Literary Notices. xxxv 



himself notices the resemblance of the utterances of these modern 

 pythonesses to " the meaningless chants heard in Buddhist temples." 

 He may not have known of the frequency with which such facility of 

 versification appears in the exalted states of mania. It will even be 

 recalled that the habit discoverable in Shakespeare's characters of drop- 

 ping into mongrel rhymes at the critical moments has been seriously 

 defended on the ground that it is a common tendency of overwrought 

 minds to spend and distract themselves in poetical expression. 



With the second or theoretical part of the book it is difficult to 

 speak patiently, perhaps unnecessary to speak at all. We are told that 

 the distinguishing marks of demoniac possession are alterations in per- 

 sonality. We can form only a vague guess as to what is meant by per- 

 sonality, but, whatever it is, it remains certain that the vast majority of 

 the insane would by this law be regarded as possessed. By a simple 

 application of this conclusion it would appear that dements with morbid 

 changes in the cortex (as easily detected by the microscopist as small 

 pox pustules in the skin) should be treated as possessed and cured by 

 exorcism. 



Cases are now well known in which an insane person has two dif- 

 ferent states or " personalities " in one of which he has one set of men- 

 tal and moral attributes, and in the other, along with certain obscure 

 but measureable changes in circulation and other physiological func- 

 tions, displays an entirely different set of mental and moral peculiarities. 

 In one case he is intelligent and speaks fluently — is crafty and excita- 

 ble, while in the other he is stupid and speaks a different language. 

 Nor are we wholly at a loss as to the physical cause of this double man- 

 ifestation. We find, perhaps, that he is left-handed in the second state 

 but right-handed in the first. We learn that he was left-handed in his boy- 

 hood in Wales but learned English and the use of the right hand later, 

 receiving an education in English. With abundant evidence now at 

 hand that only one side of the brain is concerned with speech, and that 

 the side corresponding to the educated hand, we have a right to sug- 

 gest that' both halves of this man's brain have been modified, the one 

 in the Welsh or left-banded, the other in the English, right-handed 

 way. We cannot follow this line further, but it suggests a reasonable 

 ground for the most difficult phenomena of hypnotism. The author's 

 distinction between the pathological and psychical theory is arbitrary. 

 We think a proper appreciation of the dignity and sphere of the soul 

 would make one glad to see in the driveling lunacy of the class of phe- 

 nomena here discussed matters for the alienist rather than the theolo- 

 gian. It was a very true word in the author's preface : " Some of the 



