intervals; and on the day following, another was attacked; then a third, and a fourth; in short, almost the whole of the children, both girls and boys, were afflicted with these convulsions. No sooner was one seized, than the sight brought on the paroxysms in almost all the rest at the same time. Under these distressing circumstances, the physicians exhibited all the powerful anti-epileptic medicines with which their art furnishes them, but in vain. They then applied to Boerhave, who, compassionating the wretched condition of the poor children, repaired to Haerlem; and while he was inquiring into the matter, one of them was seized with a fit, and immediately he saw several others attacked with a species of epileptic convulsion. It presently occurred to this sagacious physician, that, as the best medicines had been skilfully administered, and as the propagation of the disease from one to another appeared to depend on the imagination, [the sympathy of imagination,] by preventing this impression upon the mind, the disease might be cured; and his suggestion was successfully adopted. Having previously apprized the magistrates of his views, he ordered, in the presence of all the children, that several portable furnaces should be placed in different parts of the chamber, containing burning coals; and that iron, bent to a certain form, should be placed in the furnaces; and then he gave these further commands; that all medicines would be totally useless, and the only remedy with which he was acquainted was, that the first who should be seized with a fit, whether boy or girl, must be burned in the arm to the very bone by a red-hot iron. He spoke this with uncommon dignity and gravity; and the children, terrified at the thoughts of this cruel remedy, when they perceived any tendency to the recurrence of the paroxysm, immediately exerted all their strength of mind, and called up the horrible idea of the burning; and were thus enabled, by the stronger mental impression, to resist the influence of the morbid propensity." § 439. Other instances of this species of imitation. It would not be difficult to multiply cases similar to those which have been mentioned. A few years since, there was a man in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, who had a family of six children, one of whom became affected with the CHOREA, or St. Vitus's dance. The others, in the indulgence of that thoughtless gayety which is natural to children, amused themselves with imitating his odd gestures, until, after a time, they were irresistibly affected in the same way. At this state of things, which seems to be susceptible of an explanation in no other way than on the principles of sympathetic imitation, the family, as may naturally be supposed, were in great affliction. The father, a man of some sagacity as well as singularity of humour, brought into the house a block and axe, and solemnly threatened to take off the head of the first child who should hereafter exhibit any involuntary bodily movement, except the child originally diseased. By this measure, which proceeded on the same view of the human mind as the experiment of Boerhave just mentioned, a new train of feeling was excited, and the spell was broken.* It may be added, that not only those in the same family and in the same building have been seized, but the contagion has sometimes spread from one to another, (by the mere imitation of sympathy as we suppose,) over whole towns, and even large districts of country. This was the case in a part of the island of Anglesey in 1796; and still later in this country, in some parts of Tennessee.† CHAPTER III. DISORDERED ACTION OF THE AFFECTIONS. 440. Of the states of mind denominated presentiments. WE proceed now to remark, that there may be a disordered action of the Affections or Passions, as well as of the lower principles of the Sensitive nature; and this remark is designed to apply to both classes of the Affections, the benevolent and those of an opposite kind. We do not pro * Powers's Essay on the Influence of the Imagination, p. 32. pose, however, in this Chapter, to confine ourselves very strictly to the Affections, properly so called; but shall introduce some collateral or connected subjects, which may be regarded as too interesting to be omitted, and at the same time as too unimportant to require a distinct place. They may be expected, moreover, to throw indirectly some light upon the leading topic of the chapter. We begin with the subject of PRESENTIMENTS. Many individuals have had at certain times strong and distinct impressions in relation to something future; so much so that not the least doubt has remained in their own minds of its being something out of the common course of nature. It is related, for instance, of the nonconformist writer, Isaac Ambrose, whose religious works formerly had some celebrity, that he had such a striking internal intimation of his approaching death, that he went round to all his friends to bid them farewell. When the day arrived, which his presentiments indicated as the day of his dissolution, he shut himself up in his room and died. Mozart, the great musical composer, had a strong presentiment that the celebrated Requiem which bears his name would be his last Work. Nothing could remove this impression from his mind. He expressly said, "It is certain I am writing this requiem for myself; it will serve for my funeral service." The foreboding was realized. It is stated of Pendergrast, an officer in the Duke of Marlborough's army, that he had a strong foreboding that he would be killed on a certain day. He mentioned his conviction to others, and even made a written memorandum in relation to it. And the event was such as he had foretold it would be.