Twenty-second annual report of the directors of the Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics : submitted in terms of their charter to a general meeting of the directors, 20th June, 1842.

  • Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics
Date:
1842
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Twenty-second annual report of the directors of the Dundee Royal Asylum for Lunatics : submitted in terms of their charter to a general meeting of the directors, 20th June, 1842. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    oi tobacco. Like the old Romans, who, after the toils and dan¬ gers of war were over, betook themselves to the labour of the fields, you may find the greatest general of the present age plant¬ ing cabbages or digging potatoes. The man who fancies himself the greatest monarch in the world—the brother, perhaps, of the sun and moon—you may find him mending his own breeches, or making a pair of shoes for the meanest of his subjects. You may see another who fancies he can direct the courses of the stars condescending to hurl a wheelbarrow, and all of them cheerful and happy at their various labours. There are constantly a great number of the inmates of the ' Asylum employed in different ways, each as far as possible at the occupation to which he had been accustomed in health. Occupa¬ tion has a most beneficial effect on their disease, and is generally by themseh es ardently desired. It relieves the monotony to which they are so subject, and tends to divert the current of their thoughts from running constantly in one direction. By breaking : the chain with which their thoughts are bound, it raises the spirits of those who are depressed, and moderates the exuberance of spirits and loquacity to which others are subject. By this means it be- | conies a valuable instrument of cure, and any appearance of a ! desire on the part of a patient for employment is ardently to be longed for and encouraged to the utmost. | Neither are those who have been brought up in a different i sphere of life without a capacity for enjoyment; for in general the mind is not so completely affected that the patient is incapable of lelishing the pleasures of literature. In many cases, especially in cases of monomania, some of the intellectual powers remain in full vigour, and the patient would be rendered miserable without the means of exeicising them. Persons who have been accustomed to the refinements of civilized society, feel acutely if any of the ob¬ servances to which they were accustomed are neglected, and feel a corresponding degree of pleasure when they are treated with the same attention, and are indulged with the same amusements, or a lowed the opportunity of gratifying their different tastes with the accomplishments to which they had been accustomed in their state of health. If a patient is able to work at his former trade, or is able to
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