19^ THE CAUSATION OF DISEASE. 



most simple questions. A perfect reasoner, indeed, is very 

 rarely met with. Our own medical literature affords abundant 

 proof of this, and this work is doubtless no exception. But, 

 apart from the fact that reason may fail to work properly, 

 there is the additional fact that the material for reason may 

 not be to hand — we may be ignorant of the data from which 

 to derive the proper conclusion. Wherefore, in order that reason 

 shall on all occasions give a correct result, two things are re- 

 quisite — man must be acquainted with every natural law, and 

 he must be gifted with perfect reasoning power. 



By the aid of experience and reason, however, he can fre- 

 quently learn what is the proper course to take. But here 

 another imperfection arises : he may know, but he may not 

 choose to be guided by his knowledge. Perfect knowledge of 

 right and wrong does not imply virtue. Socrates held know- 

 ledge to be virtue, but we may, with more correctness, say 

 virtue is the correct application of, or the proper acting up to, 

 knowledge. 



When an individual fails to act up to his knowledge in a 

 matter relating to his personal well-being, he is said to be im~ 

 'prudent (Bain). An imprudent man is one who is unable to 

 see that the evil ultimately resulting from a present pleasure 

 quite outweighs it, and that the algebraical sum gives a minus 

 quantity — he cannot correctly weigh between a present pleasure 

 — e.g., unwise eating — and future misery — dyspepsia. Impru- 

 dence is therefore a mental defect, or a defect of reason, 

 employing this word as an antithesis to instinct, and as signi- 

 fying all those mental forces, other than the instinctive, which 

 impel to action (not as signifying intellect, which is perhaps 

 its proper signification). 



"No one who pays any attention to this subject .... can fail 

 to see that the vast difference which exists between what actually is 

 and what might be depends, not so much upon w r ant of knowledge, 

 as on want of action. Ignorance, no doubt, has much to do with 

 sickly lives and early deaths, but surely the indisposition and want of 

 will to act on what is clearly understood has much more to do with 

 the presence of disease and premature decay. As an instance of this, 

 let us refer for a moment to the influence of intoxicating liquors on 

 the population. Is the absence of any effort to control or mitigate 



