“I love to cope him in these sullen fits,
For then he’s full of matter.”
AS YOU LIKE IT.
ASTR. So that in these cases it is _one faculty only_ which is
interrupted, and not the _combined intellect_. But all the faculties
_but_ one may be deranged, may they not?
EV. Yes. When the patient is insane on all points but one, we term it,
“Folie raisonnante.”
The very idiot, indeed, is often fond of most exact arrangement. The
savage of Aveyron instantly put things in order when they were deranged.
White, in his “History of Selborne,” records the propensities of an
idiot, who, he says, was a very _Merops-apiaster_, or Bee-bird.
Honey-bees, humblebees, and wasps, were his prey: he would seize them,
disarm them of their weapons, and suck their bodies for the sake of
their honey-bags. Except in this adroitness, he had no understanding.
Pinel states the case of a mechanical genius, who became insane,
believing _his head to be changed_. Yet he invented mechanism of the
most intricate combinations. We are informed, too, of a clergyman, who
was ever insane, but when delivering his discourses from the pulpit.
I believe some parts of a national establishment were constructed from
the plans of one of its inmates, who was to all other intents and
purposes a madman.
Dr. Uwins once told me, that some of the lines in his biographical work
were written by a maniac in the Hoxton Asylum, who was ever aware of the
approach of his mania. These lines were thought to be among the best in
the work.
Nay, idiots will sometimes reason, and work out a syllogism. I think Dr.
Conolly relates a story of two, who quarrelled, because each asserted
that he was the Holy Ghost; at length, one decided that the other _was_
the Holy Ghost, and that he _could not be, because_ there were not two.
From this “folie raisonnante” there is an easy transition to that
eccentricity which seems to be a set-off against the _strength of mind_
of the deep thinker. The _permanent_ derangement, however, we term
_insanity_; the _transient, eccentricity_.
Marullus informs us that Bernard rode all day long by the Lemnian Lake,
and at last inquired _where he was_. Archimedes rushed into the street
naked from the bath, in an ecstacy at having discovered the alloy in the
crown of Syracuse. Pinel tells us of a priest, who, in an abstract mood,
felt no pain, although part of his body was burning.
“Viote,” says Zimmerman, “during his fits of mathematical abstraction,
would often remain sleepless and foodless for three days and nights.”
And Plato thus records an instance of the abstraction of Socrates:—“One
morning he fell into one of these raptures of contemplation, and
continued standing in the same posture till about noon. In the evening,
some Ionian soldiers went out, and, wrapping themselves up warm, lay
down by him in the open field, to observe if he would continue in that
posture all night; which he did until the morning, and as soon as the
sun rose he saluted it, and retired.” This is mental abstraction with a
vengeance!
ASTR. I will laugh with you at these oddities, Evelyn; yet not a whit
less ludicrous are some of the vagaries of the learned Thebans of
_modern_ times. The abstractions of Newton were proverbial. It may not
be true, that he once inserted the little finger of a lady, whose hand
he was holding, into his pipe, instead of a tobacco-stopper; or that he
made a small hole in his study-door for the exit of a kitten, by the
side of a large one for the cat: it is certain, however, that he was
once musing by his fire, with his knees close to the bars, when, finding
his legs in danger of being grilled, he rang his bell, and, in a rage,
desired his servant to _take away the grate_.
Dr. Hamilton, author of the acute “Essay on the National Debt,” visited
his college class in the morning with his own black silk stocking on one
leg, and his wife’s white cotton on the other; and would sometimes
occupy the whole class time by repeatedly removing the students’ hats
from his table, which they as often placed there. He would run against a
cow, and beg madam’s pardon, hoping he had not hurt her; and he would
bow politely to his wife in the street, without recognition. Yet with
all this he would, at any time, directly converse on a scientific
subject beautifully and eloquently.
Bacon, the sculptor, in a rich full dress was finishing Howard’s statue
in St. Paul’s, and, being cold, put on a ragged green and red shag
waistcoat. In this trim he walked out to call on some ladies in Doctors’
Commons. On his return he told his son that they were sadly disposed to
laugh about nothing. On being convinced, however, of his condition, he
remembered the people he passed _also_ giggled, and cried out, “He does
it for a wager.”
