Nervii

“ But the lessons which our psychologists are rapidly learning, as to the evil effects on the brain of an education that promotes self-consciousness, are sorely needed to be applied to the pathology of nervous diseases generally, and of neuralgia among the rest. Common sense and common humanity, when united with the physician's knowledge, cry out against the system under which religious parents and teachers subject the feeble and highly mobile nervous systems of the young to the tremendous strain of spiritual self-questioning upon the most momentous topics. ”

“ Microscopic researches are constantly revealing nerve-fibres, in ever-increasing profusion, which penetrate to parts seemingly the least vitalized in the organism. But, in any case, the nerves are certainly the ultimate channel of communication between the suffering part and the sentient centre. ”

“ Both ideation and emotion are, indeed, very often quick and active in the victims of neuralgia, who in this respect differ strikingly from the majority of epileptics. But this mobility of the higher centres of the nervous system is itself no sign of general nervous strength; which last can never be possessed except by those in whom a certain balance of the various nervous functions is maintained. Much more will be said on this topic when we come to discuss the etiology of neuralgia. ”

“ This change, as I have seen in my practice of medicine, sometimes passes up the nerves toward the centers, and occasions a more or less constant irritation of the nerve-fibers, producing neuralgia, which is usually referred by the brain to that part of the lost limb to which the affected nerve belonged. This pain keeps the brain ever mindful of the missing part, and, imperfectly at least, preserves to the man a consciousness of possessing that which he has not. ”

“ Numerous investigators have long established the fact that the great sensory nerve of the head and face is endowed with an exquisite degree of sensibility. More than half a century ago, both Magendie and Sir Charles Bell pointed out that merely exposing and touching this fifth nerve gave signs of most acute pain. "All who have divided this root in living animals must have recognized, not only that it is sensitive, but that its sensibility is far more acute than that of any other nervous trunk in the body." ”

“ And, on the subject of age, I need only recall what I have said so strongly about the coincidence of neuralgia with particular epochs in life, as affording evidence of the most powerful kind that neuralgics are, save in exceptional instances, persons with congenitally weak spots in the nervous centres, which break down into degeneration, temporary or permanent, under the strains imposed by one or other of the physiological crises of the organism, or the special physical or psychical circumstances which surround the patient's life. ”

“ Nero fled from Rome, was declared an enemy of his country, and to save himself from execution committed suicide. See W. Wolfe Capes' Early Roman Empire and Merivale's History of the Romans under the Empire.
Nerves, the fibers of white nervous matter connecting the different parts of the body with the central nervous system. Two kinds of nervous tissue are recognized,— the white and gray. The white is composed of fibers, the gray is largely made of nerve cells located in centers. The nerves are merely conductors of the nervous impulses that arise within the nerve-cells. ”

“ But, in all examples of the burning pain after injury, Messrs. Mitchell, Moorehouse, and Keen found the temperature of the painful parts notably elevated.
It would appear that there is no form of neuralgia more dreadful, and scarcely any so hopeless, as this burning pain coming on as a sequel to severe nerve injuries. It exercises a profoundly depressing effect upon the whole nervous tone; the most robust men become timid and broken down, and their condition is compared by the American writers to that of hysterical women. ”

“ Peripheral irritation of a particular sensory nerve may evoke neuralgic pains in nerves connected with that irritated only through the spinal centre. (3) Neuralgia in a sensory nerve may (and almost always does, to some extent) produce secondary vaso-motor paralyses: these paralyses may affect fibres which run in the same branch of the nerve as that which is painful, or fibres that run in another branch of the same nerve, or fibres that run with another sensory nerve, or the ganglionic chain of the sympathetic itself. ”

“ Its most striking teaching is the fact that the acutest agonies of neuralgia can be felt in a nerve, the central end of which is reduced to such a pitch of degeneration that conduction between centre and periphery must very shortly have entirely ceased had the patient lived. And hardly less important is its illustration of the fact that permanent injury to the ganglion of the posterior root of a spinal nerve impairs the vitality of the posterior root itself—a fact which has been independently made out by the physiological researches of Bernard and of Augustus Waller. ”

“ Nerve-fluid has its own aura like every congregation of molecules in nature, even prime ether has its own aura which is âkâsh. Nerve-fluid has its own aura, called the odic aura of the man. All auras have one base, they are all akin to the magnetic fluid in the cosmos. For every thought there is an affection of the nerve currents of the brain or nerve. This implies vibration which is caught up by the astral aura which communicates with the astral fluid with which it is in contact. ”

“ The nerves are the medium of illusions; their influence pervades the whole body, and their various impressions are transmitted to the brain. When the entire brain is affected, delirium is the consequence; if the optic nerve only, visions disturb the imagination; if the acoustic nerves receive the impression, unreal sounds or voices are heard. If the optic nerves are cut or rendered paralytic, the sense of vision is irrecoverably destroyed. The nervous system is liable to be diseased and deranged from various causes, from which, it is obvious, derangement of both body and mind must ensue. ”

“ In physiological reality both systems, central and peripheral, are one; the separation is artificial. Strictly speaking, therefore, Neurility—or nerve-action—is the general property of nerve-tissue, central and peripheral. But since Neurility may be manifested by nerves apart from centres, whereas Sensibility demands the co-operation of both, and since we have often to consider the central process in itself, without attending to the process in the nerves, it is well to have two characteristic terms. ”

