WHEN THE RED IS INJURIOUS – Edwin Babbitt

  1. Red is injurious, of course, when there is already too much of the red, or inflammatory condition of the system, such as the predominance of red hair, very rubicund countenance, or feverish and excitable condition generally.

Iron, the preparations of which abound in the red, is “contra-indicated in inflammatory diseases, producing, when injudiciously employed, heat, thirst, head-ache, difficulty of breathing and other symptoms of an excited circulation;” “contra-indicated in the sanguine temperament generally.”

  1. The same is true of the other red elements, or of elements in which red abounds in the spectrum, but the principle is too obvious to need further examples. The exciting effect of red objects on various animals is also well known. That red light has exactly the same exciting effect is well known. I quote the following from a letter of a thoughtful observer, Edwin M. Hale, M. D., to the Chicago Tribune:
  2. “In one of the French Insane Asylums, not only the blue ray but others were tried, and the effect was very interesting. The red ray caused results which confirmed the popular belief in its exciting, maddening, influence. When violent and maniacal patients were placed in rooms where the red ray predominated, they became worse. All the violent symptoms were aggravated. If these patients were removed to a room where the blue ray predominated, they became calm and quiet. It is related that one patient, a woman, whose delirium was greatly aggravated by the red ray, immediately said on going into the blue room—’how soothing that is,’ and shortly after, when left alone, fell asleep.”
  3. Thermel must naturally produce an effect somewhat similar to that of red, so far as its heating qualities are concerned, but being invisible cannot, of course, affect one through the optic nerve.
  4. Dr. Pancoast speaking of the red light says that “if employed to excess, as to amount or time, the red light over-excites the nervous system and may produce dangerous fevers or other disorders that may prove as troublesome as the evil we are seeking to correct. We seldom employ red light to the exclusion of the other rays, and it should never be so employed, except in extreme cases, when prompt action is the first consideration.”

The danger of the above “exclusive red light,” which Dr. Pancoast deems so great as to require “a skilful physician,” may be averted by using the red glass only a few minutes at a time at first, taking the precaution when the system becomes too hot, to put blue glass in its place, or a wet bandage over the head. For general cases, however, it would be better to have blue glass over the head and red and clear glass over the rest of the body in conditions of lethargy. A better arrangement still is the instrument devised by the author called the CHROMOLUME, in which both physiological and chemical laws are complied with in the harmonic arrangement of glass. See explanation in XXIII and XXIV of this chapter.