had befallen the French nation. Several persons died from the same cause, Mr. Hume tells us, upon witnessing the restoration of Charles II. to the British throne; and it is well known the doorkeeper of Congress died of an apoplexy, from joy, upon hearing the news of the capture of Lord Cornwallis and his army during the American Révolutionary war."* CHAPTER IV. DISORDERED ACTION OF THE MORAL SENSIBILITIES. § 335. Nature of voluntary moral derangement. THE moral, as well as the natural or pathematic Sensibilities, the Conscience as well as the Heart, may be the subject of a greater or less degree of disorder and alienation. There are probably two leading forms, at least, of moral derangement, viz., VOLUNTARY, and NATURAL or CONGENITAL. In regard to voluntary moral derangement, we remark, as an interesting and practically important fact, that man may virtually destroy his conscience. There is sound philosophy in the well-known passage of Juvenal, "NEMO REPENTE FUIT TURPISSIMUS.” The truth implied in this passage is unquestionably applicable to all persons, with the exception of those few cases where the moral derangement is natural or congenital. A man is not in the first instance turpissimus, or a villain, because his conscience makes resistance, and will not let him be so. But if the energies of the will are exercised in opposition to the conscience; if, on a systematic plan and by a permanent effort, the remonstrances of conscience are unheeded and its action repressed, its energies will be found to diminish, and its very existence will be put at hazard. There is no doubt that in this way the conscience may be so far seared as to be virtually annihilated. Multitudes have prepared themselves for the greatest wickedness, and have become, in fact, morally insane, * Rush on the Diseases of the Mind, p. 339. by their own voluntary doing. There is a passage in Beaumont, in his "King and no King," which strikingly indicates the progress of the mind in such cases. "There is a method in man's wickedness; It grows up by degress. I am not come We say in such cases the conscience is virtually annihilated. And by this remark we mean, that it is inert, inefficient, dormant, paralyzed. We do not mean that it is dead. The conscience never dies. Its apparent death is impregnated with the elements of a real and terrible resurrection. It seems to gather vivification and strength in the period of its inactivity; and, at the appointed time of its reappearance, inflicts a stern and fearful retribution, not only for the crimes which are committed against others, but for the iniquity which has been perpetrated against itself. § 336. Of accountability in connexion with this form of disordered conscience. If the moral sensibility, under the system of repression which has been mentioned, refuses to act, the question arises, whether, at such a time, a person is morally accountable for his conduct. As his conscience does not condemn him in what he does, is the transaction, whatever its nature, a criminal one? There can be but one answer to this question. If the individual is not condemned by his conscience, it is the result of his own evil course. We may illustrate the subject by a case which is unhappily too frequent. A man who commits a crime in a state of drunkenness, may plead that he was not, at the time, aware of the guilt of his conduct. And this may be true. But he was guilty for placing himself in a situation where he knew he would be likely to injure others, or in some other way commit unlawful acts. His crime, instead of being diminished, is in fact increased. It is twofold. He is guilty of drunkenness, and he is guilty of everything evil, which he knew, or might have known, would result from his drunkenness. In like manner, a man is not at liberty to plead that he was not, in the commission of his crimes, condemned by conscience, if it be the fact that he has, by a previous process, voluntarily perverted or hardened the conscience. On the contrary, it would be fair to say, as in the case of drunkenness, that he has increased his guilt; for he has added to the guilt of the thing done the antecedent and still greater crime of aiming a blow at the mind, of striking at the very life of the soul. Practically he is not self-condemned, for the mere reason that he has paralyzed the principle by which the sentence of self-condemnation is pronounced. But in the eye of immutable justice there is not only no diminution of his guilt, but it is inexpressibly enhanced by the attempts to murder, if we may so express it, the principle which, more than anything else, constitutes the dignity and glory of man's nature. (See § 236, 237.) § 337. Of natural or congenital moral derangement. The other form of moral derangement is NATURAL or CONGENITAL. We do not know that we are authorized to say that men are by nature, in any case whatever, absolutely destitute of a conscience; nor, on the other hand, have we positive grounds for asserting that this is not the case. There is no more inconsistency or impossibility in a man's coming into the world destitute of a conscience, than there is in his being born without the powers of