Men of the Time, eleventh edition/Browne, William Alexander Francis
BROWNE, William Alexander Francis, LL.D., formerly Fellow of the Royal Society, Edinburgh, and various other societies, was born near Stirling, in 1805, and studied medicine, with special reference to mental diseases, in Edinburgh, France, and Germany. In 1834 he was appointed physician to the Montrose Lunatic Asylum; and, four years afterwards, to the Royal Crichton Institution, Dumfries, which appointment he held till 1857, when the Government made him a Commissioner in Lunacy for Scotland. Dr. Browne advocated the non-restraint system, and his work, "What Asylums were, are, and ought to be," contributed largely to the reformation in the hospital treatment of the insane. His Annual Reports of the Royal Crichton Institution, his advocacy of the greatest possible liberty to the insane that could be consistent with safety, and his varied illustrations of treatment by out-door amusements, concerts, &c., had a great effect in convincing the public of the expediency of employing kindness and moral influences in the treatment of lunatics. He was the first person in this country to give a systematic course of lectures on insanity, and his numerous writings and essays have had a marked influence upon the study of psychology as a branch of medical science. He was (1867) President of the Medico-Psychological Association; and in the same year he delivered a course of Lectures on Mental Diseases in Edinburgh University during the illness of Professor Laycock. In 1870 he resigned the Commissionership in Lunacy, in consequence of impairment of vision. He is now again connected with the Crichton Institution as Psychological Consultant.