Essays on asylums for inebriates / by Samuel B. Woodward.

  • Woodward, Samuel B. (Samuel Bayard), 1787-1850.
Date:
[1838?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essays on asylums for inebriates / by Samuel B. Woodward. 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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    severity and fatal tendency of the malady even for these ten years 1 But no sober and considerate man can for a moment suppose that the evil of intemperance is to be removed from amongst us. Intem- perance will continue to be the scourge of our country, will send its thousands of victims to an early and untimely grave, probably for ages yet to come. Temperance societies have done much, very much already, and will do much more, it is devoutly to be hoped, to rescue mankind from the horrors of intemperance. Yet a large class of man- kind will pursue their accustomed habits, and drunkards will still be thick amongst us ; poverty, and wretchedness, and disease will by this means for years, perhaps centuries to come, be entailed upon our race. Shall we then sit idle and see the mighty evil, witness the ruin and wretchedness it entails upon man, and not make an effort for its cure? Is there no balm in Gilead, and is there no physician there ? Let the experiment be fairly tried ; let an institution be founded; let the means of cure be provided ; let the principles on which it is to be founded be extensively promulgated, and I doubt not, all intelligent men will be satisfied of its feasibility, and be ready to extend to it ample benefactions, to build up and endow it with every necessary means. It cannot with exact certainty be told what would be the necessary expense of such an institution. It would be desirable to connect it with a good farm of moderate size, with plain, substantial buildings, a sufficient number of rooms for public instruction and private accom- modation, in a pleasant and inviting section of the country. Twenty thousand dollars would be ample means for such accommodations as would be sufficient to make a magnificent experiment of the utility of the scheme; half that sum would afford an opportunity for a fair experiment. At the head of this institution place a physician of zeal, medical skill, and enlarged benevolence; let the principle of total abstinence be rigorously adopted and enforced; let the patients be so placed as absolutely to prohibit all access to the intoxicating draught. If the health suffered, let appropriate medication be afforded ; let the mind be soothed, hope, that balm which is potent to save, be held out; let the certainty of success be clearly delineated to the mind of the sufferer, founded in the undeviating and ample experience which the last ten years have afforded; let good nutrition be regularly administered, let perfect quiet be enjoined while the prostration of strength and energy continued ; — this course, rigorously adopted and pursued, will restore nine of ten in all cases, where organic disease of liver, brain, stomach, heart, or other organs essential to life, has not been produced. After the powers of the system begin to rally, let the patient take moderate exercise, labor or diversion, as will best please him; let his physical system be thoroughly attended to; let his mind be interested by every means consistent with his confinement; let him walk abroad accompanied by a faithful and temperate attendant in the intervals of his labor, which should be long at first; let him play backgammon, checkers, ninepins, and pursue any other amusements congenial to his feelings. Tea, coffee, and water should constitute the whole drink.