Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 February 1885 — The Mind During Starvation. [ARTICLE]

The Mind During Starvation.

The recent case of cannibalism at sea opens up some curious questions aB to the effect of fasting on the moral nature of man. To the superficial observer, death by starvation simply means a wasting of the body, a horrible agony, an increasing weakness, a lethargic state of the brain, and a sleep from which their is no awakening; but is this all that it means ? While this is going on let us consider whether or not the ihtellectual faculty, and with it the powerpf distinguishing right from wrong is not also undergoing a process of wasting and dea£h, even before that of the material part, for, however dangerous it may be to received opinions to associate the material nature of brain with the moral nature of onr being, we are bound to do so to elucidate some of the facts connected with this case. Reasoning by analogy, we find that, in many cases of bodily disease, the state of the mind is the first indicator of the mischief going on in the system. Take even such a simple thing as indigestion, which, as everyone must know, is only the manifestation of a deranged .stomach, and what do we find ? That the lowness of spirits induced by this affection may vary from slight dejection and ill-humor to the most extreme melancholy, sometimes inducing even a disposition to suicide, a The sufferer misconceives every act of friendship, and exaggerates -slight ailments into heavy grievances. So in starvation, the power of reason seems paralyzed and the intellectual faculty dazed really before the functions of the body suffer, or even the wasting of its tissue becomes extreme. Such being the case, the unfortunate individual is not accountable for bis actions, even if they be criminal in character, long before death puts an end to his sufferings. — N. E. Davies, in Popular Science Ji lonthbj. ■" ■■ ■ "■ »'■"