Responsibility in mental disease / by Henry Maudsley.

  • Henry Maudsley
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Responsibility in mental disease / by Henry Maudsley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    volver in the street, and had at last struck on the head with an axe a cab-horse as he drove past it. He was acquitted at his trial on the ground of insanity. He had at the time the delusion that he was Jesus Christ, but soon after he was placed in confinement he was calm and courteous in behaviour, rational in conversation, and so sane apparently that his wife made strong and repeated representations to the authorities in order to obtain his discharge. On two occasionshe was examined at her request by two eminent physicians, who could find no insanity in him, and strongly recommended his discharge. And yet this gentleman, as it appeared afterwards, believed all the while that he was Jesus Christ, and had made the attack on the cab-horse in consequence of that delusion : he wished by the publicity which he would thus gain to attract attention to his mission. Insane enough to conceive and act upon such a motive he was still in- telligent enough to appear so sane as to deceive two physicians, who were informed what had been his delusion and what he had done. Given the act alone, could any one, however acute in the analysis of motives, have guessed the motive of it ? Given the delusion alone, could any one, however much experience of insanity he might have had, have predicted the course of action pursued ? Given the delusion and the act, what sane mind could, without help from the patient—which for years he would not give—have made known the connection which actually existed between them ? On one occasion I spent an hour with this gentleman, en- deavouring to elicit from him evidence of the delusion