BRAINS OF NATION MUST BE MOBILIZED IN CRISIS

The following appeal for the mobilization of the brains of the nation was made recently by Professor Stewart Paton, in an address at the National Conference of Charities and Correction in Pittsburgh:

"We are face to face with a great crisis. Forces are stirring our civilization to its foundations. Success in meeting this crisis depends upon our success in mobilizing the brains of the nation. We cannot longer take refuge behind such terms as 'charity' or 'correction.' We must go to the root of the trouble, and organize society so that a large part of our time and energy will not be wasted in making compensation for sins of omission. Even before the present crisis there were many serious problems to be facade; startling increase in insanity, the commission of crimes, and the rapid multiplication of persons with unstable temperaments and character.

If we are to guide the human machine intelligently, we must study the various parts of the machine and then its activities as expressed in feeling, thinking acting. At present the best opportunities for this line of investigation exist in the medical schools. Over a century ago a great Frenchman declared that medicine should be the basis for all public instruction. It is possible for the medical schools to give modified courses to students of social phenomena.

Every large city should have two institutions for the study of human behavior; psychiatric clinic for the study of methods useful in assisting persons to readjust their lives; and Department of Mental Hygiene, chief functions of which are prevention of maladjustment. Around these two institutions may be grouped other institutional agencies devoted to the study of human behavior. These institutions include the home, college, juvenile court, courts, home for dependents, prisons, organizations for the study of social conditions and the improvement of these conditions. Our success in the great struggle in which we have entered calls for a mobilization of the brains of the nation. If civilization is to profit, and not be set back by this conflict, we must be prepared to secure an even more effective mobilization of brains in time of peace.