Diseases of the Internal Senses. 729 



either imbecility or insanity ; imbecilit}^ if it is congenital, insanity if it 

 supervenes later. And if other symptoms of insanity do not appear in 

 the same generation, they are apt to appear in the next by heredity, be- 

 cause the individual is on the down-hill, and is suffering intellectual de- 

 cay, and will most likely transmit an impaired mental^ to his posterity. 



A general unwinding of our moral natures could not take place with- 

 out a corresponding degeneration of our intellect, since if the intellect 

 were left to us it would become the basis of moral regeneration, and 

 again construct a code of action, duty and sentiment founded on social 

 relationships. 



We may conclude, therefore, that the mere existence of animals 

 -whose nature makes it possible for them to be helpful to each other, 

 necessarily causes them to associate together ; and that this association, 

 of inevitable necessity causes a mutual understanding of reciprocal 

 duties between the individuals composing the association. In the case 

 of man, his superior intellect and his power of speech render his ability 

 for mutual assistance infinitely greater than that of any of the lower 

 animals, consequently his mutual relationships are infinitely more com- 

 plicated and far closer, and the perception of the relationships and the 

 duties they entail are of an infinitely higher order. But the principle 

 which underlies both cases is just the same. The causes of both are 

 natural and material. They have laid the foundation of the moral law 

 in lower animal life, and built it up by slow evolution to its present cul- 

 mination in man. 



CHAPTER LXIX. 



DISEASES OF THE INTERNAL SENSES. 



There are but few if any purely intellectual states of consciousness that 

 lead to motor action. In order to become motor they must as a rule 

 contain emotional elements. Each purely intellectual conception auto- 

 matically connects itself with those ideas which involve ourselves and 

 our relations to other persons and things, in short the emotional ideas. 

 As such unions are apt to form wills which lead to motor activities, it is 

 evident that if the intellectual ideas are based upon incomplete or par- 

 tial sensations and recollections, they will be erroneous or only partly 

 true representations of the objects to which they relate, and will there- 

 fore dictate actions which will be of that degree of oddity, eccentricity 

 or insanity, which necessarily and automatically " expresses " that cere- 

 bral state. The causes which lead to abnormal cerebral action are var- 

 ious, such as want of proper nutrition to the whole organ, either in 

 quantity or quality ; partial deprivation of nourishment by embolism or 



