THE PATHOLOGY OF THE PASSIONS. 659 



neral of ByroD. These two women had lived years and years, the one 

 preserving in the depths of her heart the calm despair of an impos- 

 sible love, the other the bitter recollection of a love that was spurned ; 

 but neither of them could outlive the affliction of seeing the object of 

 her affection taken .away by death. There are some cases in which 

 the resistance is not of so long duration, and where the ravages of 

 passion are such that the organism becomes dislocated with fearful 

 rapidity. Indeed, it is no rare thing for a physician to be summoned 

 to a patient who is wasting away with sadness and dejection. No 

 organic cause can be discovered to account for the malady ; the usual 

 remedies are of no avail ; the patient does not mend, and usually 

 keeps the secret of his griefs to himself. In such cases the physician 

 should always strive to discover whether there is any passion of the 

 soul which produces this disorder of the functions, and makes his 

 remedies of no effect. Usually such a passion exists. Thus it was 

 that the physician Erasistratus discovered that Antiochus loved bis 

 step-mother, Stratonice. Boccaccio likewise tells of a physician who 

 by chance detected the true cause, previously unknown, of the com- 

 plaint with which a certain young man was suffering ; whenever a 

 young female cousin of the patient entered his room, his pulse beat 

 quicker. It often happens that the melancholic becomes incapable 

 of bearing his afflictions, or of waiting for death to relieve him. This 

 is the origin of suicide. The history of medicine and literature is 

 full of narratives, real or fictitious, of suicide determined by an unfor- 

 tunate passion. While we admire what is touching and dramatic in 

 such narratives, we cannot fail to see that suicide is in se a fact of the 

 morbid kind. Its cause is a total aberration of the instinct of self- 

 preservation ; and, as the latter has its seat in a certain part of the 

 brain, we are authorized in locating the cause of suicide in a cerebral 

 disorganization, brought about more or less rapidly by certain more 

 general changes in the economy. 



Similar changes are produced sooner or later under the influence 

 of resentment, hate, and anger. Resentment is a secret passion which 

 draws its plans in silence. Hate is taciturn, or finds utterance only in 

 imprecations. Anger has its crises. Whereas resentment is disquiet- 

 ing, hate painful, and anger distressing, revenge is a kind of pleasure. 

 It has been compared to the feel of silk, to indicate at once its impe- 

 rious nature and our gratification in appeasing it. When anger and 

 the desire of revenge distend the veins, flush the face, stiffen the arms, 

 brighten the eyes, 1 bewilder the mind, and lead it to the commission 

 often of criminal acts, the soul feels a sort of delight, but it is of 

 short duration ; and the momentary excitement is followed by a pro- 



1 In his admirable studies on the " Expression of the Emotions," Mr. Darwin notes a 

 characteristic expression of fear, rage, and anger, not found in man, though it appears in 

 all animals — viz., the erection of the hair and feathers. This phenomenon, which is 

 analogous to that of goose-skin in man, is produced not only by passional influences, but 



