64 OBSERVATIONS ON INSANITY 



approach of a second childhood is more than surmised. Fatuity may 

 be partial or complete : it may implicate and enfeeble or destroy one, 

 several, or all of the mental faculties ; these may remain, but their 

 strength especially the strength acquired by cultivation, is gone. 

 They no longer act in concert ; and the indistinct description of a 

 discovery in mechanics, or a transaction in business, is associated 

 with a prayer or a passionate ejaculation. Some solitary power, or 

 accomplishment, or favourite train of thought, occasionally lingers 

 behind the rest or survives their destruction. From their being at 

 once harmless and independent of society, from the extinction of their 

 social dispositions, the fatuous lunatics have a separate ward allotted 

 for their use in most hospitals, where their existence glides onwards 

 to its peaceful close, undisturbed by cold, or hunger, or darkness, or 

 pain, or any of the few strictly animal irritations of which they are 

 susceptible. — Mr. B.'s picture of Fatuity is as faithful as it is hum- 

 bling and melancholy. 



Monomania. — This is partial insanity, and it takes place when 

 one, several or many of the mental faculties have their manifestations 

 deranged relatively to one particular subject which may be simple or 

 complicate. Fourteen distinct kinds of this malady are succinctly 

 and graphically described by Mr. Browne, as examples of its multi- 

 formal appearances. 1. The Monomania of Concupiscence; with 

 inordinate sexual desire, incontrollable by the powers of self-govern- 

 ment, by admonitions, threats, punishment or coercion, the patient 

 being generally furious and inaccessible to any moral influence. 

 2. Monomania of Homicide, or the passion to destroy ; with an irre- 

 sistible impulse to tear or break clothes, furniture, books, plants or 

 other articles valued as objects of usefulness or desire ; with a diposi- 

 tion incorrigibly quarrelsome, where the monomaniac seeks grounds 

 of dispute and antagonists, throws all around into turmoil and confu- 

 sion, and will fight with his shadow rather than suffer his aggressive 

 powers to be dormant ; or with an indomitable hatred of human life, 

 superadded to the contentious and destructive inclinations, and a thirst 

 for blood which is insat'able. 3. Monomania of Pride ; either with 

 the exaltation of self-conceit, appearing in the deep and impregnable 

 notion of superiority and indifference or contempt for all that is 

 beneath the egotist, or that does not minister to his affairs or his 

 selfishness ; or with these supercilious feelings, coupled with delusions 

 as to the character, circumstances, rank and claims, upon which the 

 visionary pretensions of his haughtiness are based : in the most perti- 

 nacious contenders for imaginary dignity, there is no loss of the con- 



