tion upon the whole mind may be such as to cause disorder in all its functions, and leave it a wide mass of ruins. The history of those who are confined in Insane Hospitals furnishes a strong presumption that such results are not unfrequent. Although the mind is deranged, the predominant feeling which led to the derangement seems still to remain. One individual challenges for himself the honours of a Chancellor, another of a King; one is a member of Parliament, another is the Lord Mayor of London; one, under the name of the Duke of Wellington or Bonaparte, claims to be the commander of mighty armies; another announces himself with the tone and attitude of a Prophet of the Most High. Pinel informs us that there were at one time no less than three maniacs in one of the French Insane Hospitals, each of whom assumed to be Louis XIV. On one occasion, these individuals were found disputing with each other, with a great degree of energy, their respective rights to the throne. The dispute was terminated by the sagacity of the superintendent, who, approaching one of them, gave him, with a serious look, to understand that he ought not to dispute on the subject with the others, since they were obviously mad. "Is it not well known," said the superintendent, "that you alone ought to be acknowledged as Louis XIV. ?" The insane person, flattered with this homage, cast upon his companions a look of the most marked disdain, and immediately retired. CHAPTER II. SYMPATHETIC IMITATION. § 436. Of sympathetic imitation, and what is involved in it. We endeavoured, in its proper place, to illustrate the natural origin and the prevalence of the propensity to IMIn connexion with the general truth of the existence of such a propensity, it is proper to observe here that there is a subordinate and peculiar form of imitation, ITATION. which is deserving of a separate notice, and particularly so on account of its practical results. We speak now of what has been appropriately termed Sympathetic Imitation. It is implied, in all cases of Sympathetic Imitation, that there is more than one person concerned in them; and it exists, in general, in the highest degree, when the number of persons is considerable. Some one or more of these individuals is strongly agitated by some internal emotion, desire, or passion; and this inward agitation is expressed by the countenance, gestures, or other external signs. There is also a communication of such agitation of the mind to others; they experience similar emotions, desires, and passions. And these new exercises of soul are expressed on the part of the sympathetic person by similar outward signs. In a single word, when we are under the influence of this form of imitation, we both act and feel as others. And this happens, not only in consequence of what we witness in them, and apparently for no other reason, but it happens naturally; that is to say, in virtue of an implanted or natural principle. The view which we are inclined to take of this principle is, that, although we may properly speak of it, on account of its close resemblance, as a modification of the more ordinary form of Imitativeness, yet, on the whole, it is so far distinct and specific in its character as to entitle it to be regarded as a separate part of our sensitive nature. As such it might have been treated of in another place; but in its ordinary action it is generally well understood; and we have delayed the consideration of it till the present time, because it is our principal object to give some account of its disordered or alienated action. 437. Familiar instances of sympathetic imitation. Abundance of instances (many of them frequent and familiar) show the existence of SYMPATHETIC IMITATION; in other words, that there is in human feelings, and in the signs of those feelings, a power of contagious communication, by which they often spread themselves rapidly from one to another. "In general it may be remarked," says Mr. Stewart, "that whenever we see in the countenance of another individual any sudden change of features, more especially such a change as is expressive of any particular passion or emotion, our own countenance has a tendency to assimilate itself to his. Every man is sensible of this when he looks at a person under the influence of laughter or in a deep melancholy. Something, too, of the same kind takes place in that spasm of the muscles of the jaw which we experience in yawning; an action which is well known to be frequently excited by the contagious power of example."