as of no special significance; but I cannot help thinking that, properly studied, they may sometimes teach us more of the real nature of the particular form of insanity-of its probable course, termination, and its most suitable treatment-than many much more obtrusive symptoms.

In bringing this lecture to an end, I may fitly point out how entirely thus far the observation of the phenomena of defective and disordered mind proves their essential dependence on defective and disordered brain, and how closely they are related to some other disordered nervous functions. The insane neurosis which the child inherits in consequence of its parent's insanity is as surely a defect of physical nature as is the epileptic neurosis to which it is so closely allied. It is an indisputable though extreme fact that certain human beings are born with such a native deficiency of mind that all the training and education in the world will not raise them to the height of brutes; and I believe it to be not less true that, in consequence of evil ancestral influences, individuals are born with such a flaw or warp of nature that all the care in the world will not prevent them from being vicious or criminal, or becoming insane. Education, it is true, may do much, and the circumstances of life may do much; but we cannot forget that the foundations on which the acquisitions of education must rest are not acquired, but inherited. No one can escape the tyranny of his organization; no one can elude the destiny that is innate in him, and which unconsciously and irresistibly shapes his ends, even when he believes that

he is determining them with consummate foresight and skill. A well-grounded and comprehensive theory of mind must recognize and embrace these facts; they meet us every moment of our lives, and cannot be ignored if we are in earnest in our attempts to construct a mental science; and it is because metaphysical mental philosophy has taken no notice whatever of them, because it is bound by the principle of its existence as a philosophy to ignore them, that, notwithstanding the labour bestowed on it, it has borne no fruits-that, as Bacon said of it, "not only what was asserted once is asserted still, but what were questions once are questions still, and, instead of being resolved by discussion, are only fixed and fed."

LECTURE III.

GENTLEMEN,-In my last lecture I showed how large a part in the production of insanity is played by the hereditary neurosis, and pointed out the necessity of scrutinizing more closely than has yet been done the features of the different forms of mental derangement that own its baneful influence. Past all question it is the most important element in the causation of insanity. It cannot be in the normal order of events that a healthy organism should be unable to bear ordinary mental trials, much less a natural physiological function such as the evolution of puberty, the puerperal state, or the climacteric change. When, therefore, the strain of grief or one of these physiological conditions becomes the occasion of an outbreak of insanity, we must look for the root of the ill in some natural infirmity or instability of nerve element. Not until we apply ourselves earnestly to an exact observation and discrimination of all the mental and bodily conditions which co-operate in the causation, and are manifested in the symptoms, of the manifold varieties of insanity, shall

we render more precise and satisfactory our knowledge of its causes, its classification, and its treatment. How unscientific it appears, when we reflect, to enumerate, as is commonly done, sex and age amongst its predisposing causes! No one goes mad because he or she happens to be a man or a woman, but because to each sex, and at certain ages, there occur special physiological changes, which are apt to run into pathological effects in persons predisposed to nervous disorder. How often it happens that a moral cause of insanity is sought and falsely found in a state of mind such as grief or jealousy, which is really an early symptom of the disease! Again, how vague and unsatisfactory the accepted psychological classification of insanity, under which forms of disease distinct enough to claim separate descriptions are included in the same class! It is obvious that we learn very little of value from an account of the treatment of mania generally when there are included under the class diseases so different as puerperal mania, the mania of general paralysis, syphilitic, epileptic, and hysterical mania, each presenting features and requiring treatment in some degree special. The hope and the way of advance in our knowledge of mental disorders lie in the exact observation of the varieties of the insane diathesis, and of the effects of bodily functions and disorders upon these; in noting carefully the bodily as well as mental symptoms that characterize the several forms of derangement of mind; and in tracing the relations of mental to other disorders of the nervous system. We must aim to distinguish

well if we would teach well-to separate the cases that exhibit special features and relations, and to arrange them in groups or classes according to their affinities, just as we do habitually with general paralysis, and as I did in my last lecture with epileptic mania.

Following this plan, we might in like manner make of hysterical insanity a special variety. An attack of acute maniacal excitement, with great restlessness, rapid and disconnected but not entirely incoherent conversation, sometimes tending to the erotic or obscene, evidently without abolition of consciousness; laughing, singing, or rhyming, and perverseness of conduct, which is still more or less coherent and seemingly wilful, -may occur in connection with, or instead of, the usual hysterical convulsions. Or the ordinary hysterical symptoms may pass by degrees into chronic insanity. Loss of power of will is a characteristic symptom of hysteria in all its Protean forms, and with the perverted sensations and disordered movements there is always some degree of moral perversion. This increases until it swallows up the other symptoms: the patient loses more and more of her energy and self-control, becoming capriciously fanciful about her health, imagining or feigning strange diseases, and keeping up the delusion or the imposture with a pertinacity that might seem incredible, getting more and more impatient of the advice and interference of others, and indifferent to the interests and duties of her position. Outbursts of temper become almost outbreaks of mania, particularly at the menstrual periods. An erotic tinge may be