378 PSYCHOLOGY. 



measurably far away. I looked about me with terror and astonish- 

 ment ; the icorld was escaping from me. ... I remarked at the same 

 time that my voice was extremely far away from me, that it sounded no 

 longer as if mine. I struck the ground with ray foot, and perceived its 

 resistance ; but this resistance seemed illusory — not that the soil was 

 soft, but that the weight of my body was reduced to almost nothing. 

 ... I had the feeling of being without weight. . . .'' In addition to 

 being so distant, "objects appeared to nn^ fiat. When I spoke with 

 anyone, I saw him like an image cut out of paper with no relief. . . . This 

 sensation lasted intermittently for two years. . . . Constantly it seemed 

 as if ray legs did not belong to me. It was almost as bad with my arms. 

 As for my head, it seemed no longer to exist. ... I appeared to my- 

 self to act automatically, by an impulsion foreign to myself. . , . There 

 was inside of me a new being, and another part of myself, the old be- 

 ing, which took no interest in the new-comer. I distinctly reraeraber 

 saying to myself that the sufferings of this new being were to me 

 indifferent. I was never really dupe of tliese illusions, but my mind 

 grew often tired of incessantly correcting the new impressions, and I 

 let myself go and lived the unhappy life of this new entity. I had an 

 ardent desire to see my old world again, to get back to my old self. 

 This desire kept me from killing myself. ... I was another, and I 

 hated, I despised this other ; he was perfectly odious to me ; it was cer- 

 tainly another who had taken my form and assumed my functions." * 



In cases similar to tliis, it is as certain that tlie 7 is un- 

 altered as that the me is changed. That is to sav, the pres- 

 ent Thought of the patient is cognitive of both the old me 

 and the new, so long as its memory holds good. Only, 

 within that objective sphere which formerly lent itself so 

 simply to the judgment of recognition and of egoistic appro- 

 priation, strange perplexities have arisen. The present and 

 the past both seen therein will not unite. Where is my old 

 me ? What is this new one ? Are they the same ? Or have 

 I two ? Such questions, answered by Avhatever theory the 

 patient is able to conjure up as plausible, form the begin- 

 ning of his insane life.f 



* De I'Intelligence, 3me edition (1878), vol. ii, note. p. 461. Kii.s- 

 haber's book (La Nevropathie Cerebro-cardiaque, 1873) is full of similar 

 observations. 



f Sudden alterations in outward fortune often produce such a change 

 in the empirical me as almost to amoimt to a pathological disturbance of 

 self-consciousness. When a poor man draws the big prize in a lottery, or 

 unexpectedly inherits an estate ; when a man high in fame is publicly 

 disgraced, a millionaire becomes a pauper, or a loving husband and father 

 sees his family perish at one fell swoop, theie is temporarily such a rupture 



