ter, are, with difficulty defined, not easily diagnosed, occasionally escape observation, and often resist, too successfully, the operation of the best directed remedial measures. If, among the diseases more particularly implicating the ordinary organic functions of life, we witness these pseudo or eccentric deviations from the recognised pathological character, à fortiori, are we not justified in anticipating that in the subtle, complicated, varied, and often obscure affections of the cerebral matter, deranging the operations of mind, we should have brought within the sphere of our observation extraordinary, anomalous, and eccentric deviations from certain pre-determined, morbid, cerebral, and psychological conditions? It is the purport of this essay to illustrate some of these spurious morbid mental states. It is not my intention to discuss that vexata quæstio, what constitutes insanity, or to lay down rules by which we may successfully trace, in every case, the line of demarcation between the sane and insane condition, passion and insanity, eccentricity and mental derange

ment.

With the view of avoiding this discussion, I have preferred confining my remarks to those unrecognised forms of what may be properly termed mental disorders. I presume it to be a generally admitted axiom that the mind may be disordered without being insane, using this phrase in its strictly legal acceptation. These conditions of morbid thought may be considered by some as only degrees of insanity; but I would suggest that this term be restricted to those mental affections accompanied by positive aberration or derangement of idea, associated with loss of controlling power, clearly justifying the exercise of moral restraint; and to those morbid conditions of the intellect which sanction an appeal to the protective influence of the law. In other words, I would confine my remarks to those cases in which the mind may be said to be pathologically disordered but not legally insane. Have we in practice sufficiently appreciated this distinction? Fearful of committing ourselves to an opinion that might authorize an interference with the free agency of the subject, and justify the use of legal restraint, have we not exhibited an indisposition to admit the existence of positive mental disorder, even in cases where it has been obviously and painfully apparent? This excessive caution-originating in motives that do honour to human nature-has often, I fear, been productive of serious, fatal, and irremediable mischief.

The subject under consideration is one, I readily admit, of extreme delicacy, but one, nevertheless, to my humble conception, of incalculable importance to all sections of the community. It is beset with difficulties and surrounded by dangers. In the hands of the inexperienced, the ignorant, the indiscreet,

and the wilfully designing, the facts that I have to record, and principles which I purpose to enunciate, might be productive of much mischief; but, I ask, ought any apprehensions of this kind to deter me from entering upon this important inquiry? The subject of latent and unrecognised morbid mind is yet in its infancy. It may be said to occupy, at present, untrodden and almost untouched ground. What a vast field is here presented to the truth seeking and philosophical observer, who, to a practical knowledge of the world and human character, adds an acquaintance with the higher departments of mental philosophy and a knowledge of cerebral pathology. How much of the bitterness, misery, and wretchedness so often witnessed in the bosom of families arises from concealed and undetected mental alienation! How often do we witness ruin, beggary, disgrace, and death result from such unrecognised morbid mental conditions! It is the canker worm gnawing at the vitals, and undermining the happiness of many a domestic hearth. Can nothing be done to arrest the fearful progress of the moral avalanche, or arrest the course of the rapid current that is hurling so many to ruin and destruction?

This type of morbid mental disorder exists to a frightful extent in real life. It is unhappily on the increase, and it therefore behoves the profession, as guardians of the public health, as medical philosophers engaged in the loftiest and most ennobling of human inquiries, as practical physicians called upon to unravel the mysterious and complicated phenomena of disease, and to administer relief to human suffering, to fearlessly grapple with an evil which is sapping the happiness of families, and to exert their utmost ability to disseminate sound principles of pathology upon a matter so intimately associated and so closely interwoven with the social well-being of the human race. These unrecognised morbid conditions most frequently implicate the affections, propensities, appetites, and moral sense. In many instances it is difficult to distinguish between normal or healthy mental irregularities of thought, passion, appetite, and those deviations from natural conditions of the intellect, both in its intellectual and moral manifestations, clearly bringing those so affected within the legitimate domain of pathology. Are there any unfailing diagnostic symptoms by means of which we may detect these pseudo forms of mental disorder with sufficient exactness, precision, and distinctness to justify the conclusion that they result from a deviation from the normal cerebral condition? This question it will be my duty to consider. The affections of which I speak are necessarily obscure, and, unlike the ordinary cases of mental aberration of every day occurrence, they frequently manifest themselves in either an exalted,

depressed, or vitiated state of the moral sense. The disorder frequently assumes the character of a mere exaggeration of some single predominant passion, appetite, or emotion, and so often resembles, in its prominent features, the natural and healthy actions of thought, either in excess of development or irregular in its operations, that the practised eye of the experienced physician can alone safely pronounce the state to be one of disease. I do not refer to mere ordinary instances of eccentricity, to certain idiosyncrasies of thought and feeling, or to cases in which the mind appears to be absorbed by some one idea, which exercises an influence over the conduct and thoughts quite disproportionate to its intrinsic value. Neither do I advert to examples of natural irritability, violence or passion, coarseness and brutality, vicious inclinations, criminal propensities, excessive caprice, or extravagance of conduct, for these conditions of mind may, alas! be the natural and healthy operations of the intellect. These strange phases of the understanding-these bizarreries of character-these vagaries of the intellect these singularities, irregularities, and oddities of conduct, common to so many who mix in every day life, and who pass current in society, present to the philosophical psychologist many points for grave contemplation and even suspicion; but such natural and normal, although eccentric states of the intellect, do not legitimately come within the province of the practical physician unless they can be clearly demonstrated to be morbid results-to be positive and clearly established deviations from cerebral and mental health. It has been well observed by Dr. Coombe that a brusque, rough manner, which is natural to one person, indicates nothing but mental health in him, but if another individual, who has always been remarkable for a deferential deportment and habitual politeness, lays these qualities aside, and, without provocation or other adequate cause, assumes the unpolished forwardness of the former, we may justly infer that his mind is either already deranged or on the point of becoming so; or if a person who has been noted. all his life for prudence, steadiness, regularity, and sobriety, suddenly becomes, without any adequate change in his external situation, rash, unsettled, and dissipated in his habits, or vice versa, every one recognises at once in these changes, accompanied as they are by certain bodily symptoms, evidences of the presence of disease affecting the mind through the instrumentality of its organs. It is not therefore the abstract feeling or act that constitutes positive proof of the existence of mental derangement, but a departure from, or an exaggeration of, the natural and healthy character, temper, habits of the person so affected.