Hogarth paid a visit, in his new carriage, to the Lord Mayor, and, after
his audience, walked home in his state clothes, leaving his carriage at
a private door of the Mansion-House.
Dr. Harvest, of Ditton, a very learned man, would unconsciously allow
his horse to be loosened from his grasp, and walk home _with the bridle
on his arm_. He would walk into his church on Sunday, _with his
fowling-piece_. He would write a letter, address it, and send it to
_three different persons_. He lost a lady, the daughter of a bishop, as
his wife, by going out to _catch gudgeons_, forgetting that it was the
morning of his marriage ceremony; and he once threw a glass of wine at
backgammon, and swallowed the dice!
After this we can no longer call caricatures the abstract philosopher
who boiled his watch, and held the egg in his hand as the time-keeper;
or the American, who put his candle to bed, and blew himself out; or the
lady, who believed herself to be a post-letter, but waited patiently
until the letter-sorter had examined her, to ascertain if she was single
or double.
EV. There is some hope of you now, dear Astrophel, for you are returning
to matters of fact.
From the deep interest of _dramatic scenes_ may spring the same apathy
as that which _you_ have illustrated. Dr. Fordyce writes of one who
forgot he was sitting on a hard bench, when Garrick brought in his dead
Cordelia in his arms. And even the impression of _fatigue_ and _pain_
will often, for a time, leave us, when we are gazing on architectural or
picturesque beauty.
IDA. Are not those minds which are easily influenced by morbid
sensibility, the minutiæ of existence, often thus depressed into a
condition somewhat resembling the moroseness of these half-idiots?
EV. Ay, even the mighty minds of heroes and of monarchs. Queen Elizabeth
was often wont to sit alone, _in the dark_, in sorrow and in tears. We
know not if the fate of Essex or of Mary were the cause, but the marble
mind of Elizabeth was dissolved before she died. In Sully’s “Mémoires,”
also, we read that the solitude of Charles IX., of France, was saddened
by remorse, for his memory was ever pealing in his ear the shrieks and
groans of the massacre of St. Bartholomew. During this influence we may
often find that the features or actions are so deeply expressive as to
prove an involuntary, though correct, index of the thought. According to
the passions or subjects which occupy the mind, will be the play of
feature or the movement of the body.
“We might almost suppose the body thought.”
This “brown study” is the slightest form of that state which the French
term _ennui_, in which the mind too often is left to prey upon itself,
having, as it were, no sympathy with the world. Its more severe symptoms
are those of _misanthropy_, _melancholy_, and _hypochondriasis_,
inducing but too often that extreme _tedium vitæ_, the climax of which
is suicide. Out of the first, which is but the mere ripple of
derangement, we may be laughed or coaxed; nay, it may yield to the
positive _suffering_ of the _body_. The second is like the deep still
water, the awful calmness antecedent to a tempest. In the words of Lord
Erskine, “Reason is not driven from her seat, but distraction sits down
on it along with her, holds her trembling on it, and frights her from
her propriety. And then comes often o’er the mind a very coward
sentiment, echoing the demoniac resolution of Spenser’s “Cave of
Despair”:
“What if some little payne the passage have,
That makes frayle flesh to fear the better wave?
Is not short payne well borne, that brings long ease,
And layes the soule to sleep in quiet grave?”
IDA. Despair will often rouse even the most sensitive beings to the most
patient fortitude. How is this?
EV. Not rouse, but depress—not fortitude, but apathy. I could excite
your deepest sympathy and wonder, Ida, by the history of the young and
beautiful Ann G——n, who was hung for child-murder; in whom the
convulsive agony which followed her sentence at length ended in a
resignation which some would term heroism. During the nights in which I
myself watched her slumbers, both from deep scientific interest, and the
request of her judges, her actions were automatic; her existence was one
perfect trance; and she met her fate as if life and its consciousness
had long been parted.
Even an intense blow will sometimes, as it were, annihilate sensibility,
creating an icy apathy to all subsequent inflictions; which was the
effect on Mandrin, during the tortures of the wheel; for he smiled at
the _third_ blow, to find that it hurt him so little.
