I would give anything to recover the train of thought.' His wife said to him, 'Go and look on your table.' She had seen him get up in the night and go to his table and sit down and write. He did so, and found there the opinion which he had been most earnestly endeavoring to recover, lying in his own handwriting. There was no doubt about it whatever."

In this case the action of the brain was clearly automatic, _i. e._, reflex. The lawyer had worried his brain by his anxiety, and thus prevented his mind from doing its best. But it had received an impulse in a certain direction, and when left to itself, worked out the result. (See Appendix for other illustrations.)] Thus we wink involuntarily at a flash of light or a threatened blow. [Footnote: A very eminent chemist a few years ago was making an experiment upon some extremely explosive compound which he had discovered. He had a small quantity of this compound in a bottle, and was holding it up to the light, looking at it intently; and whether it was a shake of the bottle or the warmth of his hand, I do not know, but it exploded in his hand, and the bottle was shivered into a million of minute fragments, which were driven in every direction. His first impression was that they had penetrated his eyes, but to his intense relief he found presently that they had only struck the outside of his eyelids. You may conceive how infinitesimally short the interval was between the explosion of the bottle and the particles reaching his eyes; and yet in that interval the impression had been made upon his sight, the mandate of the reflex action, so to speak, had gone forth, the muscles of his eyelids had been called into action, and he had closed his eyelids before the particles had reached them, and in this manner his eyes were saved. You see what a wonderful proof this is of the way in which the automatic action of our nervous apparatus enters into the sustenance of our lives, and the protection of our most important organs from injury.-- DR. CARPENTER.] We start at a sudden sound. We jump back from a precipice before the mind has time to reason upon the danger. The spinal cord conducts certain impressions to the brain, but responds to others without troubling that organ. [Footnote: There is a story told of a man, who, having injured his spinal cord, had lost feeling and motion in his lower extremities. Dr. John Hunter experimented upon him. Tickling his feet, he asked him if he felt it; the man, pointing to his limbs, which were kicking vigorously about, answered, "No, but you see my legs do." Illustrations of this independent action of the spinal cord are common in animals. A headless wasp will ply its sting energetically. A fowl, after its head is cut off, will flap its wings and jump about as if in pain, although, of course, all sensation has ceased. "A water beetle, having had its head removed, remained motionless as long as it rested on a dry surface, but when cast into water, it executed the usual swimming motions with great energy and rapidity, striking all its comrades to one side by its violence, and persisting in these for more than half an hour."] The medulla oblongata carries on the process of respiration. The great sympathetic system binds together all the organs of the body.

USES OF REFLEX ACTION.--We breathe eighteen times every minute; we stand erect without a consciousness of effort; [Footnote: In this way we account for the perilous feats performed by the somnambulist. He is not conscious, as his operations are not directed by the cerebrum, but by the other nervous centers. Were he to attempt their repetition when awake, the emotion of fear might render it impossible.] we walk, eat, digest, and at the same time carry on a train of thought. Our brain is thus emancipated from the petty detail of life. If we were obliged to attend to every breath, every pulsation of the heart, every wink of the eye, our time would be wasted in keeping alive. Mere standing would require our entire attention. Besides, an act which at first demands all our thought soon requires less, and at last becomes mechanical, [Footnote: "As every one knows," says Huxley, "it takes a soldier a long time to learn his drill-- for instance, to put himself into the attitude of 'attention' at the instant the word of command is heard. But, after a time, the sound of the word gives rise to the act, whether the soldier be thinking of it or not. There is a story, which is credible enough, though it may not be true, of a practical joker, who, seeing a discharged veteran carrying home his dinner, suddenly called out 'Attention!' whereupon the man instantly brought his hands down and lost his mutton and potatoes in the gutter. The drill had been thorough, and its effects had become embodied in the man's nervous structure."] as we say, _i. e._, reflex. Thus we play a familiar tune upon an instrument and carry on a conversation at the same time. All the possibilities of an education and the power of forming habits are based upon this principle. No act we perform ends with itself. It leaves behind it in the nervous centers a tendency to do the same thing again. Our physical being thus conspires to fix upon us the habits of a good or an evil life. Our very thoughts are written in our muscles, so that the expression of our face and even our features grow into harmony with the life we live.

BRAIN EXERCISE.--The nervous system demands its life and activity. The mind grows by what it feeds on. One who reads mainly light literature, who lolls on the sofa or worries through the platitudes of an idle or fashionable life, decays mentally; his system loses tone, and physical weakness follows mental poverty. On the other hand, an excessive use of the mind withdraws force from the body, whose weakness, reacting on the brain, produces gradual decay and serious diseases. (See p. 331.)

