Another World Part 8

INTERNAL CONCENTRATED LIGHT.

There is concentrated light--the very essence of light--within ourselves, particularly in the brain, to which the light, having travelled about the body, is conveyed, through the instrumentality of the blood, to the nerves and other organs.

In speaking of the brain, we often use words belonging to vision. Until the discovery of "concentrated light," we did not know how truthful were these expressions, one of which in our language answers to the "mind's eye." The eye as well as the brain contains concentrated light, and physical impressions received through the visual organs are by this electricity immediately conveyed to the sympathetic "light" of the brain.

By the application of concentrated light we can even increase for a time the intellectual powers, or, rather, we can strengthen the instrument through which the intellectual powers are manifested.

EXPERIMENT ON THE LIVING MAN.

The possession of concentrated light led to the discovery of the exact mode in which the brain acts in the living man. By experiments on transparent fish of the zoophyte cla.s.s, and on the eyes of animals, we discovered the means of making a living body for a time transparent. The skull was rendered transparent accordingly, and by the aid of concentrated light and of an instrument called an "electric viewer," the currents of electricity in the brain were made visible.

These currents include myriads of electrical lines--literally composed of electricity--lines the nearest approach to your definition of a mathematical line, that which hath length without breadth.

The filaments, as we may truly call them, are of different forms, straight, spiral, and otherwise curved, and of varied length and colours. They are set in motion by the impulsion of thought. When we talked to the patient on a particular subject, one series of lines would be set in motion with indescribable rapidity; other topics would call into play other series of straight or curved lines. They can also be set in motion under the influence of certain electricities.

Although the experiments on the living man proved very valuable, they could not be conducted with impunity, and were therefore not often repeated. The man operated upon was insensible for some time afterwards, and felt the effects for years. He was, however, cared for during the rest of his life, and was not expected to work. Moreover, every kind of comfort, luxury, and amus.e.m.e.nt was provided for him and for a certain number of relatives and friends whom he selected as companions. Still he was not allowed to marry, that being one of the princ.i.p.al conditions to which he subscribed on being chosen for the experiment from amongst a host of candidates to whom all the serious consequences attending the operation were made known.

XIV.

PHYSICIANS.

DISEASE GERMS.

"Cure all evils in their early germ, so shall ye be spared endless suffering."

Physicians take very high rank in Montalluyah; they are furnished with palaces and gardens; their revenue is great; they are wholly provided for by the State, since on their knowledge and efforts depend greatly the prolongation of life, the prevention of disease and suffering, the preservation of beauty, and of invaluable nerve and brain power. As in the moral, so in the physical const.i.tution, the aim is to discover and crush evils in their germ, before they have taken proportions dangerous to the individual and to the community.

Formerly the chief duty of physicians was to wait patiently until disease had worked great and even fatal mischief. Their chief occupation now is to preserve the patient's health and prevent disease, and if, from any but accidental causes, any one fell ill, it would be a disgrace to them. They were formerly called by a name answering to "Disease Doctors," whilst they are now known by a term signifying "Health Guardians."

Prior to seasons formerly unhealthy, the physicians make visitations from house to house. With the aid of powerful microscopes, they examine the minute particles of the perspiration issuing through the pores. The perspiration, being the result of efforts made by the system to throw off impurities, indicates whether the patient is in good health, or whether there is a tendency to disease. The state of the perspiration, though varying greatly, does not always show the exact nature of the malady; for many diseases present the same appearances, and, in that case, tests are applied, which do not fail to indicate to what malady the impurities belong.

To give an instance: There is a disease of the lungs called Scrofiuska, which impedes respiration, and is besides often attended with cough, emaciation of the body, and other symptoms like those that accompany consumption, for which indeed it was formerly mistaken. It is now well known to be a different disease, requiring different treatment. In scrofiuska the lungs swell inwardly, but tubercles are not generated, and, unlike consumption, this disease can be cured even when at its height. I recollect a bad case, early in my reign, where our physicians, mistaking the complaint for confirmed consumption, declared that the right lung was gone. A short time afterwards the real nature of the disease was discovered, and the patient was completely restored to health.

In both complaints, however, the perspiration, when viewed through our microscopes, presents exactly the same appearance. In consumption, and to a greater extent in scrofiuska, the lungs are covered with a web-like moisture, portions of which are thrown off by the system with the perspiration.

The ordinary appearance of perspiration in a healthy state is that of an oleaginous liquid consistency resembling, say, a thin cream; but the water exuded by the lungs has the appearance of dew, and is indeed called by a term signifying "lung-dew." It does not amalgamate with the oleaginous part of the perspiration.

Our doctors at first thought that they could detect incipient consumption from the appearance of this dew, whilst they had only ascertained that the germs of some one of several diseases existed in the system. For although the presence of lung-dew in any quant.i.ty gives intimation that all is not right, the specific malady is not indicated with certainty. The application of certain tests to the patient is necessary to discover the particular disease with the incipient germs of which he is afflicted.

Disease and contagion difficult to deal with in their advanced stages, when they have already made their presence known by symptoms too palpable to be disregarded, are easily mastered in their germ.

