Human Physiology. 



of nervous disorders. The weight of clothes bearing and 

 pressing upon the lower part of the spine, and heating and 

 compressing the delicate organs of the pelvis, causes painful 

 diseases of the womb and ovaries. The bulk and weight of 

 false hair now worn upon the back of the head and neck can- 

 not fail to produce disorders of the cerebellum. Men's hats 

 burthen and compress their brains. Infants and young child- 

 ren are sometimes half-smothered in clothing, sometimes their 

 lower extremities are exposed without covering to the bitterest 

 wintry blasts. 



Excessive labour, especially protracted labour in unhealthy 

 conditions, in heated shops and factories, in bad air. in cram- 

 ped positions, and exposed to irritating dust or poisonous 

 vapours, is a fruitful cause of disease. Steel-filers, brass-workers, 

 workers in mercury, arsenic, lead, and antimony, workers in 

 shoddy factories and bakeries, are short-lived, and suffer from 

 special diseases. Lead causes constipation and paralysis; the 

 makers of lucifer matches are liable to a horrible necrosis of 

 the jaws; metallic dust, and even the flour of mills and bakeries, 

 clogs the lungs and causes consumption. But shoemakers, 

 tailors, milliners, artificial flowermakers, suffer scarcely less 

 from the bad air of crowded and unventilated shops and fac- 

 tories. Among all our manufactures there goes on the manu- 

 facture of disease and death. The agricultural labourer is laid 

 up with rheumatism from hard work, exposure, and too much 

 cyder. The town artizan dies of bad air, dust, and beer. 

 Literary men break down early with sedentary brain-work and 

 stimulants. There is no healthful order of industry; but a 

 great disorderly battle of life, with its wounded, disabled, 

 dying victims. 



Whatever exhausts the nervous power, whatever is a drain 

 upon the material of life, must be a cause of disease. In exces- 

 sive amative indulgence, we have both causes in action. There 

 is a great expenditure of nervous force in the sexual orgasm. 



