38 THE CAEE AND TREATMENT OF THE INSANE. 



Officers were elected as follows : 

 Irving Elting, . . . • . . President. 



James Winnie, Vice-President. 



Safford a. Grummet Secretary. 



Edward Elsworth, Treasurer. 



THE CARE AND TREATMENT OF THE INSANE.* 



BY CHAS. W. PILGRIM, M.D. 



Insanity is undoubtedly one of the saddest afflictions 

 that can befall mankind. There is no other disease 

 which is so far reaching in its effects and which creates 

 so much and such varied distress. In the language of 

 Conolly, "It extinguishes knowledge, lays waste all 

 accomplishments, renders beauty itself painful or fearful 

 to behold ; whilst it breaks up domestic happiness and 

 perverts or annihilates all the habits and affections which 

 impart comfort and joy to human existence." When 

 we consider the serious effects that this "complicated 

 misery" has, not only upon the individual sufferer, but 

 upon his family and friends, as well as upon the com- 

 munity at large, it is obvious that the question of the 

 care and treatment of the insane is one worthy of the 

 most careful consideration. 



Insanity has been recognized from the very earliest 

 times, and classical writers who lived many years before 

 Christ frequently allude to it. In the Old Testament it 

 is recorded how Saul, a thousand years before Christ, 

 " was possessed of an evil spirit and was made well 

 again by the music of David's harp." David, himself, 

 feigned madness and in the first book of Samuel, Chapter 



*The following paper, which was read before the Literary Section 

 of Vassar Brothers Institute, March 10, 1896, by Chas. W. Pilgrim, 

 M. D., Superintendent of the Hudson River State Hospital, is thought 

 by the Committee on Publication to deserve a place among the scien- 

 tific papers of the Institute, and accordingly is printed here. 



