MENTAL DISORDERS; OR, 726.13 DISEASES OF THE BRAIN AND NERVES, DEVELOPING THE ORIGIN AND PHILOSOPHY OF MANIA, INSANITY, AND CRIME, WITH FULL DIRECTIONS FOR THEIR TREATMENT AND CURE. S'avis, A, J. BY THE AUTHOR OF "The Physician," "Harbinger of Health," etc., etc., etc. SPECIAL EDITION. NEW YORK: AMERICAN NEWS COMPANY, 119 NASSAU STREET. BURG, PA.: The Pittsburg News Company. News Company. 1871. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, BY ANDREW JACKSON DAVIS, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. RC601 ~ D26 1891 TEMPLE OF AKROPANAMEDE. INTRODUCTION. Of all wonders, the greatest is the human Mind. It presents at once the greatest variety and the greatest unity. Its attributes, its complexity, its mobility, its sensibility, its profundity, its imponderability, its solidity, its wondrous proportions of essences, and organs fitted to the ends and uses they have to serve, and its harmonies of substance and feeling adapted to fulfil the higher ends of justice and beauty-all these constitute realities and perfections which transcend even its own powers of comprehension. USE, is first manifested; then a far superior use, BEAUTY. Consequently, descending into the human body, we find material embodiments of all these invisible wonders; made manifest in its anatomy, physiology, organs, fluids, vitality, and powers. Man, therefore, is composed of both body and mind. Hence man, to be perfectly comprehended, should be investigated as a final totality, as a unity in variety, as a moving, feeling, thinking, indestructible being. He must be penetrated and vitalized with a new light; in which, in his own sight, he may become transformed and regenerated—rendered worthy, healthy, and beautiful, to an infinite degree. To accomplish this, accuracy must march before rapidity, and veneration should out-rank and govern familiarity. Without such patience and perfection in studying parts, and in estimating the wonderful beauty of detail, correct personal progress will be almost impossible. "The sight," says a kind teacher, "has an action of the quickest, and embraces in one moment an infinity of forms; nevertheless, it only comprehends one thing at a time. Let us suppose, reader, that you bestow one rapid glance on all this written page, you will judge in an instant, that it is full of different letters; but you will not know in so short a space of time what letters they are, nor what they mean; you will be obliged then to go over them word by word, line by line, 54747 iv INTRODUCTION TO THE TEMPLE. in order to comprehend those letters. Or again, if you wish to reach the top of a building, you must mount step by step; without which it is impossible for you to reach the top." But most minds hesitate; they retire at the beginning of the journey; and many turn back disheartened. They say the study is too difficult and the results too uncertain, or too impracticable. Men think concerning the "spiritual" exactly what Schiller once thought and said about Goethe: "I doubt," he says, "whether any secure, substantial intimacy can ever exist between us. I don't know whether we shall ever come into a close communion with each other. Much that interests me has already had its epoch with him. His whole nature is, from its very origin, differently constituted from mine; his world is not my world; our modes of conceiving things appear to be essentially different." Thus men speak as if the "spiritual" were foreign to themselves; while, if they would but study themselves (i.e., the spiritual, for man is a spirit), they would find a common ground whereon all might meet; and thus, as Goethe said of the ultimate friendship which sprang up between Schiller and himself, "by means of that mighty and interminable controversy between object and subject, we two concluded an alliance, which remained unbroken, and produced much benefit to ourselves and others." In this volume you will find an idea which seeks to embody itself in an institution. The Temple of Akropanamede is an institution, which embodies and represents an idea, which is founded upon the nature and substance of the human mind, upon its laws, sensibilities, phenomena, and destiny, and which now seeks, in a limited degree, to embody itself in the organization of a corresponding institution among men. It has been observed that a man's best friends come to him without bell or advertisement; that "To the feast of the good, will go The good of their own accord." The human mind, in its highest development, recalls a preconsciousness, of which the unexpanded mind feels and knows nothing. This remembrance of an antecedent consciousness is the testimony of germs to the full-blossomed intelligence. When man attains to that noble degree of culture where he can logically analyze himself as he |