IDA. Then we are to contrast the state of the unhappy girl with the
_voluntary_ endurance of heroism depending on the power of
_concentrating mind_? The almost superhuman endurance of pain is finely
displayed among the North American Indians, who even chant their own
death-song calmly amidst worse than the tortures of the Inquisition, or
sustain with a smile those probationary trials for the dignities of a
chief, or the admission to the class of warriors, that are modelled with
all the refinement of cruelty. On the banks of the Orinoco, especially,
(if Robertson be right, or Gumilla, his authority, to be believed,) the
ordeal begins by a rigid fast, reductive of the body’s energy; then
commences a flaying of his body by lashes as dreadful as the knout, by
the hands of the assembled chiefs, and then, if the slightest
sensibility be evinced, he is disgraced for ever. His raw and reeking
flesh is then exposed to the stings and venom of insects and reptiles,
and again suspended over the scorching and suffocating flames of herbs
of the most disgusting odour; and, to close this tale of torture, it is
not seldom that the victim sinks in mortal agonies beneath the dreadful
ordeal.
EV. The two great springs of voluntary endurance of pain are _religion_
and _honour_. Thus, among other heroic acts of England’s martyrs,
Cranmer held the apostate hand which signed his recantation in the midst
of the flames until it was _wasted_. And the unyielding fortitude with
which the victim bore the rack and other excruciating tortures of the
popish Inquisition is almost beyond belief.
The fanaticism of the wild enthusiasts of the east it were profanation
to call religion; but with the hope of rejoining her husband in the
realms of bliss, the Hindoo widow clasps his corpse in her arms, and,
without a sigh, sets the torch to his funeral pile. And, to inherit the
paradise of Brahma, the Fakir or Yoghee keeps his fist clenched for
years, until the nails grow through his hand; or forces the hooks
between his ribs, and whirls himself aloft until he expires, or throws
himself prostrate beneath the crushing wheels of Juggernaut.
It is written that Cardan rendered himself by great efforts insensible
to external irritants.
And analogous to this, was the almost superhuman effort of that
determined action of Muley Moloch quoted in the “Spectator,” from
Vertot’s “Revolutions of Portugal:”—“In a condition of extreme
prostration he was borne in a litter with his army. On the sounding of a
retreat, although in a half-dying state, he leaped from the litter, and
led his quailing troops to a charge, which ended in victory. Ere this
was accomplished his life was fast ebbing, and, reclining on his litter,
and enjoining the secrecy of his staff, with his finger on his lip, he
died.”
But my analysis will be incomplete, if I do not revert to a point that I
had almost forgotten. These abstract moods have often been confounded
with the visions of slumber, being adduced as proofs of the perfection
of mind during sleep.
You reminded me, Astrophel, of the brilliant parody composed by
Mackenzie, of the versification of Voltaire and La Fontaine, of the
solution of the difficult problem by Condorcet, of the discussion of
abstruse points of policy by Cabanis. You might have added Condillac,
who asserts that when he was composing the “_Cours d’Etudes_,” he often
left a chapter unfinished, but had it all in his mind when he awoke. And
Franklin assures us, that he often _dreamed_ of the issue of important
events in which he was engaged, believing the vision to be the influence
of inspired prophecy. Dr. Haycock, of Oxford, too, is said to have
composed and preached sermons in his sleep, in despite even of
buffetings.
These are not dreams, but the reveries of philosophers and poets. The
faculties of perception are suspended: one only object occupies the
mind, and the impression on the memory is vivid and permanent. Of this
reverie I do not recollect a more interesting illustration than the
“_Dream_ of Tartini,” and its exquisite product, “La Sonata di Diavolo.”
