Report of the trial of Daniel M’Naughton at the Central Criminal Court, Old Bailey (on Friday, the 3rd, and Saturday, the 4th of March, 1843) for the wilful murder of Edward Drummond, Esq / by Richard M. Bousfield and Richard Merrett.

Date:
1843
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the trial of Daniel M’Naughton at the Central Criminal Court, Old Bailey (on Friday, the 3rd, and Saturday, the 4th of March, 1843) for the wilful murder of Edward Drummond, Esq / by Richard M. Bousfield and Richard Merrett. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    It now becomes necessary to consider what is the nature and degree of mental disease which in the eyeof the law will have the effect of divesting the party afflicted with it from legal responsibility for his acts. My learned friend the Solicitor-General has directed your attention to the legal authorities which bear upon this question ; and, perhaps, when those authorities shall have been minutely examined, no great difference will be found to exist between my learned friend and myself. But lest any confusion should be produced in your minds to the detriment of justice, you will forgive me if I pray your attention to the observations which I deem it my duty to make on this branch of the subject. I think it will be quite impossible for any person, who brings a sound judgment to bear upon this subject, when viewed with the aid of the light which science has thrown upon it, to come to the opinion that the ancient maxims, which, in times gone by, have been laid down for our guid- ance, can be taken still to obtain in the full force of the terms in which they were laid down. It must not be forgotten that the knowledge of this disease in all its various forms is a matter of very recent growth. I feel that I may appeal to the many medical gentlemen I see around me, whether the know- ledge and pathology of this disease has not within a few recent years first acquired the character of a science ? It is known to all that it is but as yester- day that the system of treatment, which in past ages—to the eternal disgrace of those ages—was pursued towards those whom it had pleased Heaven to visit with the heaviest of all human afflictions, and who were therefore best en- titled to the tenderest care and most watchful kindness of their Christian brethren—it is but as yesterday, I say, that that system has been changed for another, which, thank God, exists to our honour, and to the comfort and better prospect of recovery of the unfortunate diseased in mind ! It is but as yesterday that darkness and solitude—cut off from the rest of mankind like the lepers of old—the dismal cell, the bed of straw, the iron chain, and the inhuman scourge, were the fearful lot of those who were best entitled to human pity and to human sympathy, as being the victims of the most dread- ful of all mortal calamities. This state of things has passed, or is passing fast away: But in former times when it did exist, you will not wonder that these unhappy persons were looked upon with a different eye. Thank God, atlast—thoughbutat last—humanity and wisdom have penetrated, hand in hand, into the dreary abodes of these miserable beings, and whilst the one has poured the balm of consolation into the bosoms of the afflicted, the other has held the light of science over our hitherto imperfect knowledge of this dire disease, has ascertained] its varying character, and marked its sha- dowy boundaries, and taught us how, in gentleness and mercy, best to minister to the relief and restoration of the sufferer 1 You can easily under- stand, gentlemen, that when it was the practice to separate these unhappy beings from the rest of mankind and to subject them to this cruel treatment, the person whose reason was but partially obscured would ultimately, and perhaps speedily, in most cases, be converted into a raving madman. You can easily understand, too, that, when thus immured and shut up from the inspection of public inquiry, neglected, abandoned, overlooked—all the peculiar forms, and characteristics, and changes of this malady were lost sight of and unknown, and kept from the knowledge of mankind at large, and therefore how difficult it was to judge correctly concerning it. Thus I am enabled to understand how it was that crude maxims and singular propositions founded upon the hitherto partial knowledge of this disease, have been put forward and received as authority, although utterly inappli- cable to many of the cases arising under the varied forms of insanity.