To collect the perspiration, a little instrument, called "the sc.r.a.per,"

is pa.s.sed over the skin, and at each turn deposits the perspiration in an air-tight receptacle attached to the instrument.

The blood was found to be but a partial test of disease, for there is much in the body which does not mingle with the blood, whilst the perspiration contains impurities thrown off by every part of the organization, and, when examined through our microscopes, never fails to give warning.

At the same time the blood is the subject of deep study in Montalluyah; and every point connected with its component parts, colour, circulation, heat, quality, purification, is thoroughly understood.

The physicians sometimes examine the breath. With this view, the patient breathes on a little instrument saturated with a preparation which condenses and retains the breath. Ample opportunity is thus afforded for its microscopic examination, and for the discovery of the unhealthy particles with which the breath may be impregnated.

XV.

MADNESS.

"Think not others blind because ye will not see....The concentrated light of the soul is not visible to the naked eye."

The microscope also led to the discovery of the incipient causes of madness, by the facility it afforded us for the dissection and examination of the minutest portions of the numerous divisions of the brain.

Before my laws came into operation the incipient symptoms of monomania were rarely noticed, and many were driven into confirmed madness and crime by neglect or improper treatment, whilst some of the supposed lunatics were really wiser than their keepers or the doctors who attended them. It often happened that the aspirations of a superior mind were mistaken for indications of the malady, and led to the incarceration of the supposed lunatic. For instance, a poor man, who lived in the reign of my predecessor, thought, and truly thought, that electricity might be used as a motive power for the heaviest bodies, and supply the place of wood used as fuel in manufactures. He also thought that electricity, then impalpable to the senses, was the material ingredient affecting the weight and coherence of bodies. People laughed at what they supposed to be illusions, and there the matter might have stopped; but the poor man persisted in his a.s.sertions that the sun contained electricity, which could be attracted, concentrated, and applied to various purposes. He appealed to the well-known fact, that the sun ripens the fruits of the earth, changes the colours of substances, affects the brain, and produces many wondrous phenomena without visible contact. His lucubrations, instead of suggesting experiment, were received with derision, and the man himself was cruelly treated, his very persistency in the truth convincing the world that he was a confirmed madman. In vain he appealed to the officers charged to visit the monomaniacs, and, in spite of all his efforts, he died in a lunatic asylum.

So dangerous, indeed, was it formerly to announce new ideas opposed to those already received, that we had a proverb to the effect, that he was not mad who had "droll" thoughts, but he was so who told them to the world. The proverb is now somewhat reversed, and he is thought wicked who, being favoured with gleams of light, allows them to perish with him.

Accompanying all laws, I gave to the people my reasons at length for their promulgation, together with answers to antic.i.p.ated objections; and in the exposition of the laws relating to madness I bid them recollect that had I endeavoured to put my thoughts into action some years earlier, I should undoubtedly have suffered similar persecution to those under which many others had succ.u.mbed.

Monomania is not now a.s.sumed, as formerly, from the seeming extravagance or supposed absurdity of people's words; for it is well known in Montalluyah that thoughts which a few years before were scoffed at as the height of absurdity are now acknowledged facts, and they who could doubt the existence of the now familiar phenomena would alone be thought mad! It is known, too, that people often say strange things from confused or indistinct recollections of what has befallen them in a prior state of existence, or from prenotion or intuition of things as yet unknown to others; and although in the sciences we accept nothing as conclusive that is not confirmed by experiment, the vastness or strangeness of the thought, far from attracting ridicule, generally leads to inquiry, experiments, and results. Many of our great discoveries have been suggested by hints which formerly would have seemed the ravings of a disordered mind.

With our microscopes we have been enabled to examine and dissect all the minutest divisions of the brain, each of which responds to certain trains of thought, and to ascertain the physical cause of madness.

This knowledge enables us to discriminate with certainty, to detect the existence, nature, and locality of the germ, and apply effectual remedies during the earliest tendency to the malady. Until this discovery was made, I took effectual means for curing the numbers in whose brains madness had already been developed. I erected many great buildings, where each patient was separated from the others, for in Montalluyah madness is thought to be more or less contagious; but after I had reigned some years the deserted divisions only served to show for what purpose they had been formerly used, and, with one single exception, kept in case of need, these buildings are now appropriated to other purposes.

Amongst the discoveries that astonished the brain-doctors and mind-tamers was the following:--It was formerly thought that the disease existed in the _overworked_, portion of the brain; but this was found to be an error, inasmuch as the disease exists in those parts of the brain which have lain dormant or have been little used. From these the oleaginous fluids essential to their life and activity are drawn to supply the overworked portion, which remains in full health and power.

The doctors admitted that their original belief would alone suffice to account for their having failed to cure so many cases of madness.

The heat of the climate, the power of the sun, the then excessive use of stimulants, and the excitability of the people,--whose pulsation is more rapid than yours,--all tended formerly to augment the victims of the scourge.

XVI.

THE DEATH SOLACE.

INSECTS.