Cause and effect

“ If casual or irregular disturbing causes exist, we should probably require many such cycles of results to render their effect inappreciable. We obtain the desired result by taking the mean of all the367 observations in which a cause acts positively, and the mean of all in which it acts negatively. ”

“ I conceive it to be necessary, when the hypothesis relates to causation, that the supposed cause should not only be a real phenomenon, something actually existing in nature, but should be already known to exercise, or at least to be capable of exercising, an influence of some sort over the effect. ”

“ We see that the finer forms develop slowly and slowly, and gradually becomes grosser and grosser. We have seen that the cause is the same as the effect, and the effect is only the cause in another form. ”

“ If when the supposed cause is present the effect is present, and when the supposed cause is absent the effect is wanting, there being in neither case any other agents present to effect the result, we may reasonably infer that the supposed cause is the real one. ”

“ And now remains That we find out the cause of this effect, Or rather say, the cause of this defect, For this effect defective comes by cause. ”

“ You seem not to remember, that all your reasonings on this subject can only be drawn from effects to causes; and that every argument, deducted from causes to effects, must of necessity be a gross sophism; since it is impossible for you to know anything of the cause, but what you have antecedently, not inferred, but discovered to the full, in the effect. ”

“ Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule. ”

“ It is clear that when the disturbing action, the cause of disease, works upon the fundamental element, the same causes will produce fundamentally similar effects; when, on the contrary, this action is exercised upon the acquired and special element of each race, the same causes will produce different effects. ”

“ In vain, therefore, should we pretend to determine any single event, or infer any cause or effect, without the assistance of observation and experience. ”

“ All the visible manifestations of human life, then, are effects; and as such, although they may possess a reflex action, they can never be causes, but must remain forever what they are—dead effects, galvanized into life by an enduring and profound cause. ”

“ In short, we are all, though in different degrees, the subjects of a variety of subtle influences, which, more or less, neutralize each other, and many of which, therefore, we never observe; and frequently when we do observe the effects, we have neither time nor capacity for tracing the cause; and when in more susceptible organisms such effects are manifested, we content ourselves with referring the phenomena to disease or imposture. ”

“ Our body, which is the means of attaining the four aims of life, viz., virtue, worldly pursuits, pleasure, and liberation, is subject to diseases which emaciate and weaken it, deprive the senses of their functions, and cause extreme pain. ”

“ It has been shown that thence they may, and frequently do, exercise a baleful effect upon the whole organism, giving rise to disease symptoms, the particular type of which were determined by the victim's self-suggestion. ”

“ But if, with reference to the scientific value of this popular view, we turn to psychology for advice, we find at the present time, in that science, decidedly opposed interpretations of the sense in which the human will can be regarded as a cause. According to one of these interpretations the word “act” is properly to be applied merely to the physical process by which our organism gets adjusted to its environment. ”

“ The conditions of every causation are multifarious as we look at them in a regressus of causes or a progressus of effects, and as the mind of the individual can make but one judgment at a time, it may be that the one of the causes or effects which is considered, is in fact a trivial element in the causation, for in all our language we are accustomed to speak of one of the causes as the special cause, for it must be the special one in consideration. ”

“ In this work new theories, some revolutionary in the extreme, are advanced as to the nature of disease, the action of drugs and stimulants, the germ theory, the quantity of food necessary to sustain life, of cancer, insanity, pain, fatigue, sleep, death, the causation and maintenance of bodily heat and of human vitality. ”

“ Will the theory of physical disease account for the instantaneous plunging of a man or woman into the deepest anguish who, scarce ten seconds before, were in the enjoyment of perfect health of spirit, soul and body? ”

“ We may therefore broadly conclude that the only circumstance, within the range of those by which persons of similar conditions of life are affected, capable of producing a marked effect on the character of adults, is illness or some accident which causes physical infirmity. ”

“ THERE are certain mental mysteries associated with peculiar states of disease, and especially with low, nervous diseases, which discover unexpected powers of mind, and which illustrate some of the conditions on which human life depends, and the laws that govern its continuance. ”

“ We are still mercifully surrounded with the countless mysteries of everyday experience, all the evidences of the unimaginable stimulus we call life. Would you take them away? Would you resolve life into a disease of the ether—a disease of which you and I, all life and all matter, are symptoms? ”

“ The reparative process which Nature has instituted and which we call disease, has been hindered by some want of knowledge or attention, in one or in all of these things, and pain, suffering, or interruption of the whole process sets in. ”

“ His natural good sense, however, soon reacted against these impressions, for he knew that all the astonishing manifestations which he had met with must be due to natural causes. But what natural cause could explain the danger-signal which had reached him, or the violent shock which he had just experienced? ”

“ A single touch, by introducing into the body some morbid matter, may set up an immensely involved set of functional disturbances and structural alterations. The whole tenor of a life may be changed by a word of advice; or a glance may determine an action which alters thoughts, feelings, and deeds throughout a long series of years. In those still more involved combinations of changes which societies exhibit, this truth is still more conspicuous. ”

