The use of these nerve tonics, as they were called, was advocated by adherents of the prevalent medical orthodoxy of the time known as allopathy, meaning “other than the disease.” In short, the theory held that the best way to treat a disease was to produce the somatic condition opposite to the pathological state in question. With a fever, for instance, one had to cool the body down. With disorders of the mind, one had to restore strength and firmness to the patient’s frayed nerves.