This admirable violinist and once esteemed composer, relates the
following anecdote as the origin of his _chef-d’œuvre_, the “Devil’s
Sonata.” “One night, it was in the year 1713, I dreamed that I had made
over my soul to his satanic majesty. Every thing was done to my wink;
the faithful menial anticipated my fondest wishes. Among other freaks,
it came into my head to put the violin into his hands, for I was anxious
to see whether he was capable of producing anything worth hearing upon
it. Conceive my astonishment at his playing a sonata, with such
dexterity and grace, as to surpass whatever the imagination can
conceive. I was so much delighted, enraptured, and entranced by his
performance, that I was unable to fetch another breath, and, in this
state, I awoke. I jumped up and seized upon my instrument, in the hope
of reproducing a portion, at least, of the unearthly harmonies I had
heard in my dream. But all in vain: the music which I composed under the
inspiration, I must admit the best I have ever written, and of right I
have called it the ‘Devil’s Sonata;’ but the falling off between that
piece and the sonata which had laid such fast hold of my imagination is
so immense, that I would rather have broken my violin into a thousand
fragments, and renounced music for good and all, than, had it been
possible, have been robbed of the enjoyment which the remembrance
afforded me.”
In the cases of precocious children, who are said to have “lisp’d in
numbers,” I do not doubt that the secret may be referred to this
concentration of genius. Mozart composed a sonata at the age of four.
The precocious little girl, Louisa Vinning, who was called the “_Infant
Sappho_,” has yet eclipsed Mozart in this; that at the age of two years
and eight months she sang repeatedly a melody perfectly new, and so
perfect, that it was written down from her lips, and entitled, “The
Infant’s Dream.” During all this, the little creature was in such a
state of apparent abstraction, that it was believed by all around her
that she walked and talked in _her sleep_.
These mental concentrations can, by some enthusiasts, be produced at
pleasure. The paroxysm of the improvisatore, for instance. But it is an
effort which, like the dark hour of the Caledonian seer, is not endured
with impunity: it points, indeed, emphatically to the limit beyond which
mind should not be strained.
The Marquis de Moschati expressed himself to us, as experiencing
excitement like intoxication when he _sat himself_ to compose, and threw
his whole soul into his subject. It commenced with irregular and
laborious breathing, excessive palpitations, _vertigo_, _tinnitus
aurium_,—the perception of objects being lost. Then came romantic
fancies, like the visions of opium, “thoughts that breathe, and words
that burn.” At the conclusion was felt excessive exhaustion, and a state
of mild catalepsy ensued for five or six days together. This excited
talent, therefore, is an evanescent madness.
CAST. Another fling at poesy. Were I an improvisatrice, you would not so
libel my inspiration. “Listen, lords and lady gay.” In the summer of
18—, after the _Eisteddfod_ at Cardiff, we wandered over the hills to
Caerphilly, the gigantic towers of Owain Glyndwr.
As I lay under the celebrated Hanging Tower, which is projecting eleven
feet beyond its base, I reflected on the strange circumstance of the
arrest of so gigantic a mass in its progress to prostration. “What,” I
exclaimed, “is the power by which it is suspended?” My imagination
heightened my reverie, and placed before me the image of the Destroyer,
with his emblematic scythe and glass, and he answered me thus:—
“Half-dreaming mortal, listen! It is _I_,
Time, the destroyer, whose gigantic arm
Lifted this pond’rous ruin from its base.
Why hangs it thus, arrested in its course,
In bold defiance of attraction’s law?
Why, like its once proud lord, renown’d Glyndwr,
Sinks not its mouldering grandeur to the ground?
Behold an emblem of vitality!
A type of mortal man, of thee, of all!
Like this grey wall, thy tott’ring steps are staid,
And on a thread thy fragile life is hung;
Yet leaning, ever leaning, to the grave.
One moment more, an atom of an age,
This mould’ring ruin, trembling on its base,
May, like the marble shafts of lone Palmyra,
Be hurl’d to earth, and crumble into dust;
And, like the ruin, thou!”
And yet _I_ was not mad.
EV. I talk not of a gentle heart like yours, fair Castaly; but of that
extreme, when ideas are received by a mind nearly exhausted, and lie for
a while dormant. As sleep and fatigue wear off, and consciousness
returns, these images are suddenly and brilliantly lighted up. If
intense impression shall have been made on the heart or mind, intense
will be the abstraction of the enthusiast. Until _one_ thought is
touched, the patient is sane; but, when the chord vibrates, then, as in
the pathetic episode of Sterne’s Maria, the paroxysm is expended in a
flood of tears, or in a mad fit, or in a gush of wildest music.
