60 ON THE EFFECTS OF CERTAIN MENTAL 



The character of Madge Wildfire, so admirably drawn by Sir 

 W. Scott, is scarcely inferior to that of Ophelia in the boldness of 

 its outline and truth of its colouring. The previous bias of the 

 mind was different, the station in life, the refinement of education, 

 the delicacy of sentiment, were all on the side of Ophelia ; though 

 we find, as is commonly the case with the insane, that this delicacy 

 is in a measure removed, and Ophelia the distraught speaks boldly 

 of that passion which Ophelia the sane would hardly have dared to 

 unmask to the moon. 



The history of Madge Wildfire, previous to her derangement, 

 is well known to all who have read — and who has not read ? — that 

 chef a" ceuvre of the wizard of the north, the Heart of Mid Lothian, 

 Illicit love and its consequences, in a character of low extraction, 

 whom beauty raised above her station, were the predisposing causes 

 of her malady. Her personal charms appear to have attracted much 

 attention, and a considerable degree of vanity and self-love formed 

 a prominent feature in her character. This ruling passion of her 

 mind runs through the whole of her history when insane, and 

 stamps all its workings with a peculiar feature. Facts teach us 

 that persons in whom vanity or amour-propre form a predominating 

 part of the disposition, if afflicted with insanity, from whatever 

 cause it may arise, the ideas of health are renewed in a modified and 

 exalted form in the state of disease ; and as the tenor of the mind 

 when awake, determines, in a great measure, the nature of our 

 dreams — so does the stamp of the sane intellect throw the hue of its 

 colouring over the Imaginations of the insane.* The vain are apt, 

 in this condition, to imagine themselves queens and princesses, and 

 are more greedy of admiration, than ambitious of power. This turn 

 of the insane mind is peculiar to females. It is well exemplified in 

 some of Madge's ditties : — 



* This is not only true as it relates to individuals, but as it regards the 

 monomaniacs of a whole nation taken collectively. An author of great me- 

 rit has asserted that the history of a country may be in some measure traced 

 by the Imagination of its insane inhabitants. During the age of chivalry, 

 the grand feature of the monomaniac was sentimental affection : when Eu- 

 rope was agitated with the Reformation, and the truths promulgated by the 

 dauntless Luther shook the foundations of Catholicism to the very centre, 

 religious enthusiasm became the prevailing idea in the Imagination of the 

 insane. For this reason monomania has generally the national character; 

 haughty and superstitious in the Spaniard — soft and pleasing in the Italian ; 

 gay among the French— gloomy and reserved in the inhabitants of Britain. 

 Of course, in addition to this must be taken into consideration the peculiarity 

 of individual minds, their prevailing disposition, and the causes, the griefs, 

 the losses, or the provocation which were the exciting cause of the disease. 