The brain grows by the growth of the body. The body grows through good food, fresh air, and work and rest in suitable proportion. For the full development and perfect use of a strong mind, a strong body is essential. Hence, in seeking to expand and store the intellect, we should be equally thoughtful of the growth and health of the body.

SLEEP [Footnote: Sleep procured by medicine is rarely as beneficial as that secured naturally. The disturbance to the nervous system is often sufficient to counterbalance all the good results. The habit of seeking sleep in this way, without the advice of a physician, is to be most earnestly deprecated. The dose must be constantly increased to produce the effect, and thus great injury may be caused. Often, too, where laudanum or morphine is used, the person unconsciously comes into a terrible and fatal bondage. (See p. 342.) Especially should infants never be dosed with cordials, as is a common family practice. The damage done to helpless childhood by the ignorant and reckless use of soothing syrups is frightful to contemplate. All the ordinary sleeping draughts have life-destroying properties, as is proved by the fatal effects of an overdose. At the best, they paralyze the nerve centers, disorder the digestion, and poison the blood. Their promiscuous use is therefore full of danger.] is as essential as food. During the day, the process of tearing down goes on; during the night, the work of building up should make good the loss. In youth more sleep is needed than in old age, when nature makes few permanent repairs, and is content with temporary expedients. The number of hours required for sleep must be decided by each person. Napoleon took only five hours, but most people need from six to eight hours,--brain workers even more. In general, one should sleep until he naturally wakes. If one's rest be broken, it should be made up as soon as possible. (See p. 334.)

SUNLIGHT.--The influence of the sun's rays upon the nervous system is very marked. [Footnote: The necessity of light for young children is not half appreciated. Many of their diseases, and nearly all the cadaverous looks of those brought up in great cities, are ascribable to the deficiency of light and air. When we see the glass room of the photographers in every street, in the topmost story, we grudge them their application to what is often a mere personal vanity. Why should not a nursery be constructed in the same manner? If parents knew the value of light to the skin, especially to children of a scrofulous tendency, we should have plenty of these glass house nurseries, where children might run about in a proper temperature, free from much of that clothing which at present seals up the skin--that great supplementary lung--against sunlight and oxygen. They would save many a weakly child who now perishes from lack of these necessaries of infant life.--DR. WINTER.] It is said also to have the effect of developing red disks in the blood. All vigor and activity come from the sun. Vegetables grown in subdued light have a bleached and faded look. An infant kept in absolute darkness would grow into a shapeless idiot. That room is the healthiest to which the sun has the freest access. Epidemics frequently attack the inhabitants of the shady side of a street, and exempt those on the sunny side. If, on a slight indisposition, we should go out into the open air and bright sunlight, instead of shutting ourselves up in a close, dark chamber, we might often avoid a serious illness. The sun bath is doubtless a most efficient remedy for many diseases. Our window blinds and curtains should be thrown back and open, and we should let the blessed air and sun stream in to invigorate and cheer. No house buried in shade, and no room with darkened windows, is fit for human habitation. In damp and darkness, lies in wait almost every disease to which flesh is heir. The sun is their only successful foe. (See p. 336.)

WONDERS OF THE BRAIN.--After having seen the beautiful contrivances and the exquisite delicacy of the lower organs, it is natural to suppose that when we come to the brain we should find the most elaborate machinery. How surprising, then, it is to have revealed to us only cells and fibers! The brain is the least solid and most unsubstantial looking organ in the body. Eighty per cent of water, seven of albumen, some fat, and a few minor substances constitute the instrument which rules the world. Strangest of all, the brain, which is the seat of sensation, is itself without sensation. Every nerve, every part of the spinal cord, is keenly alive to the slightest touch, yet "the brain may be cut, burned, or electrified without producing pain."

ALCOHOLIC DRINKS AND NARCOTICS.

ALCOHOL (Continued from p. 187).

EFFECT UPON THE NERVOUS SYSTEM.--In the progressive influence of alcohol upon the nervous system, there are, according to the researches of Dr. Richardson, four successive stages.

1. THE STAGE OF EXCITEMENT. [Footnote: The pupil should be careful to note here that alcohol does not act upon the heart directly, and cause it to contract with more force. The idea that alcohol gives energy and activity to the muscles is entirely false. It really, as we have seen (p. 183), weakens muscular contraction. The enfeeblement begins in the first stage, and continues in the other stages with increased effect. The heart beats quickly merely because the resistance of the minute controlling vessels is taken off, and it works without being under proper regulation. _What is called a stimulation or excitement is, in absolute fact, a relaxation, a partial paralysis_ of one of the most important mechanisms in the animal body. Alcohol should be ranked among the narcotics.--RICHARDSON.]-- The first effect of alcohol, as we have already described on page 144, is to paralyze the nerves that lead to the extreme and minute blood vessels, and so regulate the passage of the blood through the capillary system. The vital force, thus drawn into the nervous centers, drives the machinery of life with tremendous energy. The heart jumps like the mainspring of a watch when the resistance of the wheels is removed. The blood surges through the body with increased force. Every capillary tube in the system is swollen and flushed, like the reddened nose and cheek.

