Papers read before the Medico-legal Society of New York, from its organization : Third series. 1875-1878 / Printed by a committee of the Medico-legal Society.

  • Medico-Legal Society of New York
Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Papers read before the Medico-legal Society of New York, from its organization : Third series. 1875-1878 / Printed by a committee of the Medico-legal Society. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    ually control their actions, and it is equally certain tnat on some occasions they can not. But, excluding the question of insanity for the immediate present,—whether a given impulse is resistible or not can be known to its own subject alone. No outsider^ can determine it to any more than an approximate degree, nor by any other than the method of observation and inference. It is therefore best to forego attempts to discover its irresistibility by ab- stract thinking, and limit ourselves to a study of it in the con- crete by more simple methods. We may proceed thus : Men are prompted to do evil and good, and with a large number of men the habit is formed of obeying impulse and passion. Good people subdue their desires, keep them in subjection, and, after a struggle of variable length, feel the inclination to do evil fade away before the steady purpose to follow in the right path. On this point an eminent writer of the present century has remarked : The difference between a bad and a good man is not that the latter acts in opposition to his strong- est desires : it is that his desire to do right and his aversion to doing wrong are strong enough to overcome, and, in the case of perfect virtue, to silence any other desire or aversion which may conflict with them. It is because this state of mind is possible to human nature that human beings are capable of moral government; and moral education consists in subject- ing them to the discipline which has most tendency to bring them into this state. [Mill, J. S. *' Examination of Sir W. Hamilton's Philosophy, 3d Ed., p. 560.] The reverse of all that Mr. Mill writes is true of the evil doer. He is the slave and instrument of his bad passions. His own gratification is his paramount desire. The newspapers lately gave an account of a very revolting crime. An adult negro entered a house wherein its occupant's daughter was alone, and outraged her. He seized the terri- fied girl, announced his intention to her, and declared he would accomplish it'though she were to suffer death at the very next moment. Now, what is the meaning of this ? Here is a brutal man who braves the law with full knowledge of the criminality of his cond ict and of its consequences to himself. Here if anywhere is a case of uncontrollable impulse ; that is