* To these statements, illustrative of sympathetic imitation, may be added the fact, that if there are a number of children together, and one of them suddenly gives way to tears and sobs, it is generally the case that all the rest are more or less affected in the same manner. Another case, illustrative of the same natural principle, is that of a mob when they gaze at a dancer on the slack rope. They seem not only to be filled with the same anxiety, which we may suppose to exist in the rope-dancer himself; but they naturally writhe, and twist, and balance their own bodies as they see him do. It has also been frequently remarked, that when we see a stroke aimed and just ready to fall upon the leg or arm of another person, we naturally shrink, and slightly draw back our own leg or arm, with a sort of prophetic or anticipative imitation of the person on whom the blow is about to be inflicted. § 438. Instances of sympathetic imitation at the poor-house of Haerlem. Multitudes of well-attested facts show the sympathetic connexion between mind and mind, and sympathy between the mind and the nervous and muscular system. Few are more interesting or decisive than what is stated to have occurred at Haerlem under the inspection of Boerhave." In the house of charity at Haerlem," says the account, "a girl, under an impression of terror, fell into a convulsive disease, which returned in regular paroxysms. One of the by-standers, intent upon assisting her, was seized with a similar fit, which also recurred at * Stewart's Elements, vol. iii., chap. ii. intervals; and on the day following, another was attacked; then a third, and a fourth; in short, almost the whole of the children, both girls and boys, were afflicted with these convulsions. No sooner was one seized, than the sight brought on the paroxysms in almost all the rest at the same time. Under these distressing circumstances, the physicians exhibited all the powerful anti-epileptic medicines with which their art furnishes them, but in vain. They then applied to Boerhave, who, compassionating the wretched condition of the poor children, repaired to Haerlem; and while he was inquiring into the matter, one of them was seized with a fit, and immediately he saw several others attacked with a species of epileptic convulsion. It presently occurred to this sagacious physician, that, as the best medicines had been skilfully administered, and as the propagation of the disease from one to another appeared to depend on the imagination, [the sympathy of imagination,] by preventing this impression upon the mind, the disease might be cured; and his suggestion was successfully adopted. Having previously apprized the magistrates of his views, he ordered, in the presence of all the children, that several portable furnaces should be placed in different parts of the chamber, containing burning coals; and that iron, bent to a certain form, should be placed in the furnaces; and then he gave these further commands; that all medicines would be totally useless, and the only remedy with which he was acquainted was, that the first who should be seized with a fit, whether boy or girl, must be burned in the arm to the very bone by a red-hot iron. He spoke this with uncommon dignity and gravity; and the children, terrified at the thoughts of this cruel remedy, when they perceived any tendency to the recurrence of the paroxysm, mediately exerted all their strength of mind, and called the horrible idea of the burning; and were thus enabled, by the stronger mental impression, to resist the influence of the morbid propensity." up § 439. Other instances of this species of imitation. im It would not be difficult to multiply cases similar to those which have been mentioned. A few years since, there was a man in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, who had a family of six children, one of whom became affected with the CHOREA, or St. Vitus's dance. The others, in the indulgence of that thoughtless gayety which is natural to children, amused themselves with imitating his odd gestures, until, after a time, they were irresistibly affected in the same way. At this state of things, which seems to be susceptible of an explanation in no other way than on the principles of sympathetic imitation, the family, as may naturally be supposed, were in great affliction. The father, a man of some sagacity as well as singularity of humour, brought into the house a block and axe, and solemnly threatened to take off the head of the first child who should hereafter exhibit any involuntary bodily movement, except the child originally diseased. By this measure, which proceeded on the same view of the human mind as the experiment of Boerhave just mentioned, a new train of feeling was excited, and the spell was broken.* It may be added, that not only those in the same family and in the same building have been seized, but the contagion has sometimes spread from one to another, (by the mere imitation of sympathy as we suppose,) over whole towns, and even large districts of country. This was the case in a part of the island of Anglesey in 1796; and still later in this country, in some parts of Tennessee.† CHAPTER III. DISORDERED ACTION OF THE AFFECTIONS. 440. Of the states of mind denominated presentiments. WE proceed now to remark, that there may be a disordered action of the Affections or Passions, as well as of the lower principles of the Sensitive nature; and this remark is designed to apply to both classes of the Affections, the benevolent and those of an opposite kind. We do not pro * Powers's Essay on the Influence of the Imagination, p. 32. |