“ With the field thus narrowed for us, it is surely legitimate, in the necessary scarcity of anatomical records referring directly to the state of the nerve-roots in ordinary neuralgia, to place great weight on the facts of a disease like locomotor ataxy, in which the main anatomical change is a progressive atrophy of the posterior columns which usually falls with peculiar severity on the posterior nerve-roots, or on the parts of the gray matter immediately adjoining these, and in which neuralgia may be said, for practical purposes, to be a constant and most characteristic phenomenon. ”

“ And certainly it is infinitely more probable that paralysis or spasm of a muscular viscus should occur as a reflex consequence of neuralgia occurring in a nerve whose central nucleus was closely connected with the motor centre of the organ, than that mere paralysis of the viscus should convey a reflex impression to sensitive nerves which should express itself in the form of acute pain. It must be confessed that the matter hangs in doubt; but the evidence is, on the whole, very strong for the belief that central nervous mischief is the most important element in angina. ”

“ The portion of Sensibility which feels the influences of the human nervaura, is the highest portion of the organ, where it connects with Modesty, Somnolence, and Ideality. This we regard as the special organ of Nervauric Impressibility, because it renders the system so sensitive to the nervaura, as to be strongly affected whenever it is applied. ”

“ The technical term for nervousness is psycho-neurosis—disease of the psyche. There are certain "real neuroses" such as paralysis and spinal-cord disease, which involve an organic impairment of nerve-tissue. However, as this book deals only with psychic disturbance, we shall, throughout, use the term neuroses and psycho-neuroses indiscriminately, to denote nervous or functional disorders.
To still other people nervous trouble means fear,—just terrible fear without object or meaning or reason (anxiety neuroses) ; or a definite fear of some harmless object (phobia) ”

“ If perturbation of nerve-function—a disturbance quite different from mere exaltation of the normal development of nerve-force—be the essence of pain, how comes it that pains of the severest type may be produced by changes in structures which are usually described, for practical purposes, as lying outside the nervous system? We must, in the first place, remark that the externality of any bodily tissue to the nervous system is more apparent than real. ”

“ For it is to be observed that, while the sensations conveyed by the healthy nerve are correct in the indications which they afford to the percipient brain, the indications given by pain are vague and untrustworthy, and often seriously misleading. Not to speak of the nerves of special sense, or of the fibres which convey the sensations of muscular movement, even the nerves of common sensation do carry to the internal perception, in health, a distinct impression of the well-being of the organs to which they are distributed. ”

“ Every physical disorder is only the hull of an order, every foul spring is the hull of a fair autumn; but are, then, our vices the buds of our virtues, and is the earthly fall of a continually sinking villain nothing but a disguised ascension of his to heaven?—And is there an object in the life of a Nero? ”

“ Helen: And what sends the messages to and from the brain over the nerves, mother?
Mother: The power which sends them is called “nerve force,” though what it is even the wisest men do not know. We can stop it by pressing on the nerves, just as you can stop the current of the telegraph. We sometimes say that our leg or arm is “asleep.” If we try to move, it gives us pain, or it may be we can not move at all. One nerve runs along the back side of the arm over the elbow. If we hit the elbow, it makes the arm and hand feel numb. ”

“ The editor nodded, his facial muscles twitching uncontrollably.
"He said, 'Conscious co-operation of mind and body depends on neighboring nerve units being in contact with one another so nerve impulses can pass from neuron to neuron to reach the brain. In sleep the dendrites retract and separate, and the result is unconsciousness. Some influence whose nature we do not yet understand is causing the nerve dendrites of earth's mammalian life to retract, bringing sleep. The action is not chemical, as air is normal. ”

“ Men frequently do break down, of course, at an age when their tissues generally are sound enough, and there is no reason, except on the side of their nervous system, why they should not remain in vigorous health for years. But it is greatly more common for the nervous collapse to take the form of insanity, [25] or hypochondriasis, or paralysis, then that of neuralgia. ”

“ As regards the working of the intellect, it is easier to speak in a free and unembarrassed manner than respecting the other matters. There can be no doubt that, of intellectual work, that sort which exhausts and harasses the nervous system is the forced, the premature, and the unreal kind; and this it is which predisposes, among other nervous maladies, to neuralgia. It is more difficult to speak the truth about emotional influences generally, and especially about those which are concerned with the highest spiritual matters ”

“ How often we hear that and how little does the person with steady nerves appreciate the tortures of "nerves."
A cut, a bruise, a headache, or any of the physical ailments can be quickly cured. Nature will mend the break, but tired, worn, stretched, abused nerves take time to restore. These nerve ailments call for most vigorous mental treatment.
Neurasthenia means debilitated or prostrated nerves and it shows itself first of all by worry. Worry means the inability to relax the attention from a definite fear or fancied hard luck. Worry leads to many physical and mental disorders. ”

“ Neuralgia may attack any one, or all, of the three divisions of the nerve; the latter event is comparatively rare. Valleix, indeed, holds a different opinion; but this seems to me to arise from the fact that his definition of neuralgia was too narrow to include a large number of the milder cases of neuralgia, which are, nevertheless I believe, decidedly of the same essential character with the severer affections. The most frequent occurrence is the limitation of the pain to the ophthalmic division, and incomparably the most frequent foci of pain are the supra-orbital and the parietal. ”

“ After I had described my symptoms, the doctor smiled rather more expansively than was to my liking and said:—
“You may have a little post-nasal catarrh, but I think it is only a neurosis.”
I thought to myself that if it was “only” a neurosis it was one with great possibilities. The fact that collapses are frequent among brain-workers was not easily dismissed from [Pg 25] my mind. I feared insanity and began to picture how I would disport myself in a madhouse. ”