Manual of psychiatry / by J. Rogues de Fursac ; translated and edited by A.J. Rosanoff.

  • Marie Henri Joseph Pierre Étienne Rogues de Fursac
Date:
1911
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Manual of psychiatry / by J. Rogues de Fursac ; translated and edited by A.J. Rosanoff. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    ants and collateral relatives of the insane: neuroses, psychoses, organic nervous diseases, defects of character and morals [criminality], arthritic manifestations, gout, diabetes, etc. Heredity is convergent when the father and the mother both belong to families of degenerates. The relative frequency of this form reveals the curious fact that there is a peculiar mutual affinity among psychopaths (Fere). A priori this accumulated degeneration would seem to give rise to particularly grave consequences. At times it produces genius. It is to convergent heredity that the bad influence of consanguinity is to be attributed. Consanguineous mar- riages do not create the defects, as is the general belief among the laity; they merely accentuate the tendencies of the family, whether these tendencies be good or bad, and therefore cannot exercise a bad influence except in degenerate families.1 Degeneration has, according to Morel, a tendency to become more pronounced from generation to generation. The final product of this retrogressive evolution is the idiot, who, sexually sterile, or placed in social positions which prevent his leaving a posterity; constitutes the last offspring of the degenerate race. This progressive course is quite frequently observed.2 The law of Morel3 is, however, not absolute; degeneration may be effec- tively combated in the individual by appropriate physi- cal and moral hygienic measures, also by favorable 1 Peiper. Consanguinilat in der Ehe und deren Folge fur die Descendenz. Allg. Zeitschr. f. Psych., Vol. 58, No. 5. 2 Doutrebente. Ann. mecl. psych., 1869, II, p. 385. 3 Morel. Traite des maladies menlales, p. 575.
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