Lectures to women on anatomy and physiology : with an appendix on water cure / by Mary S. Gove.

  • Mary Nichols
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Lectures to women on anatomy and physiology : with an appendix on water cure / by Mary S. Gove. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    before birth. They are born with deteriorated constitutions, and predisposition to disease. Their hold on life is often 60 slight, that but a breath will break the attenuated thread. O that I could speak to the heart and the understanding of every moth- er ! I would persuade her to let the life of her child be precious in her sight. But how can this be, when she is all the time laying suicidal hands on herself; and during the time she nurses her child, it is a part of her being. What mother does not know, if she is ill, her nursing infant will be ill? Milk is formed of such materials as are put into the stomach. If good materials are wanting, it is formed of such as there are. We know that medicines affect the milk. When it was fashion- able to drink wine and strong drink, the deadly draught passed almost unaltered to the lips of the little innocent who hung at its mother's breast, from which naught but the pure streams of life should ever flow. But alcohol is not the only deadly sub- stance, and when the food of the mother is im- proper, it induces a train of evils that have a re- ciprocal influence in aggravating each other. The stomach of the mother becomes diseased. The delicate lining membrane is inflamed, perhaps ul- cerated ; digestion is imperfectly performed ; the temper of the mother is continually irritated by the morbid condition of her system. A host of sym- pathies are excited; the unhappy, because un- healthy mother, has many cares besides her fretful child. She thinks she has a cross infant. Peo- ple should learn to call things by their right names : we should say a diseased infant. My heart has long been pained at beholding the ignorance of mothers. I rejoice that a spirit of inquiry is awa- kened, that the laws of life and health are begin- ning to be investigated and understood. T am per-