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are left unimpaired and undisturbed; that while the mind may be overpowered by delusions which utterly demoralize it and unfit it for the perception of the true nature of surrounding things, or for the discharge of the common obligations of life, there often are delusions which, though the offspring of mental disease, and so far constituting insanity, yet leave the individual in all other respects rational, and capable of transacting the ordinary affairs and fulfilling the duties and obligations incidental to the various relations of life. No doubt when delusions exist which have no foundation in reality, and spring only from a diseased and morbid condition of the mind, to that extent the mind must necessarily be taken to be unsound, just as the body, if any of its parts or functions is affected by local disease, may be said to be unsound, though all its other members may be healthy and their powers or functions unimpaired." There can, we think, be little doubt that this is a correct statement for all practical purposes, although many psychologists might differ from this learned Judge in so far as the phenomonology of mind is concerned, and question the statement that "will, perception, thought, and reason, are distinct faculties or functions." But the question of moral insanity is somewhat different. Is the faculty by which we judge of moral obligation, is the moral sense or conscience a distinct faculty or function of mind from reason? Is it not a cognitive faculty, just as the power of judging of quantities or numbers, relations or associations, is cognitive? and if it is intellectual, in that sense, can it be said that there can be a moral insanity which does not affect the intellectual life? If the existence of such an insanity can be proved, ought its proved existence to modify the civil capacity of the individual affected by it, and ought it to limit his responsibility to the criminal law of the land? These questions we propose to consider here.

255. The Psychology of Eccentricity.-One thing must be remembered with regard to this subject, and that is, that every man is very like a steam-engine, and that every brain, like a boiler, has just a certain power. If a man over

Banks v. Goodfellow, 5 L. R., Q. B. 549.

works his viscera, he must underwork his brain. If he goes in for physical labor, he must be content to go withont ideas. There is a deep physiological truth in the statement that a man "cannnot serve God and mammon." So it is in habitual direction. Energy always takes the easy road. The easy road is the one which has [107] been trodden. Habit is the maker of paths. Thus it comes that he who would cultivate one faculty must generally let another lie fallow. Leonardo da Vinci was an uncommon man. Shakespeare might have been Newton or Laplace, but he could not have been Shakespeare too. A man who wishes to be skilful in one thing must neglect others. The whole theory of the process of natural selection is founded on this principle. This is true of any mental direction of energy, of any acquired skill-one faculty suffers because the other is advantaged. This follows from the fact that a man has just so much energy to make use of and no more; that it is, in other words, a constant quantity. Now, where energy is manifested under the influence of disease, where a channel is made by abnormal conditions through which energy flows, this must necessarily alter the relation of other faculties to the supply of energy which they enjoyed in the healthy state. Automatic movements require energy. When Johnson touched all the lamp-posts in Fleet Street, there was no diminution of the amount of his thought, but there was a development of energy too great to be employed in the continuation of certain changing mental states, and which found vent in certain easy muscular motions. So a person who is insane, who may be said to think automatically, may have too great a flow of energy to be employed in healthy mental exercise, and it therefore manifests itself in eccentricity of conduct and speech. But when the flow through those new channels has become continuous, when habits of energy have been confirmed, these very acts become powers in the life of the individual-they not only take surplus energy, but they demand energy where there is no overflow. To trace this distinction between eccentricity and insanity, suppose that the above explanation of Dr. Johnson's habit to be correct, then, whenever from length of custom this habit of touching the lamp-posts in Fleet Street began to demand energy-whenever this waste-pipe for overflow became a

"main" for consumption-eccentricity had become insanity. Thus, suppose Johnson had little enough energy to continue any series of mental states; suppose that strong emotion demanded, and was capable of using, all the energy which could be developed at the time, in the sane man, this automatic act ceases. In the insane man there is a demand for energy by this channel, and in spite of the emotion this incongruous act is indulged in. In this way it will be seen that any abnormal demand for energy must influence other [198] faculties, which would otherwise have had their supply, just as any supply of energy to a skilful part of the organism for the time deprives other parts of the energy necessary to their functions. Thus it will be seen that no disease, however partial in its manifestation, say, for instance, the case quoted from Trousseau, of the gentleman who had an irresistible desire to shout, could exist in the human mind without modify ing the direction of energy in some degree. This is actually true, but it is equally true that if an aerolite falls to earth, the earth has actually moved out of its orbit to meet it. The one is, in most cases of medical psychology, as worthy of consideration as the other is in questions of astronomy. And the fact, for all the purposes of law, might be that one faculty only was affected, and that the others could perform their functions exactly as they did when the mind was healthy. The legal maxim that the law does not trouble itself about trifles, might be applied to some arguments which medical psychologists have advanced in all seriousness. The doctrine of the law with regard to monomania has been fully explained, and it seems to us that the doctrine of the law with regard to partial moral mania ought to be exactly similar. There are slight differences, but these are easily explained. Thus, if a man takes property, believing it to be his own, we have seen that he will not be held guilty of theft. If, then, this theft had sprung from any disorder of the emotional part of a man's character, instead of Leing due to a delusion; if it had arisen from an absolute inability to be influenced by ordinary motives, and if this is satisfactorily proved, then it seems to us to be upon a footing with the case just put, and their responsibility seems to us to be the same in the one case as in the other. This doctrine will hold true with regard to all

