4 68 



VEGETATIVE DISTURBANCES 



limit ourself to the thought that the childish organism is characterized not 

 only by the still undeveloped genitalia and the childish mentality, but, as 

 already Breus and Kolisko mention, by definite childish dimensions. 



Definition. We may therefore 

 briefly define a pure infantilism as a 

 standing still at the infantile stages of 

 development, considering especially the 

 following factors: the genitalia and the 

 vita sexualis remain undeveloped, or de- 

 velop deficiently; and the same is true 

 of the secondary sexual characters; the 

 involution of the lymphatic apparatus is 

 deficient, the growth is deficient, ossifi- 

 cation, that is, the appearance of the 

 bone-nuclei and the closure of the epiphy- 

 ses is delayed, and the childish di- 

 mensions of the body are retained 

 wholly or in part ; that is the lower length 

 of the body equals the upper length or, 

 what is commoner, exceeds it only a 

 little, the form of the pelvis is neither 

 [of the] masculine or feminine [type], 

 but infantile, and finally the psyche, 

 remains behind [in development]. Such 

 individuals show throughout no gross 

 defect in intelligence, but their minds 

 remain childish. 



Important for the definition of in- 

 fantilism are the following considera- 

 tions, which serve to render precise the 

 position of the ductless glandular sys- 

 tem in the pathogenesis of infantilism. 

 If the infantilism comes about through 

 a standstill of the entire organism at a 

 child stage of development, then it is 

 intelligible that also the sexual glands 

 do not develop further. Up to the 

 present however we have not sufficiently 



FIG. 8i.-True infantilism (Observation LVI). considered that the sexual glands occupy 



a separate position in the ductless glandu- 

 lar system, in that, though they functionate from early youth and influence 

 the development of the organism, yet they attain their complete maturity 

 only at the age of puberty; the other ductless glands are already fully de- 



