SLEEPLESSNESS AND SUICIDE.

Thames Advertiser, Volume XXV, Issue 7170, 10 March 1892, Page 3

SLEEPLESSNESS AND SUICIDE.

IV anything can exctifu Hiticido i' ii sleeplessness.' A jury of college mustur; and Eton residents llio nllier day decided Ih'st Dr" Philip Horbort Carpenter Scieuco Master fit li'ttm, had killed him , self by the adiriiiiatr.iliuii of chloroforn while suffering 'row temporary insanity It was piven in evidence that Dr Carpenter had been a martyr to sleepless ness, The deceased gentleman had hat n severe attack of influenza, and this line been followed by great restiveness anc want of sleep; both of which condition! indicated a distressing exhaustion of Ih< nervous svßtom. Dr Carpenter viaitec the Isle of Wight, and improved do cidedly in health, but he appears to havi returned to his work too soon for he had scarcely well begun wher sleep again deserted him, On walkim toj the school he said he felt his braii reeling, and that he had no sleep. In digestion, partly the cause and partly thi effect of his insomnia, added its tor meets to Dr Onrpeuter's mind. He grev desperate, antf in a mement of frenzie< despair destroyed himself, lie wa: about 89 years of age, and has left i widow ard four young children. This is the kind of tragedy that moden times produce. It all comes, ultimately from too much work on the brain on< too little work on the muscular system Have doctors, schoolmasters, and uni versiiy'professors ever considered the fact thf.t horses and cattle, dogs, and other animals practically never suffer J from insomnia? Of course, when attacked by acute disease, or. experiencing sharp pains, they are wakeful; but at ordinary times sleeplessness is a thing unknown amongst them.. The farm labourer and the ,nawy are like the horse and the dog—they do not, in a regular way, know what sleeplessness is. Now, is it not the case that science and culture outfit to diminish for us the ills of life, not to increase them ? Culturo and science that produce among the cultured and scientific classes a wide range of ills, like sleeplessness and dyspepsia, are not 'wnefits but injuries. They do not mark real progress, but retrogression,—The Hospital,