To the latter cause, we owe many beauties of composition. Demarini, the
Italian tragedian, acted a prison-scene before Paganini, in which, with
the pathos of deep distress, the victim prayed for death. The maestro
retired to bed, but not to sleep; his excited brain relieved its painful
sympathies by the composition of the “_Adagio apassionato_.”
Carl Maria Von Weber witnessed the waltzing of his wife with a gallant
cavalier. He retired in a mood of jealous frenzy, and expressed the
ideas which rankled in his heart by the “_Invitation à la Walse_.”
ASTR. Well, is there not something special in all this?
EV. Yes, truly,—a power imparted to some, withheld from
others,—_genius_.
ASTR. Yet, in explanation of this abstract reverie, the phrenologist
will, I dare say, satisfy himself by merely deciding that the organ of
concentrativeness is strongly developed.
EV. It is clear, at least, that the deep interest of the subject of
reflection overbalances the influence of the external senses. The
impression of objects is either too slight, or rapid, to produce
perception, or (in other words), however the impression may be imparted
to the brain by the nerve, the brain is not _sensible_ of it, and there
is therefore no perception.
So intense indeed has been this influence, that Pliny contemplated the
volcanic philosophy amidst the ashy cloud of Vesuvius by which he was
destroyed. And Archimedes was so intent in solving a problem, during the
siege of Syracuse, that no sense of danger impelled him to avoid the
storm, or fly from the dagger of the assassin.
While Parmegiano was painting at Rome the “Vision of St. Jerome,” which
now adorns the National Gallery of England, the famous siege of that
city was concluded by its spoliation. Yet Parmegiano (absorbed with his
painting) was unconscious of the tumult, until his _studio_ was burst
open by some of the soldiers of the enemy. A similar story is told,
also, of Protogenes, when Demetrius was laying siege to Rhodes.
CAST. The flappers of Laputa would soon have dispelled this reverie.
EV. But if they had thus flourished their official bladders, perhaps the
“Principia Mathematica” had not been written; for Newton explained the
extent of his discoveries by his “always thinking unto them.”
Somewhat like the effect of intense study on the mind, the muscles of
the limbs will be influenced _by one long-directed habit_. Paganini was
observed, on board a steam-boat, constantly to repose on the sofa.
During this state of reverie, his left arm assumed the peculiar attitude
in which he held his violin, until he saw that he was noticed, when he
altered its position.
The right hand of Benjamin West, of which I saw a posthumous model at
Lord de Tabley’s, appeared to have taken that form in which he was wont
to hold the pencil.
By this concentration, this full possession of the mind, the wildness of
fancy in the dark is often the source of terror; but this is ever
lessened or dispelled by any sound or sight which presents a subject to
the _perceptive_ faculty. Such is the sudden glimmer of a light, the
barking of a dog, or the almost instinctive effort of the school-boy,
“Whistling aloud to keep his courage up.”
All these cases, then, indicate concentration of mind. “Mental
conception is uninfluenced by conscious perception.”
I may add, that, in the heat of engagement, soldiers and sailors are
often unconscious of being even seriously wounded. In the battle of Lake
Thrasymene, the armies of Rome and Carthage were so absorbed in the
tumult and din of war, that an earthquake, which spread desolation
around them, was unheeded by these determined soldiers.
IDA. I have gleaned enough from your illustrations, Evelyn, to believe
that we may explain by them that solemn and last reverie of the dying,
when all other ideas have ceased to influence, but the _most
impressive_—
“The ruling passion strong in death;”
when earthly life is on the wane, and the spirit, in this expiring
thought, takes its last farewell of the flesh. I remember some beautiful
evidences of this influence.
It was observed that Porson, after a paralytic fit, scarcely uttered a
word of English; but to the last moment spoke _Greek_ fluently.
Dr. Adam (a master of Sir Walter Scott), on the subsidence of delirium,
exclaimed, “It grows dark—the boys may dismiss;” and instantly expired.
The last words of Dr. Abercrombie were addressed to an imaginary
patient, regarding the care of his digestive functions.
Some time after the trial of the Bristol magistrates, Lord Tenterden
lapsed into a stupor from exhaustion. A short period before death he
rallied, and, after conversing with his friends for a few minutes, he
raised himself on his couch, and said, “Gentlemen of the jury, you may
retire;” and then fell back and expired.