memory, comparison, and reasoning, which we find to be the case in some idiots. But certain it is, that there are some men who appear to have naturally a very enfeebled conscience; a conscience which but very imperfectly fulfils its office; and who, in this respect at least, appear to be constituted very differently from the great body of their fellow-men. They exhibit an imbecility, or, if the expression may be allowed, an idiocy of conscience, which unquestionably diminishes, in a very considerable degree, their moral accountability. A number of those writers who have examined the subject of Insanity have taken this view, and have given instances in support of it. "In the course of my life," says Dr. Rush, "I have been consulted in three cases of the total perversion of the moral faculties. One of them was in a young man, the second in a young woman, both of Virginia, and the third was in the daughter of a citizen of Philadelphia. The last was addicted to every kind of mischief. Her wickedness had no intervals while she was awake, except when she was kept busy in some steady and difficult employment." He refers also to instances in other writers. Dr. Haslam, in his Observations on Madness, has given two decided cases of moral derangement. One of these was a lad about ten years of age. Some of the traits which he exhibited were as follows. He early showed an impatience and irritability of temper, and became so mischievous and uncontrollable that it was necessary to appoint a person to watch over him. He gave answers only to such questions as pleased him, and acted in opposition to every direction. "On the first interview I had with him," says Dr. Haslam, "he contrived, after two or three minutes' acquaintance, to break a window and tear the frill of my shirt. He was an unrelenting foe to all china, glass, and crockery-ware. Whenever they came within his reach, he shivered them instantly. In walking the street, the keeper was compelled to take the wall, as he uniformly broke the windows if he could get near them; and this operation he performed so dexterously, and with such safety to himself, that he never cut his fingers. To tear lace and destroy the finer textures of female ornament seemed to gratify him exceedingly, and he seldom walked out without finding an occasion of indulging this propensity. He never became attached to any inferior animal, a benevolence so common to the generality of children. To these creatures his conduct was that of the brute. He oppressed the feeble, and avoided the society of those more powerful than himself. Considerable practice had taught him that he was the cat's master; and, whenever this luckless animal approached him, he plucked out its whiskers with wonderful rapidity; to use his own language, 'I must have her beard off? After this operation he commonly threw the creature on the fire or through the window. If a little dog came near him, he kicked it; if a large one, he would not notice it. When he was spoken to, he usually said, 'I do not choose to answer.' When he perceived any one who appeared to observe him attentively, he always said, 'Now I will look unpleasant.' The usual games of children afforded him no amusement; whenever boys were at play, he never joined them: indeed, the most singular part of his character was, that he appeared incapable of forming a friendship with any one; he felt no considerations for sex, and would as readily kick or bite a girl as a boy. Of any kindness shown him he was equally insensible; he would receive an orange as a present, and afterward throw it in the face of the donor." This unfortunate lad seems sometimes to have been sensible of his melancholy condition. When, on a certain occasion, he was conducted through an insane hospital, and a mischievous maniac was pointed out to him who was more strictly confined than the rest, he said to his attendant, "This would be the right place for ine." He often expressed a wish to die; and gave as a reason, "that God had not made him like other children." § 338. Of moral accountability in cases of natural or congenital moral derangement. The question recurs here, also, whether persons who are the subjects of a natural or congenital moral derangement are morally accountable, and in what degree. If there is naturally an entire extinction of the moral sense, as in some cases of Idiocy there is an entire extinction of the reasoning power, which, although it may not frequently happen, is at least a supposable case, there is no moral accountability. A person in that situation can have no distinct perception of what right and wrong are, nor can he be conscious of doing either right or wrong in any given case; and, consequently, being without either merit or demerit in the moral sense of the terms, he is not the proper subject of reward and punishment. He is to be treated on the principles that are applicable to idiots and insane persons generally. In other cases where the mental disorder is not so great, but there are some lingering rays of moral light, some feeble capability of moral vision, the person is to be judged, if it is possible to ascertain what it is, according to |