The Physiology and Pathology of Mind.

from the library of oliver sacks

Second edition of this important work by the leading psychiatrist of the Victorian Era, from the library of Dr. Oliver Sacks, with his octopus bookplate.

Dr. Henry Maudsley (1835-1918) began his career working in asylums, but also developed a successful private practice and was a respected lecturer and author on psychology. 'Described by contemporaries as a positivist and a materialist, he was convinced of the importance of an inductive approach to science, and believed in the physical basis of mental illness; he developed the evolutionary ideas of Herbert Spencer and Charles Darwin and the neurophysiology of W. B. Carpenter and Thomas Laycock. Themes of heredity and degeneration underscored his written and clinical work, as demonstrated in The Physiology and Pathology of Mind, published in 1867, which was widely admired, and extensively translated, revised, and enlarged in later editions' (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography).

Second edition; 8vo; contents partially unopened and with some pencilled notes and underlining, the occasional mark and a little spotting primarily affecting early and late leaves; original burgundy cloth, titles to spine gilt, green coated endpapers, spine tanned, cloth lightly rubbed with a little wear at the extremities, very good condition; 526pp.