Brain exhaustion, with some preliminary considerations on cerebral dynamics / By J. Leonard Corning.

  • James Leonard Corning
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Brain exhaustion, with some preliminary considerations on cerebral dynamics / By J. Leonard Corning. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

    17/254 (page 9)
    '^ DEC 1 1B86' DsTTEODUCTOEY AKD EETEOSPECTIYE. The first distinct account of a case of cerebral ex- haustion with which I am acquainted is contained in an article entitled Mental Labor: its Effects on the Blood, by Theophilus Thompson, M. D., read before the Medical Society of London, in 1856.* After speak- ing of the unfavorable effect upon the mind induced by excessive competition, the author says: Intellectu- al, like muscular action, probably involves an expendi- ture of living materia], and introduces a changing series of particles—those which have been used giving place to others, which come with the energy of new life to perpetuate the action. There may be decay from stagnation—there may be waste from persistency, undue haste, or intensity, especially in creative efforts. It is only when the function is performed in a calm and equable manner that the equilibrium of expenditure and supply is maintained, and that power is preserved and increased. f These ideas, though not couched in tech- * The Journal of Psychological Medicine. London, 1857. f N. B.—Dr. Ray, in a lecture on the Physical Health of the Brain, published in 1851, has referred to the prejudicial effects exercised upon the brain by excesses of various kinds. His recital of the symptomatology in