HEALTH AND THE LAWS OF MECHANICS 145 



ment can only be realised on condition of the 

 individual integrity of the mem sana in corpore sano. 



The alteration of the nervous centres is subject 

 to the same general laws as mechanics, and the 

 slightest alteration in them is sufficient to modify 

 their structure, and, consequently, the whole of 

 their psychic life, whence are derived the changes 

 that include the imbecile, the criminal, and the 

 madman. All this is a consequence of present 

 social organisation, because on interfering with the 

 equilibrium of the organic chemical condition of 

 the nervous centres there arises at once an altera- 

 tion in the reticulum of the neurona, or rather the 

 mielina of the nerve-tubes, or rather that of the 

 interstitial cement ; an alteration in the quality of 

 the neuroglia, whose rule is the isolation and 

 maintenance of the different nervous unities, or 

 rather the fulness of the cerebral circulation ; in a 

 word, there arises the loss of mental balance, with 

 all its sad consequences to the individual, the 

 family, and the race. 



Society is responsible for the health of the body 

 and of the intelligence. Nervous, constitutional, 

 and infectious diseases are so many more causes 

 for the dissolution of the human species, which 

 would disappear were it not that this, like all 

 matter, is subject to the endless impulse of 

 universal energy. It matters not that humanity 



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