xxii Appendix. 
able to bear it, and nature is thus thwarted, and her wise counsels defiantly 
ignored and set aside. 
Dr. Clark says truly, ** No perfect brain ever crowns an imperfectly 
developed body. When Michael Angelo reared St. Peter's dome, he made 
every stone contribute, not only to the use and beauty of the part he put it 
in, but to the support and power of the dome. The brain must be built up 
in connection with the building of the rest of the body, always bearing in 
mind that the imperfections of the latter have a direct influence upon the 
former." 
The most common forms of disease in the present day are those which 
affect the nervous system, and we need not look far to find the causes which 
produce them. The strain to which the nervous system is subject, through 
the requirements of modern times, makes it far more liable to disease than 
formerly, and men break down prematurely from overwork and want of 
rest. Every branch of study is now pushed forward with an amount of 
vigour unknown to our ancestors, and men who wish to be admired and 
take a higher place than those around them, see no mode of gaining their 
end except by the acquisition of knowledge and the toilsome display of it. 
Before civilization had arrived at the high state we now find it in, the over- 
taxed brain was confined to laborious students in the solitary contemplation 
of human knowledge. Nervous exhaustion was not the common disorder 
we now find it. In whatever direction a man now turns his attention, he 
is sure to see competitors who are striving after the same prizes. In trade, 
in commerce, and in art, it is ever the same— no man has the field to him- 
self. Each one must strain every faculty towards the special object he is 
studying, and dare not leave his work for a moment for fear of being passed 
by. His thoughts are ever active and at work, and his brain will not rest, 
unless other occupations are found, and a new set of organs are called into 
play. Rest from thought would obviate much of the fatigue and exhaustion 
of the brain, if it could be adequately carried out, but the circumstances 
of life generally, do not enable a man to avail himself of that change of 
thought and occupation which would be a safeguard against the terrible 
evils he is fostering. 
iseases of the nervous system threaten to be the diseases of the 
future, as they are of the present day, in spite of any attempt to make it 
otherwise. Men, however desirous they may be to prevent it, are helplessly 
drawn into the contest, to struggle on and survive, or fall early and make 
way for others. If there is any truth in these statements, and I think you 
will grant that there is, is it surprising that the complex and highly 
organized structure of the brain and nerves should fail under this continued 
strain and struggle for existence in the battle of life? What wonder, then 
3 
