Lutter of [139] feeling when one is an object of paramount interest to another-the idea of ownership, and such ownership! How proud men are of a pretty wife! Then comes the mortar of mutual confidences, of shared knowledge, of common secrets. Custom binds men and women together even when other things fail. The feelings of power, of protecting and being protected, of legal rights, all cluster round this shrine of physical love. The more the stem is hidden beneath its leaves the purer is the love. The man who gratifies his passion for actual physical enjoyment, who has no care for the welfare of the woman who is instrumental to his pleasure, who feels no friendship for her, who experiences none of the better and purer feelings which ought to be associated with love, who has no care for the thoughts or sentiments which may be part of her life, is less of a man and more of an animal than most of his fellows. He indulges in a vice which morality has set its canon against, although it has not seemed expedient to the legislature to regard it as a crime.

? 207. Disease in connection with Sexual Instincts.— There may be such an exaltation of the sexual passion as to amount to disease. We have seen that disease may manifest itself through any of the many series of relations that a man bears to his external environment. And it is important for the medical jurist to recognize this specific form of disease with reference to the deprivation of liberty which must in so many cases take place. Erotomania proper is to be distinguished from nymphomania and satyriasis, and may be defined as an excessive love for a real or imaginary individual of the other sex. It may and often does occur in connection with mental disease which is manifested by many other prominent symptoms, but occasionally the love-symptoms are the only indications of insanity. The insanity in such a case is not to be traced to any physical disorder, but to serious and indulged-in misapprehensions as to the feelings and sentiments of others. "The subjects of erotomania," remarks Esquirol, "never pass the limits of propriety: they remain chaste." On the other hand, nymphomania and satyriasis are characterized by an entire absence of any of the higher or purer feelings of healthy love, and give rise to the most BR. INS.--21

obscene proposals, and to acts of the most disgusting and shameful description. Yet it is to be remembered that, although we thus distinguish erotomania from nymphomania and satyriasis, we must not always expect to find them thus clearly marked out from one another in nature; indeed, they are most frequently found to coëxist.

? 208. Classification of Diseases manifested in relation to Sexual Instincts.-140 Although nymphomania and satyriasis originate in the organs of reproduction, we very often find such departures from all the rules of propriety as would, according to the description of Esquirol, lead us to believe that the individual's conduct was not due to the less virulent erotomania, and yet we are unable to trace it in its origin to any disease of the reproductive organs. We have, therefore, used erotomania as the general term, and would distinguish erotomania as described by Esquirol, and nymphomania (or uteromania,) and satyriasis, as the three forms, or (looking upon the last two as one) as the two forms of this disease.

2209. Erotomania.-In erotomania there is almost invariably great depression of vital energy: it is one of the most direct roads to dementia. Disease of the cerebellum has been suggested as the chief cause of this disease. In most cases, there is evident deterioration of the intellectual faculties, although in others there is little or no connection. traceable between the insanity and the ordinary reasoning faculties. As illustrating this statement, we may quote the following case: "A young man, previously of most respectable character, became subject to severe epileptic fits, which were the prelude to attacks of violent mania, lasting, as it generally happens in this form of disease, but a few days, and recurring at uncertain intervals. These complaints after a time disappeared in a great measure, but they left the individual excessively irritable in temper, irascible and impetuous, liable to sudden bursts of anger and rage, during which he became dangerous to persons who were near him. Of symptoms of this description, a state approximating to the satyriasis of medical writers is no unusual accompaniment, but in the present instance the diseased propensities of the

individual were displayed in such a manner as to render confinement in a lunatic asylum the only preservative against criminal accusations."

