54 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



creased degree of sensation, which, in ordinary measure, is either not 

 noticed or pleasurable. 



3. Sensations called pains should not be mistaken for, confounded 

 with, or be considered the measure of disease, even when accompanied 

 by it. 



4. All sensations, including unpleasant sensations or pains, repre- 

 sent mental qualities only, and these always correspond, no matter what 

 the exciting cause, with the capacity of the mind to be impressed ; that 

 is, with its rapidity and force of action. 



Lastly, the individual is generally incapable of correctly estimating 

 the subjective value of his own sensations, whatever character they may 

 assume. 



Intimately connected with, and in fact growing out of, the subject 

 of the influence of mental timbre over the functions of the body, are 

 many interesting questions of mental ethics which, it seems to me, 

 ought to be studied from a somewhat different point of view than that 

 from which they are commonly regarded. 



As we have seen that bodily functions may be profoundly modified 

 under unconscious mental influence, so it will be found, when carefully 

 analyzed, that the product of the mental operations themselves may be 

 likewise modified, under peculiar subjective influences, without arousing 

 the consciousness. In a word, the mind may be in a condition of what 

 we may, illustratively, call mental allotropism, during which the laws 

 ordinarily controlling mental operations seem to be reversed, with cor- 

 responding products of intellection. 



A case in point is now attracting altogether more attention than it 

 deserves, or would receive, if properly understood. It is stated in the 

 newspapers that there is a young lady living in our neighboring city of 

 Brooklyn who, among other surprising things which she does or omits 

 to do, has not eaten any food or taken any nourishment during the past 

 nine years. It is claimed, on the one hand, that this lady is a perfectly 

 truthful person, with a highly endowed moral sense, intelligent, kind, 

 benevolent, and shrinking from notoriety, and that her statements ought 

 to be taken as conclusive in regard to the facts. The absence of any 

 motive for propagating an unprofitable, ridiculous falsehood is held as 

 confirmatory of her allegations. On the other hand, it is as stoutly 

 maintained that she is an arrant impostor, whose sole purpose is to 

 acquire a transient notoriety ; and the non-acceptance of various tests, 

 proposed to substantiate or disprove her statements, is adduced as evi- 

 dence of the fraud attempted. Now I think we shall see that, in the 

 light of inferences from what has preceded, neither party to this con- 

 trovers} r is wholly right or altogether wrong. While it can not for a 

 moment be admitted that a person can live nine years, or any number 

 of years, without food, yet it would be contrary to related facts, and 

 illogical, to assume that she intends to deceive. It is quite within the 

 possibilities that this lady believes that she does not eat. And yet she 



