Nervous and mental diseases / by Archibald Church and Frederick Peterson.

  • Church, Archibald, 1861-1952.
Date:
1908
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Nervous and mental diseases / by Archibald Church and Frederick Peterson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    living near on both sides, and the sense of the presence of the evil which I had shrunk from so long weighed down upon me with crushing weight. After a while my spell of hypochondriacal despondency passed off, and I settled down into the way of living which I adhered to as long as I remained there. As to getting acquainted with my neighbors, or having any intercourse or dealings with them, that was altogether out of the question. ... I now had more of the feeling of constraint, from the knowledge that I was moving under the eyes of people who were strangers to me, than the strangest of the strange could be to a person of the ordinary stamp. Sometimes I heard re- marks which did not affect my feelings flatteringly, but that was not common. ' 'Along in June I had a worse spell than common of the kind of nervous stagnation or will-impotence of which I have spoken, and per- petrated some quite irregular acts before my fetters became slackened. In my despair I tore the collar from my shirt, tore the slippers I was wearing, dashed my fist into a tempting dish which my mother was offering me to eat, and other things of the kind. The house we occu- pied was owned by a maiden lady who lived with her sister in part of the house. ... In the evening, after the other sister returned, who had been absent during the day, I overheard a few words which showed plainly enough that the events of the day were being discussed in no very gratified humor. It was evident that my acts were severely reprobated. The next day the justice of the peace called upon him and admonished him to restrain himself, hinting of the asylum. Of this our author says : The dragon's tooth of reprimand that had been left in my mind grew into a monster, in whose presence I found it impossible to live, and I had a fresh access of despair. It was a hot June morning. I re- member seizing a razor and flourishing it, and saying, ' Show me that rascal and I will slaughter him,' or words to that effect, meaning, of course, the justice of the peace. Both homicidal and suicidal inclinations had long been haunting the secret corners of his mind, for three years before he tells of buying a pistol for the express purpose of making way with himself or some one else. On this day, after meeting the officer, he determined upon suicide. He walked out to two different country stores and bought ammunition. On his way back he passed some men in a field. They all looked at him, and one of them laughed loud and mockingly, and then cried out, in a sort of squealing way, the intention of which could not be mis- taken. Then he played a game of croquet with a young man at his uncle's, and overheard the young man make a covert and derisive re- mark. He continues : I passed the next day in brooding, silent melancholy. It Avas a rainy day and in accord with my feelings. . . . That night I wrote a little statement to be left liehind. ... It can not be said that I plunged tlioughtlessly into the gulf of self-murder. I had from the first gaged the responsibility I was taking on myself, as fully as