BRAIN TROUBLES. 269- 



so forth, as his experience has found to be suitable, 

 and should in the greater number of cases suggest 

 negative rather than positive remedies even of this 

 kind. Many signs of illness, indeed, which obtrude 

 themselves on the attention even of those who watch 

 themselves least in such matters, may far better be 

 dealt with by the patient himself than by the 

 physician. For instance, I have learned to regard 

 severe headaches of a certain type simply as afford- 

 ing evidence that certain articles of food (milk, 

 butter, cheese, and the like) must either be given 

 up altogether for several days, or taken in much- 

 reduced quantity. "When this course is followed, I 

 am freed from all such attacks, until after the lapse, 

 perhaps, of two or three months a headache of this 

 particular kind shows me that I have taken such 

 articles of food in greater quantity than is desirable 

 for one of my constitution. A doctor might prescribe 

 with advantage for the cure of the attack itself, and 

 there can be no reason why a person troubled by 

 some severe attack of headache, muscular rheumatism, 

 or the like, should not obtain from a doctor some- 

 active medicine by which to diminish the pain from 

 which he suffers; but it is a far more important 

 matter to ascertain the regimen by which such 

 attacks may be prevented from occurring, and this 

 is a matter which a man (not being the ' ' fool " of 

 the proverb) should manage for himself. Now what 

 is true of bodily troubles is true of mental mischief, 

 short of actual disease, though doctors who have 



