Necessity of medical means

As it frequently happens that insanity, if not occassioned, is continued by the very means adopted for its removal; as where a system of evacuations is persisted in when the symptoms of excitement result only from exhaustion, it is an object of the first importance to ascertain whether any medical or even moral means are necessary, instances having often occurred in which every symptom of mental derangement has gradually disappeared, as the vessels became filled, the strength recruited, and the health reestablished.

C***
Practical Observations on Insanity, p. 53.