Morbid paychol 
REPORTS FROM THE SECTIONS, 353 
Inno epoch has, what for want of a better expression, I will 
term “mental excess,” been more prevalent than in this. News- 
rs, medical and lay, have frequently of late pointed out the 
evils of our present system of stuffing our youth and making all 
boyhood and girlhood one long period of cramming for examina- 
tion. The examinations at the London and other aarp 
and for professions have become almost encyclo their 
range. The whole tina tends to confuse and disteaot the mind, 
to unfit it for the work of the world, to stunt originality, 
and to induce what Mees not inaptly been termed “ brain-fog.” 
Where there is no absolute break-down at the time, and instances 
would have ae unharmed. ow no stronger 
eibesce as to the evil done by overwork at schools and competitive 
ions than that of Dr. Andrew Clarke, who states that he 
has discovered auporary albuminuria in 10 per cent. of the can- 
didates sent to him for examination as to ee health after 
Pasting g the Civil Service examination for I 
- Next — the high pressure, the fever sd fret of professional 
ess life, the haste, competition, and all-pervading 
quiet, which has had no parallel in other times. The over-work 
connected with business, the severe mental labour of the ar 
ta. 
instances it it is oifioalt to tabulate the cause. It behoves us, I 
think, as physicians, to inculcate pause and leisure in life, and 
to encourage the tendency which happily exists in Soe Colony to 
indulge in out-door sports and amusements of every kin 
An the English table 22°8 per cent., and in the Gladesville —_ 
259 per cent. of the causes are set down as “ unascertained.” 
Sreater percentage in the Gladesville table is due to the ‘aehsative 
Means we have for obtaining trustworthy information by ques- 
relatives and —— and to causes which I have already 
‘Be 
. se that the Sasa of insanity generally requires @ 
Sy <iggovaed of several adverse incidents, and that many cases can- 
to be attributed to any one special event. It is better, I think, 
feed hee for a solution of the problem than to set forth a 
to find ge, and it need disturb our complacency but little 
+ wd that the solution of some of the most difficult questions in 
chology is, as yet, beyond us. 