? 210. Of Simple Erotomania.-As illustrating the form of erotomania which is characterized simply by excessive love to a real or imaginary individual, and as showing how any of the associated sentiments may manifest themselves in connection with this morbid emotional affection, we may quote from a paper in the Journal of Mental Science. The writer says it is "generally displayed (in asylums) by careful and studied toilets and bedeckings with supposed fineries, and, as usual, is best marked amongst the females. It is often manifested at the sight of [141)any one of the opposite sex indiscriminately, when languishing glances, smiles, and unmistakeable fondness are displayed. Or, again, they are more capricious, praising in exaggerated strains the goodness of, and their devotion to, the object of their affection; and they are versatile and flighty withal. So intense and engrossing does the ailment become in some instances that the patient lapses into dementia from excessive nervous exhaustion. One lady is never done talking of honorable marriage, and the husband she ought to have had if she had been permitted to remain outside, away from the parties that administer chloroform and ether to her. In her case, there is hyperesthesia of the emotions, and her impassioned entreaties, tears, and seizing of the hand, betray the ardour of her attachment. Another openly beseeches the object of her attraction to marry her, and is never tired of conversing with her companions about him, planning the most extraordinary means to assist her in accomplishing her end, and jealous of every slight attention paid to other than herself. She openly watches him on every available opportunity, and the same anxious form is seen peering from a window over the exercise ground where her fancied lover is. Her whole soul is wrapt in the one all-powerful passion. Yet she is for the most part candid, and not given to any secret abuse."2

1 Prichard, Treatise on Insanity, p. 25.

* On some Varieties of Morbid Impulse and Perverted Impulse, by W. C. McIntosh Jour. of Mental Science, Jan. 1866.

2211. Case of Simple Erotomania.-A tendency similar to that described in the above quotation has been observed by ourselves in old people whose health was not impaired. And we remember one old lady who changed her lodgings repeatedly because she thought that she was followed by an amorous youth, and strict virtue even at the age of eighty advised her to fly from temptation. She was under the impression that cabmen pinched her hands-as only a woman's hand can be pinched by a man-when she gave them their fare, and believed that her ankles were universally admired by males who did not hesitate to express their opinions as to their excellence. Although over eighty years of age, she never would walk out alone. And yet this individual was to all intents and purposes sane. She had never been married.

212. More Depraved Forms of Erotomaniacal Impulse. But we turn to the more serious form of this disease the lewdness which fills man

"With reproachfull pain

Of that foule evil which all men reprove,

That rotts the marrow and consumes the brain;"

[142) which manifests all the most degraded propensities. Cases often occur in which an intense desire for sexual congress is openly expressed, or in which the patient, being a woman, frequently exposes herself in the presence of males. Cases of self-abuse are by no means uncommon, and the general debility which masturbation directly produces operates most injuriously on the nervous system and the brain. Patients laboring under demenția are constant in the practice of masturbation, and seem to have no shame connected with the discovery of the habit.

? 213. Case of Erotomania.-Many cases of erotomania are on record. We will only quote one. "A very intelligent lady was tormented from infancy with the most inordinate desires. Her excellent education alone saved her from the

See Esquirol Malad. Ment., vol. ii., pp. 32, 49; Annales Hygiène Publique et de Méd. Leg., tom. iii., p. 198. See also Marc, vol. i., p. 209; Bayard on Uteromania; and Tuke and Bucknill, Psy. Med.

rash indulgences to which her temperament so violently urged her. Arrived at maturity, she abandoned herself to the gratification of her desires, but this only increased their intensity. Frequently she saw herself on the verge of madness, and, in despair, she left her house and the city, and took refuge with her mother, who resided in the country, where the absence of objects to excite desire, the greater severity of manners, and the culture of a garden, prevented the explosion of the disease. After having changed her residence for that of a large city, she was after a while threatened with a relapse, and again she took refuge with her mother. On her return to Paris she came to me (it is Gall who speaks) and complained like a woman in perfect despair. 'Everywhere,' she exclaimed, 'I see nothing but the most lascivious images: the demon of lust unremittedly pursues me at the table and even in my sleep. I am an object of disgust to myself, and feel that I can no longer escape either madness or death.'"

214. General Remarks as to Erotomania. This disease is more frequent amongst women than men, and amongst the unmarried than the married. In many cases it can be traced to disordered menstruation. With regard to the season at which those diseases are most prevalent, nothing is definitely known, although from analogy we should expect that it will probably be discovered that the warming spring time is the most unfavorable, in [143] so far as season and

climate predispose to this disease. Erotomania is very frequently combined with hysteria. One case in which an insatiable sexual appetite was present came under the notice of a medical man, in which it had in its earlier stages been complicated with hysteria, and had passed into inveterate self-abuse. So far as he could discover, no intellectual symptoms manifested themselves in this case.

PART III.-DIPSOMANIA,

2215. Dipsomaniacs and Habitual Drunkards.-The question as to the existence of a diseased condition which

See, for this and other cases, Gall, Sur les Functions du Cerveau, t. iii., p. 318.