HORACE ON INSANITY. 277 



Under what title should such a deed be arraigned ? Is it to be 

 attributed to a kind of religious mania — to superstition become mor- 

 bid in its excess — or rather, in the case referred to, the desire to 

 return in safety to his country being more powerful than the natu- 

 ral affection of the father for his child, the latter was sacrificed to a 

 superstitious delusion ? Selfishness is a very prominent feature in 

 the character of Agamemnon, throughout his whole history. There 

 was here, certainly, " a morbid perversion of the natural feelings 

 without any maniacal hallucination ;'' but there was a motive for 

 the act, which constitutes the difference between crime and moral 

 insanity ; and this motive was not based on a false mental impres- 

 sion, but on a sound train of reasoning on sound premises. These 

 premises we know to have been false ; but to the Grecian monarch 

 they were correct, because in that period of universal ignorance 

 they were universally received and accredited. In the present day, 

 in a civilized country, a man who sacrificed his daughter to avert 

 the anticipated wrath of Heaven, would justly be deemed insane, 

 as he would be acting contrary to the dictates of reason, influenced 

 by a false mental impression. Agamemnon gives a reason for his 

 act, and directly denies the charge of insanity. He says — 



" Verum ego ut hserentes adverse littore naves 



Eriperem, prudens placavi sanguine Divos." 



" Nempe tuo furiosse." " Meo, sed non furiosus." 



Crime and insanity are nearly allied; ignorance treads on the 

 heels of both. Horace says, with truth, 



** ubi prava 

 Stultitia, hie summa est insania. Qui sceleratus 

 Et furiosus erit.'* 



This appears to be the plain truth. Unchecked immoral habits 

 and unbridled passions constitute a kind of madness, and too often 

 degenerate into real insanity. It remains doubtful whether such 

 causes should be allowed to shield their victims from the penalties 

 due for crime committed under their influence. 



The question of the positive insanity of persons by whom crimes 

 of the most dreadful character have been committed, and yet in 

 whom no mental hallucination exists, has been much argued by 

 medical jurists, and in many cases it has been urged that acts of 

 violence committed under the influence of that peculiar state of 

 mind, termed moral insanity, do not come under the denomination 

 of crime, and, therefore, are not punishable by law. 