In all this there is exhilaration, but no nourishment; there is animation, but no permanent power conferred on brain or muscle. Alcohol may cheer for the moment. It may set the sluggish blood in motion, start the flow of thought, and excite a temporary gayety. "It may enable a wearied or feeble organism to do brisk work for a short time. It may make the brain briefly brilliant. It may excite muscle to quick action, but it does nothing at its own cost, fills up nothing it has destroyed, and itself leads to destruction." Even the mental activity it has excited is an unsafe state of mind, for that just poise of the faculties so essential to good judgment is disturbed by the presence of the intruder. Johnson well remarked, "Wine improves conversation by taking the edge off the understanding."

2. THE STAGE OF MUSCULAR WEAKNESS.--If the action of the alcohol be still continued, the spinal cord is next affected by this powerful narcotic. The control of some of the muscles is lost. Those of the lower lip usually fail first, then those of the lower limbs, and the staggering, uncertain steps betray the result. The muscles themselves, also, become feebler as the power of contraction diminishes. The temperature, which, for a time, was slightly increased, soon begins to fall as the heat is radiated; the body is cooled, and the well-known "alcoholic chill" is felt.

3. THE STAGE OF MENTAL WEAKNESS.--The cerebrum is now implicated. The ideal and emotional faculties are quickened, while the will is weakened. The center of thought being overpowered, the mind is a chaos. Ideas flock in thick and fast. The tongue is loosened. The judgment loses its hold on the acts. The reason giving way, the animal instincts generally assume the mastery of the man. The hidden nature comes to the surface. All the gloss of education and social restraint falls off, and the lower nature stands revealed. The coward shows himself more craven, the braggart more boastful, the bold more daring, and the cruel more brutal. The inebriate is liable to become the perpetrator of any outrage that the slightest provocation may suggest.

4. THE STAGE OF UNCONSCIOUSNESS.--At last, prostration ensues, and the wild, mad revel of the drunkard ends with utter senselessness. In common speech, the man is "dead drunk." Brain and spinal cord are both benumbed. Fortunately, the two nervous centers which supply the heart and the diaphragm are the slowest to be influenced. So, even in this final stage, the breathing and the circulation still go on, though the other organs have stopped. Were it not for this, every person thoroughly intoxicated would die. [Footnote: Cold has a wonderful influence in hastening this stage, so that a person, previously only in the first stage of excitement, on going outdoors on a winter night, may rapidly sink into a lethargy (become _comatose_), fall, and die. He is then commonly said to have perished with cold. The signs of this coma are of great practical importance, since so many persons die in police stations and elsewhere who are really comatose, when they are supposed to be only sound asleep. The pulse is slow, and almost imperceptible. The face is pale, and the skin cold. "If the arm be pinched, it is not moved; if the eyeballs are touched, the lids will not sink." The respiration becomes slower and slower, and, if the person dies, it is because liquid collects in the bronchial tubes, and stops the passage of the air. The man then actually drowns in his own secretions.]

EFFECT UPON THE BRAIN.--Alcohol seems to have a special affinity for the brain. This organ absorbs more than any other, and its delicate structure is correspondingly affected. The "Vascular enlargement" here reaches its height. The tiny vessels become clogged with blood that is unfitted to nourish, because loaded with carbonic acid, and deprived of the usual quantity of the life-giving oxygen.--HINTON. The brain is, in the language of the physiologist, malfunctioned. The mind but slowly rallies from the stupor of the fourth stage, and a sense of dullness and depression remains to show with what difficulty the fatigued organ recovers its normal condition. So marked is the effect of the narcotic poison, that some authorities hold that "a once thoroughly intoxicated brain never fully becomes what it was before."

