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Arnold, Thomas.
Observations on the Nature, Kinds, Causes, and Prevention of Insanity.
Publisher: Printed for Richard Phillips, London;
Date of Publication: 1806
Stock Code: 10780
SECOND EDITION. Two volumes. Octavo’s, pp., lxviii, 298; viii, 344. Frontispiece portrait of Arnold (not in the first edition) engraved by Francis Legat after a painting of 1793 by G. Ralph to Volume I. Later nineteenth century half calf, bound by Leake of Shrewsbury, with 4 raised bands, gilt titles to black labels to spine and decoration in blind to compartments; marbled paper-covered boards with matching marbling to all edges. Binding lightly scuffed with minor loss to corners; marbled paper very slightly rippled but bright. Armorial bookplate of Robert Chambre Vaughan (1796-1876) to each front paste-down; a little scattered light foxing, mainly to endpapers and prelims. An attractive, solid set. Important early work on mental illness by Thomas Arnold (c.1742-1816), physician to Leicester Infirmary and proprietor of a mental illness facility in the city. The first volume concerns the incidence, definition and arrangement of insanity while the second covers its causes and prevention; Arnold advocated for the humane treatment of patients, with firm management and temperance in all things. Arnold’s progressive assessments were at the forefront of the very early embryonic stages of psychiatry in England - "Historically Arnold's importance was that he attempted a new classification of insanity by mental symptoms 'drawn with some care and exactness immediately from nature' rather than by arbitrary social assessment of degree of madness, prevailing affective state, or presence of fever". In this, his major work, Arnold ”abandoned the traditional humoral theories, basing his classification on the ideas of Locke and separating disordered sensations from disordered reasoning. He helped to pioneer a new approach to insanity based on observed symptoms, but his classification was too detailed to be practical and it never became popular. Arnold is representative of a shift towards the ‘moral’ treatment of the insane. Along with Samuel Tuke, he thought that patients should be treated as children rather than as brutes, and advocated that physical restraints should be used only on violent patients. Along with William Battie, he advised that the insane should be segregated from the outside world” ODNB, £1200.00