On hallucinations consistent with reason / by John Ordronaux.

  • John Ordronaux
Date:
[1861]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On hallucinations consistent with reason / by John Ordronaux. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    15/26 (page 13)
    intellection, and thereby producing reveries, may give rise to hallucin- ations. Some time is undoubtedly required for this effect to manifest itself, because the mind when fatigued naturally relinquishes its hold of any subject which has exclusively occupied its attention. In do- ing this it does not dismiss, however, the subject as an entirety; it puts aside only the examination of its undiscovered and undetermined relations. What is already thoroughly acquired is absolutely retain- ed, and may re-assert itself at times independently of volition. We are then said to have a “fixed idea, a predominant idea, and when it becomes overpowering]y strong, we do not hesitate to call it mono- mania. When in connection with the mind, moreover, the passions or moral affections are greatly enlisted, the hallucinative process goes on with great rapidity. It would seem that the sanitary guardianship of the mind over the body and the body over the mind is entirely suspended, and acts of most manifest self-injury are performed without apparent concern as to their ultimate results. Love,—hate,—remorse,—des- pair,—may all in turn give rise to “spectral imaginings.” In the “ Comedy of Errors” we have an example of a poor, hen-pecked hus- band, who, from excess of little griefs, bickerings, upbraidings, and rebukes, which no suit for divorce could rid him from, finally turns mad:— “ And thereof came it that the man was mad: The venom clamors of a jealous woman, Poison more deadly than a mad dog’s tooth. It seems, his sleeps were hindered by thy railing: And therefore comes it, that his head is light. Thou sayest, his meat was sauced by thy upbraidings: Unquiet meals make ill digestions, Thereof the raging fire of fever bred; And what’s a fever but a fit of madness ? Thou sayest, his sports were hindered by thy brawls: Sweet recreation barred, what doth ensue But moody and dull melancholy, Kinsman to grim and comfortless despair, And at her heels, a huge infectious troop Of pale distemperatures, and foes to life ? In food, in sport, and life preserving rest