In time, the free use of liquor hardens and thickens the membrane enveloping the nervous matter; the nerve corpuscles undergo a "Fatty degeneration"; the blood vessels lose their elasticity; and the vital fluid, flowing less freely through the obstructed channels, fails to afford the old-time nourishment. The consequent deterioration of the nervous substance--the organ of thought--shows itself in the weakened mind [Footnote: The habitual use of fermented liquors, even to an extent far short of what is necessary to produce intoxication, injures the body, and diminishes the mental power.--Sir Henry Thompson.] that we so often notice in a person accustomed to drink, and at last lays the foundation of various nervous disorders--epilepsy, paralysis, and insanity. [Footnote: Casper, the great statistician of Berlin, says: "So far as that city is concerned, one third of the insane coming from the poorer classes, were made so by spirit drinking."] The law of heredity here again asserts itself, and the inebriate's children often inherit the disease which he has escaped.

Chief among the consequences of this perverted and imperfect nutrition of the brain is that intermediate state between intoxication and insanity, well known as Delirium Tremens. "It is characterized by a low, restless activity of the cerebrum, manifesting itself in muttering delirium, with occasional paroxysms of greater violence. The victim almost always apprehends some direful calamity; he imagines his bed to be covered with loathsome reptiles; he sees the walls of his apartment crowded with foul specters; and he imagines his friends and attendants to be fiends come to drag him down to a fiery abyss beneath."--CARPENTER. (See p. 287.)

INFLUENCE UPON THE MENTAL AND MORAL POWERS.--So intimate is the relation between the body and the mind, that an injury to one harms the other. The effect of alcoholized blood is to weaken the will. The one habitually under its influence often shocks us by his indecision and his readiness to break a promise to reform. The truth is, he has lost, in a measure, his power of self-control. At last, he becomes physically unable to resist the craving demand of his morbid appetite.

Other faculties share in this mental wreck. The intellectual vision becomes less penetrating, the decisions of the mind less reliable, and the grasp of thought less vigorous. The logic grows muddy. A thriftless, reckless feeling is developed. Ere long, self-respect is lost, and then ambition ceases to allure, and the high spirit sinks.

Along with this mental deterioration comes also a failure of the moral sense. The fine fiber of character undergoes a "degeneration" as certain as that of the muscles themselves. Broken promises tell of a lowered standard of veracity, and a dulled sense of honor, quite as much as of an impaired will. Under the subtle influence of the ever-present poison, signs of spiritual weakness multiply fast. Conscience is lulled to rest. Reason is enfeebled. Customary restraints are easily thrown off. The sensibilities are blunted. There is less ability to appreciate nice shades of right and wrong. Great moral principles and motives lose their power to influence. The judgment fools with duty. The future no longer reaches back its hand to guide the present. The better nature has lost its supremacy.

The wretched victim of appetite will now gratify his tyrannical passion for drink at any expense of deceit or crime. He becomes the blind instrument of his insane impulses, and commits acts from which he would once have shrunk with horror. [Footnote: Richardson sums up the various diseases caused by alcohol, as follows: "(_a_). Diseases of the brain and nervous system, indicated by such names as apoplexy, epilepsy, paralysis, vertigo, softening of the brain, delirium tremens, dipsomania or inordinate craving for drink, loss of memory, and that general failure of the mental power, called dementia. (_b_). Diseases of the lungs: one form of consumption, congestion, and subsequent bronchitis. (_c_). Diseases of the heart: irregular beat, feebleness of the muscular walls, dilatation, disease of the valves. (_d_). Diseases of the blood: scurvy, excess of water or dropsy, separation of fibrin. (_e_). Diseases of the stomach: feebleness of the stomach, indigestion, flatulency, irritation, and sometimes inflammation. (_f_). Diseases of the bowels: relaxation or purging, irritation. (_g_). Diseases of the liver: congestion, hardening and shrinking, cirrhosis. (_h_). Diseases of the kidneys: change of structure into fatty or waxy-like condition and other results leading to dropsy, or sometimes to fatal sleep. (_i_). Diseases of the muscles: fatty change in the muscles, by which they lose their power for proper active contraction. (_j_). Diseases of the membranes of the body: thickening and loss of elasticity, by which the parts wrapped up in the membrane are impaired for use, and premature decay is induced."] Sometimes he even takes a malignant pleasure in injuring those whom Nature has ordained he should protect. [Footnote: It has been argued that a man should not be punished for any crime he may commit during intoxication, but rather for knowingly giving up the reins of reason and conscience, and thus subjecting himself to the rule of his evil passions. Voluntarily to stimulate the mind and put it into a condition where it may drive one to ruin, is very like the act of an engineer who should get up steam in his engine, and then, having opened the valves, desert his post, and let the monster go thundering down the track to sure destruction. Certain persons are thrown into the stage of mental weakness by a single glass of liquor. How can they be excused when the fact of their peculiar liability lends additional force to the argument of abstemiousness, and they know that their only safety lies in total abstinence?--CARPENTER'S _Physiology._]

2. TOBACCO.