These forms of unrecognised mental disorder are not always accompanied by any well marked disturbance of the bodily

health demanding medical attention, or any obvious departure from a normal state of thought and conduct such as to justify legal interference; neither do these affections always incapacitate the party from engaging in the ordinary business of life. There may be no appreciable morbid alienation of affection. The wit continues to dazzle, and the repartee has lost none of its brilliancy. The fancy retains its playfulness, the memory its power, and the conversation its perfect coherence and rationality. The afflicted person mixes as usual in society, sits at the head of his own table, entertains his guests, goes to the stock-exchange, to his counting-house or his bank, engages actively in his professional duties, without exhibiting evidence, very conclusive to others, of his actual morbid condition. The mental change may have progressed insidiously and stealthily, having slowly and almost imperceptibly effected important molecular modifications in the delicate vesicular nervous neurine of the brain, ultimately resulting in some aberration of the ideas, or alteration of the affections, propensities, and habits.

The party may be an unrecognised monomaniac, and acting under the terribly crushing and despotic influence of one predominant morbid idea, he bringing destruction upon his once happy home and family. His feeling may be perverted and affections alienated; thus engendering much concealed misery within the sacred circle of domestic life. His conduct may be brutal to those who have the strongest claims upon his love, kindness, and forbearance, and yet his mental malady be undetected. He may recklessly, and in opposition to the best counsels and most pathetic appeals, squander a fortune, which has been accumulated after many years of active industry and anxious toil. He may become vicious and brutal-a tyrant, a criminal, a drunkard, a suicide, and a spendthrift, as the result of an undoubtedly morbid state of the brain and mind, and yet pass unobserved through life as a sane, rational, and healthy man.

We witness in actual practice all the delicate shades and gradations of such unrecognised and neglected mental alienation. It often occurs that whilst those so affected are able to perform with praiseworthy propriety and with scrupulous probity and singular exactness, most of the important duties of life, they manifest extraordinary and unreasonable antipathies, dislikes, and suspicions against their dearest relations and kindest friends. So cleverly and successfully is this mask of sanity and mental health sometimes worn; so effectually is all suspicion disarmed, that mental disorder of a dangerous character has been known for years to progress without exciting the slightest notion of its presence, until some sad and terrible catastrophe has painfully awakened attention to its existence. Persons suffering from

latent insanity often affect singularity of dress, gait, conversation, and phraseology. The most trifling circumstances rouse their excitability,—they are martyrs to ungovernable paroxysms of passion, are roused to a state of demoniacal furor by insignificant causes, and occasionally lose all sense of delicacy of feeling and sentiment, refinement of manners and conversation. Such manifestations of undetected mental disorder are often seen associated with intellectual and moral qualities of the highest order. Neither rank nor station is free from these sad mental infirmities. Occasionally the malady shows itself in an overbearing disposition. Persons so unhappily disordered browbeat and bully those over whom they have the power of exercising a little short-lived authority, and, forgetting what is due to station, intelligence, reputation, and character, they become within their circumscribed sphere petty tyrants, aping the manners of an Eastern despot. They are impulsive in their thoughts, are often obstinately and pertinaciously rivetted to the most absurd and outrageous opinions, are dogmatic in conversation, are litigious, exhibit a controversial spirit, and oppose every endeavour to bring them within the domain of common sense and correct principles of reasoning. Persons, who were distinguished for their sweetness of disposition, unvarying urbanity, strict regard for truth, diffidence of character, evenness of temper, and all those selfdenying qualities which adorn and beautify the human character, exhibit, in this type of disordered intellect, states of morbid mind the very reverse of those natural to them when in health. The even-tempered man becomes querulous and irascible; the generous and open-hearted become cunning and selfish; the timid man assumes an unnatural boldness and forwardness. All delicacy and decency of thought is occasionally banished from the mind, so effectually does the spiritual principle in these attacks succumb to the animal instincts.

The naturally gentle, truthful, retiring, and self-denying, become quarrelsome, cunning, and selfish-the diffident bold, and the modest obscene. We frequently observe these pseudo-mental conditions involving only one particular faculty, or seizing hold of one passion or appetite. Occasionally it manifests itself in a want of veracity, or in a disposition to exaggerate, amounting to positive disease. It may show itself in a disordered volition, in morbid imitation, in an inordinate vaulting ambition, an absorbing lust of praise, an insane desire for notoriety, a sudden paralysis of the memory or impairment of the power of attention, with an obliteration from the mind of all the events of the past life. The disorder occasionally manifests itself in a depressed, exalted, or vitiated state of the reproductive function-in morbid views of Christianity, and is often connected with a profound anesthesia