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Visit Of The Legislature To The Asylum

Creator: n/a
Date: April 1854
Publication: The Opal
Source: New York State Library

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In accordance with the invitation of our -Managers and acting Superintendent, on Sat-urday, March 11th, we were visited by the Senate and Legislature of the State, com-prising about one hundred in number, accompanied by a goodly number of Ladies, the press, &c. Arriving at the Asylum, they were welcomed to the State Chambers of Lunacy, and kindly cared for. After resting awhile, they were escorted to the State Par-lor, to test Asylumia's culinary skill, where ample provision was made for strengthening the "inner man." The Hon. Joseph Benedict of Utica, in behalf of the Managers, welcomed them in a short address, briefly stating the wants of the Institution, and the object of their visit, before discussing the merits of roast turkey, ham, "incomparable pickles,'' and all the etcs. of a good dinner. The re-past over, the Hon. Walter B. Sessions, of Chautauque being loudly called, responded in a few touching and eloquent remarks, followed by the Hon. Benjamin Joy, of Tomp-kins Co(?) in a pleasing strain, highly complimentary of the pickles and dinner, comparing it to his wife's best, and the best he had eaten since leaving home -- Troy dinners not excepted.

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The guests were then conducted, by the Seers of the Institution, through the dif-ferent halls, and shown its internal arrangement and order; from thence to the printing office, tailors shop, and various other de-partments, and made particularly conversant with the new plan of heating and ventilating.

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Having thus examined the Asylum, they assembled in the Chapel, with a number of inmates, where the Hon. Charles A. Mann, of the Board of Managers, addressed them, recounting the good accomplished by the Institution since its erection, giving statistical information respecting it, and suggest-ing improvements the experience in its management would dictate. We ourself being next called upon, addressed them as follows: --

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For our household we greet you as the friends and guardians of its interests, and coming fresh from the abodes of intelligence and refinement, fraught with independence and happiness. We greet you as members of a body whose liberality has spread the mantle of humanity over the agony of insane poverty, and erected an edifice, the admiration of the tasteful traveler in its external features, as its internal police is, of the philosophically discerning. There are two important and distinguishing eras in the State's history, the one the completion of the canals, the other the abolition of Slavery; and might not the third be, in the erection and endowing of this institution? Fostered as it has been by Govs. Seward, Wright, Young, Fish, Hunt, and Seymour, it seems to be peculiarly, a child of the State, its interest that of the State. Its perpetuity, you know, gentlemen, involves a trust, and its faithful execution we rejoice to believe, involves the best emotions and sympathies of the human heart. You know that every sphere has its peculiar disappointments and trials. The details of the medical profession as exhibited to your eye, even in the ordinary practice of society, demands the utmost vigor, courage and ability; but in this arena, where a devolvement of duty is so lonely -- where the awful theme of insanity is to be met in its every variety, the simple wear and tear of intellect demands the closest vigilance of superior ability; no wonder that our chieftains so soon faint where there is so constantly presented to the mind the soul-withering influence of aches and pains, of sighs and groans and tears, amid the hallucinations of Insanity.

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It is a source of congratulation that our distinguished Superintendent has recovered his health, and is prepared to return to his post to renew the exhibition of that genius and humanity which makes him the worthy successor of the lamented Dr. Brigham; and we would congratulate you, gentlemen, as the repositories of the best interests of the people of New-York in a legislature that challenges its equal for wisdom and virtue in the sister States, in a Governor, formerly the Chief Magistrate of yon beautiful and hospitable city, where his friends and neighbors can attest to his sagacity, virtue, intelligence and patriotism, and we hope you will aid and comfort him in the discharge of those duties which be performs to the best purpose of being.

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Figures, gentlemen, are the exhibition in our Institution of some duties well and faithfully performed, and it was with surprise and joy we beheld the calculations of one of the noblest deeds since the world began, of him who has long been an ornament and pride in the literary world, and we were wishing that some friend of humanity would so immortalize his name in aiding you in the fostering of this Institution. There, gentlemen, is a nephew of a former member of your Senate, and a gentleman whose name is associated with Eddy and Clinton, and Murray, and Jay, and Adams, in the philanthropic exertions for that school system now so ably superintended, and whose efforts have incorporated him with the State as one of its best and most valuable sons. -- Cadwallader D. Golden, the grandson of the Bishop Provost, whose brother was so long an inmate of the hospital of the metropolis in those days when insanity was considered so dreadful, and its victims shunned as of a lazaretto. How changed now! From the unobtrusive efforts of our public men, aided by the Society of Friends, the institutions for the insane have become enlarged and the horrors of insanity somewhat dissipated. It does not become one so humble as myself to address gentlemen of your information and worth on subjects either of a private or public nature, on which you are well instructed. But you will allow me to say to your excellencies, that a class of human beings called "incurably insane" were particularly noticed to the Legislature of Ohio, by Gov. Wood, now Consul at Valparaiso, urging that there is hope while life lasts. And you know, gentlemen, especially those of you from the metropolis, that discriminating gleaners among its rubbish, often find some valuable in the neglected heaps that are turned over as beyond use and without value.

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