“ Whatever can cause, or help to cause, discomfort, pain, sickness, death, vice, or crime—and whatever has a tendency to avert or destroy, or diminish such cases—are matters of interest to the sanitarian ”

“ Disease and health, like circumstances, are rooted in thought. ”

“ Again, there has, within quite a recent period of time, come a considerable change in the human system itself, attributable in a measure, probably, to some or all of the above causes, in relation to the character and tendencies of diseases. ”

“ In regard to the decay of bodily or mental faculties, much more can be done to prevent or retard them than is generally supposed, and some methods for this end which have been gained by observation or experience will be presented. ”

“ But there is a disease which sometimes affects the body, and afterwards communicates its baneful influence to the mind, over [308] which it hangs such a cloud of horrors as renders life absolutely insupportable. ”

“ When we enumerate causes of disease we see among them many that under ordinary circumstances minister to life, health, and enjoyment; and I can hardly refer at all to the varying circumstances under which they become the medium of pain, disease and death. These circumstances are so various, so many of them are apt to be put in operation at the same time, and so little power have we of excluding them one after the other, so as to ascertain the exact efficiency of each, that our observation respecting their actual effects are open to much fallacy. ”

“ The effects of injury are acquirements; for example, the changes in a diseased lung or injured arm. Every modification of the mind is also an acquirement; for example, everything stored within the memory. ”

“ The facts which we examined led us to two conclusions, which, when properly applied, we shall find will explain most of the phenomena of life, both in health, and in disease. The conclusions alluded to, are these: when the exciting powers have acted more feebly, or weakly, than usual, for some time; or when their action is withdrawn, the excitability accumulates, and becomes more powerfully affected by their subsequent action. ”

“ Life then, or those functions which we call living, are the effects of certain exciting powers, acting on the excitability, or property distinguishing living from dead matter. When those effects, namely, the functions, flow easily, pleasantly, and completely, from the action of the exciting powers, they indicate that state which we call Health. ”

“ Thus the natural history of doubt, viewed as a chapter of human history, like the chapter of physiology which studies a disease, will point indirectly to the cure, or at least to the mode of avoiding the causes which induce the disease ”

“ Doubtless this is the truth; and it would be a most interesting subject of investigation, to ascertain what special forms of evil or moral disorder those universal physical disorders are derived from and correspond to. The day, perhaps, will come, when science, which at present concerns itself too exclusively with effects, will be able to rise more into the region of causes, and then such subjects will claim its earnest attention. ”

“ That the principle of life or capacity of acting, or being acted on, is strictly the property of one part, and is by diffusion communicated to the rest, we have much reason to conclude from the phenomena of both health and disease. ”

“ He will see the healthy taken, and the sickly left. If, then, it be disease, and whether mental or bodily, such disease and its causes must be latent indeed; and we confess we look for no 'coming man' who is to solve the mystery. ”

“ Who is to dictate to nature—what phenomena or qualities can inhere in what substances—what effects may result from what causes? Why should not thought be a property or result of matter, just as well as extension, or hardness, or weight, or digestion, or electricity? The psychologist must show that this cannot be the case, either because the supposition contradicts reason, or because it contradicts experience. ”

“ If brains, nerves, stomach, etc., are intelligent, talk to us, tell us how they are conditioned and report how they feel, then Spirit and matter co-mingle, sickness and health, good and evil, Life and death, are mixed ”

“ Nowadays, all this is past, in medical science. As to the causes of disease, we know that they are facts of nature,—various, but distinguishable by diagnosis and research, and more or less capable of prevention or control or counter-action. ”

“ Again, disease comes through association, even as thoughts appear. For instance, your mental condition is a fixed belief, that, exposed to severe cold or dampness, you take cold; hence, the circumstance being this, you suffer the effects of a belief through association. ”

“ This force is influenced and modified in its action, when exercised in the regulation of nutrition, growth, and reproduction of tissues, by the passions and emotions of the mind. All the secretions and functions of the body are more or less susceptible of being accelerated, retarded or modified by the psychical relations of mind and matter. ”

“ What I would insist upon is, that we should endeavour to make ourselves thoroughly acquainted with the nature and variations of healthy human physiology before we are perplexed with the changes of pathology. ”

“ CURE. In this lecture I shall treat of external disorders, which may take their origin either from injuries, or from internal acrimony of habit; for whatever disturbs the animal œconomy, prevents the natural order of the fibres, and those again when in disorder, corrupt the fluids. ”

“ Instead of attempting to investigate the nature of that connection which subsists between the mind and body, or to inquire into the manner in which they mutually affect each other, we shall only mention those diseases to which the learned are more peculiarly liable, and endeavour to point out the means of avoiding them. ”

“ A diseased body causes a disordered mind and an enfeebled will. The excessive and over-stimulated activity of one set of organs involves a corresponding defect in the activity and functions of the other faculties. ”