Gymnastics of the brain / by J.A. Grant.

  • Grant, J. A. (James Alexander), 1831-1920.
Date:
1880
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Gymnastics of the brain / by J.A. Grant. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    it is dangerous ground, still, as a matter of duty, it may not be out of place to advert briefly to a few points respecting which it is important all classes of the community should alike have full information. The point to which I first wish to direct attention is “ the brain of youth.” The problem, and one of the most difficult and trying of the age in which we live, is, how to build the best brains out of the materials placed at our disposal. Education or educated evolution certainly has considerable to do with the development of mental power. The building of a brain is a social problem of more than ordinary interest to every family circle. Mothers particularly have to do with it, and teachers are desirous of drawing out innate power in its various forms, just as varied and peculiar as the phases of the human countenance. The brain, the chief part of the nervous system, must be built up in keeping with the development of the whole body, the one depending greatly on the other in order to arrive at the greatest degree of power and perfection, either as to organization of structure, or performance of function. Dr. Maudsley, in his Gulstonian lectures for 1870, says :—“The time has come when the immediate business which lies before anyone who would advance our knowledge of mind, unquestionably is a clear and searching scrutiny of the bodily conditions, of its manifestations in health and disease ; he must recognize how entirely the integrity of the mental functions depends on the bodily organization, in fact, must acknowledge the unity of mind and body.” The brain, the seat of the mind, possesses a mechanism peculiar in itself, and a power diversified in character, presenting various phases and peculiarities, throughout the highest order of intellectual develop- ment in the genus homo. In the crude and almost rudimentary state of cerebral pulp, soft, pliant and undecided in cerebral type, as to inherit mental power or capacity, more than ordinary care must be observed, in suddenly straining the structure, nature has put in the cranial cavity. The drawing out process, embraced in the true education must be conducted with care, caution, and more than ordinary guidance and observa- tion. It is here that mental hygiene operates, embracing as it does all that relates to development, exercise and the maintenance of mental activity—in fact, education in the most comprehensive
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