criminal acts. Whether the crime be larceny or homicide, it may equally arise from morbid disease. And yet great caution is to be exercised, for the existence of insanity does not preclude the contemporaneous existence of crime. And a person who has delusions with regard to property may have a criminal intention with regard to the life of another; and if he executed that intention, he ought to suffer punishment, notwithstanding the existence of kleptomania. Again, on the other hand, care is to be taken, in deciding such a case, to ascertain whether the partial insanity has not passed into. general emotional insanity, in which case the individual might not be in a position to be influenced by any ordinary (199) motives which the law could supply, and he ought, therefore, to be held irresponsible for the criminal outrage.

256. The Legal Decisions in relation to Moral Insanity. Although we cannot but regard the principles stated above as those which do truly apply to the question of moral insanity, there has seemingly been much misunderstanding in relation to the subject; and the various decisions in cases in which the question has been raised have seemed to be to the effect that the law does not recognize such a disease as moral insanity; or, in other words, that even supposing such a disease is proved to exist, it is not of such a nature as to relieve the person who labors under it of responsibility for criminal acts. To understand this subject, one must remember what was said with reference to the nature of volition and the irresistibleness of certain impulses. And in this relation, it has been laid down that a mere uncontrollable impulse of the mind coëxisting with the full possession of the reasoning powers will not warrant an acquittal on the ground of insanity, the question for the jury being whether the pris oner, at the time he committed the act, knew the character and nature of the act, and that it was a wrongful one. Wo cannot but think that this dictum was given under a misapprehension. We have pointed out that the test of the knowledge of right and wrong must be read in relation to volition, and that if such irresistible impulse could be proved, it would

Reg. c. Barton, 3 Cox C. C. 275, per Parke, B.
PR. INS.-24

negative the knowledge of right and wrong at the time the act was committed. It cannot be said that a man who is thrown out of a window and falls on another and kills him knows he is doing wrong; and so the man who is irresistibly impelled to a certain act, cannot be said to have moral knowledge of its wrongfulness at the time it is done. The real difficulty is one of evidence. "Moral insanity," says Mr. Fitzjames Stephen in his work on the Criminal Law of England,' "is said by those who use the phrase, to consist in a specific inability to understand or act upon the distinction between right and wrong-a sort of moral color blindness, by which persons sane in all other respects are prevented from acting with reference to established moral distinctions. Whether such a disease exists, and whether particular people are affected by it, are questions of fact like any others. No doubt, if its existence in a particular case were proved, it would be a ground for acquitting the prisoner, as it would disprove malice. So it might be a good defence to admit that a man meant to murder another, that he had a loaded pistol to shoot him, and pointed it at his head, but to contend that it was fired by a sudden, involuntary convulsion of the necessary muscles, and not by the prisoner's will. The difficulty is to get the jury to believe it. The evidence given in support of the assertion that a man is morally insane is generally at least as consistent with the theory that he was a great fool and a great rogue as with the theory that he was the subject of a special disease, the existence of which is doubtful." Although we agree with the general principles laid down, we must take exception to Mr. Fitzjames Stephen's illustration. We think that the involuntary convulsion of the muscles in the case supposed would not be a ground for acquitting the prisoner, any more than the fact that a crime is done involuntarily during a fit of intoxication excuses the drunkard. If a man voluntarily places himself in such a position that he may involuntarily do a serious mischief, he must be regarded as responsible for that mischief. But apart from his illustration, we agree with what is said by Mr. Stephen, and find the real difficulty in all such cases to be

I P. 95.

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