* Henry the Fourth of France, for some weeks previous to his being assassinated by Ravaillac, had a distinct presentiment, which he mentioned to Sully and other men of his time, that some great calamity was about to befall him. Some cases of Presentiments can undoubtedly be explained on natural principles. Some accidental circumstance, a mere word, the vagaries of a dream, any trifling event, which happens in the popular belief of the time and country to be regarded as a sinister omen, may have * Boswell's Life of Johnson, vol. ii., p. 48. been enough in some cases to have laid the foundation for them; and the subsequent fulfilment may have been purely accidental. Nor is it necessary, so far as we are able to perceive, to suppose that in any cases whatever there is any supernatural or miraculous interposition. But, if this is not the case, it is difficult to account for the deep conviction which sometimes fastens upon the mind, a conviction upon which arguments and persuasions are found to make no impression, except upon the ground that the action of the Sensibilities is in some degree disordered. But of the specific nature of that disorder, the trait or circumstance which distinguishes it from other forms of disordered mental action, it is difficult to give any ac count. § 441. Of sudden and strong impulses of the mind. There is another disordered condition of the mind, different from that which has just been mentioned, and yet in some respects closely allied to it. Some persons, whose soundness of mind on all ordinary occasions is beyond question, find in themselves at certain times a sudden and strange propensity to do things, which, if done, would clearly prove them, to some extent at least, deranged. As an illustration, a person of a perfectly sane mind, according to the common estimate of insanity, once acknowledged, that, whenever he passed a particular bridge, he felt a slight inclination to throw himself over, accompanied with some dread that his inclination might hurry him away. Such slight alienated impulses are probably more frequent than is commonly supposed. And they exist in every variety of degree; sometimes scarcely attracting notice, at others bearing the broad and fatal stamp of dangerous insanity. Dr. Gall mentions the case of a woman in Germany, who, having on a certain occasion witnessed a building on fire, was ever afterward, at intervals, subject to strong impulses prompting her to fire buildings. Under the influence of these impulses she set fire to twelve buildings in the borough where she lived. Having been arrested on the thirteenth attempt, she was tried, condemned, and executed. "She could give no other reason, nor show any other motive, for firing so many houses, than this impulse which drove her to it. Notwithstanding the fear, the terror, and the repentance she felt in every instance after committing the crime, she went and did it afresh.”* Would not sound philosophy, to say nothing of the requisitions of religion, have assigned such a person to an insane hospital rather than to the block of the executioner ? The same writer, who has collected numerous valuable facts in relation to the operations of the human mind mentions the case of a German soldier, who was subject every month to a violent convulsive attack. "He was sensible," he proceeds to remark," of their approach; and as he felt, by degrees, a violent propensity to kill, in proportion as the paroxysm was on the point of commencing, he was earnest in his entreaties to be loaded with chains. At the end of some days the paroxysm and the fatal propensity diminished, and he himself fixed the period at which they might without danger set him at liberty. At Haina, we saw a man who, at certain periods, felt an irresistible desire to injure others. He knew this unhappy propensity, and had himself kept in chains till he perceived that it was safe to liberate him. An individual of melancholy temperament was present at the execution of a criminal. The sight caused him such violent emotion, that he at once felt himself seized with an irresistible desire to kill, while, at the same time, he entertained the utmost horror at the commission of the crime. He depicted his deplorable state, weeping bitterly, and in extreme perplexity. He beat his head, wrung his hands, remonstrated with himself, begged his friends to save themselves, and thanked them for the resistance they made to him."+ § 442. Insanity of the affections or passions. From the instances which have been given, it will be seen that sudden and strong impulses, indicating a disordered state of the mind, may exist in reference to very different things, and also in very various degrees. The cases last mentioned were of such an aggravated nature, * Gall's Works, vol. iv., Am. ed., p. 105. + Ib., vol. i., p. 329. |