Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 5.djvu/88

 74 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

alienation ; and this predisposition is at least doubled when both parents are affected by one or more of these diseases.

There is a distinction to be noted in the problem of heredity which is not always sufficiently considered by those who are making this kind of examinations. Too often one concludes that there is a hereditary taint when it does not really exist, except when the parents were affected at the moment of concep- tion of the child, or, at least, for the mother, before the birth of the child. Heredity may exist with the father or mother during a part of the life, and cease in consequence of treatment or healing of the nervous trouble. It may remain latent, and leap over a generation and reappear in the second, if the root of the evil has not been extirpated. Consanguine marriages, and especially those between first cousins, have given birth to feeble- minded children, and to very nervous children predisposed to mental alienation.

WHAT REMEDIES MAY WE OPPOSE TO HEREDITY ?

It goes without saying that from the moment when the least derangement of the child's nervous system is discovered, even if this is merely irritability or troubled sleep, special precautions should be taken. If the nervous state depends essentially upon the mother, the child should be confided to a good nurse, and the physician will prescribe a strict regimen for the nurse and for the child. At an age more advanced the child may have night-horrors, or be affrighted at finding itself alone or in dark- ness, and may manifest caprices or anger. The least emotion, ghost stories, hints of robbers, may produce irremediable evil. Masturbation, a too tender discipline, defective physical care, are further causes of injury. We should kindle affection for com- rades and for animals, and repress egoism by all means. All precautions are necessary to conduct the child toward the edu- cation suitable to its nature. We must consider the fact that some children are precocious and are instructed with ease, while others are dull, slow, and interested in nothing. Both species of children must be regarded in mental pathology.

Precocious children unconsciously abuse their memory and