MINOR EPILEPSY

(_Grand and Petit Mal_)

"My son is sore vexed, for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and ofttimes
into the water."--Matthew xvii, 15.

"Oft, too, some wretch before our startled sight,
Struck as with lightning with some keen disease,
Drops sudden: By the dread attack o'erpowered
He foams, he groans, he trembles, and he faints;
Now rigid, now convuls'd, his labouring lungs
Heave quick, and quivers each exhausted limb.

* * * * *

"He raves, since Soul and Spirit are alike
Disturbed throughout, and severed each from each
As urged above, distracted by the bane;
But when at length the morbid cause declines,
And the fermenting humours from the heart
Flow back--with staggering foot first treads
Led gradual on to intellect and strength."--Lucretius.

Epilepsy, or "Falling Sickness", is a chronic abnormality of the nervous
system, evinced by attacks of _alteration of consciousness_, usually
accompanied by convulsions.

It attacks men of every race, as well as domesticated animals, and has been
known since the earliest times, the ancients imputing it to demons, the
anger of the gods, or a blow from a star.

It often attacks men in crowds, when excited by oratory or sport, hence the
Roman name: _morbus comitialis_ (crowd sickness).

In mediaeval times, sufferers were regarded with awe, as being possessed by
a spirit. Witch doctors among savages, and founders and expounders of
differing creeds among more civilized peoples, have taken advantage of this
infirmity to claim divine inspiration, and the power of "seeing visions"
and prophesying.

Epilepsy has always interested medical men because of its frequency, the
difficulty of tracing its cause, and its obstinacy to treatment, while it
has appealed to popular imagination by the appalling picture of bodily
overthrow it presents, so that many gross superstitions have grown up
around it.

The description in Mark ix. 17-29, is interesting:

"Master, I have brought Thee my son, which hath a dumb spirit. And
wheresoever he taketh him, he teareth him: and he foameth, and gnasheth
with his teeth, and pineth away: ... straightway the spirit tare him;
and he fell on the ground, and wallowed foaming.

"And He asked his father, How long is it ago since this came unto him?
And he said, Of a child. And ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire,
and into the waters, to destroy