the power of doing many acts which as a citizen he would otherwise have a right to do. Thus, any contract entered into by an epileptic during the state of mania which often follows the attack would be invalid, as it is evidently a matter of no importance how long the incapacity lasts if its existence can be satisfactorily proved. But not only should this rule apply to the mania, but it ought to apply with equal force to the temporary imbecility which exists at a certain stage of the disease. In this case, of course, the proof of the existence of a mental condition which deprives an individual of the power of contracting or of the power of disposing of his property is a matter of much greater difficulty, and because of the greatness of the difficulty will be the frequency of the occurrence of cases in which it is impossible to do justice.

? 324. Responsibility of Epileptics.233 No one asserts that human tribunals always do right. Any one who is acquainted with the administration of justice must be satisfied that sometimes much injustice is done. And in those cases where civil incapacity or criminal irresponsibility is in question on the ground of the existence of the temporary mental weakness due to epilepsy, it is impossible to predicate that, even with the best medical testimony, justice will always be fairly meted out. But that whenever the existence of that mental condition which renders the individual incapable of judging fairly of motives-whenever that mental state which places the mind at the mercy of one overmastering motive or idea, which may have been made strong by the iron of habit, can be proved to exist, then, upon the legal principles already described, the individual ought to be held irresponsible for criminal acts and incapacitated from the enjoyment of civil privileges. This is no new doctrine. There is not a Judge upon the bench that would not admit that such was his idea of the English law, and it is only because medical men have used technical terms, and not been at the pains to ascertain the real foundations of the legal principle and the psychical fact of irresponsibility or incapacity, that

As to the responsibility of epileptics, see Friedreich Handbuch der girichtlichen Psychologie, p. 637, and Henke Abhandlungen aus dem Gebieta der gerichlichen Medizin, vol. iv., p. 1.

there has been interminable confusion, and in many cases very stupid blunders. A consideration of some of the remarks of the Lord Justice Clerk's charge in the case of George Stephens will show that the above surmise is correct. This was a trial for murder, and the prisoner was proved to be an epileptic. "There are some matters," said his lordship, "connected with the doctrine of legal insanity which it is quite necessary to give you directions about at the outset. Insanity is a term capable of being used in several meanings, and it is very often used by gentlemen of the medical profession in a totally different sense from what it is in use in courts of criminal jurisdiction. A man's mind may be weakened by disease, and may, in a certain sense, be called insane, but not on that account does he cease to be morally and legally responsible for his actions. A man whose mind is weakened or impaired may be more easily excited and provoked than another, just as a man in bad health may be easily irritated; but does he, therefore, cease to be a responsible agent? That is quite out of the question." But it does not seem to have occurred to his lordship that there 234 may be an amount of weakness produced by disease which will reduce the strong man to the level of the idiot; and just as it would not be absurd, and has never been out of the question, to hold that the idiot was irresponsible, therefore it seems to us that, while the mental enfeeblement which follows after epilepsy exists, and is of such a nature as we have described above, the individual thus affected should be held to be incapable of committing a criminal act, which implies the possession of volition, intention, and malice in the individual committing the act. Still we regard epileptics who are not otherwise insane as in every way capable of performing all the acts of a citizen, and liable to all the punishments which citizens incur who violate the laws, except under the conditions above described. We would also be very careful of sifting the evidence adduced in proof of the temporary mania or the temporary imbecility which follows upon epilepsy in some cases; but when it is satisfactorily proved it must necessarily be a

1 See report in Aberdeen Herald, 22d April, 1865.

bar to punishment, and must invalidate any contracts which the party may have entered into during the existence of this mental state. With regard to crimes committed during the convulsions of the disease nothing need be said.

NOTE.-The following works, which have not been alluded to in the text, may be referred to: Dr. Sieveking's Epilepsy and Epileptiform Seizures; M. Brown-Séquard's Researches on Epilepsy; Dr. Radcliffe's Epilepsy and other Convulsive Affections; Portal's Observations sur la Nature et la Traitement de l'Epilepsie; Delasiauve's Traité de l'Epilepsie; Schroeder van der Kolk's Syd. Soc. Trans.; Maissonneuve's Recherches et Observations sur l'Epilepsie; Voisin's Nouveau Dictionnaire de Medecine et de Chirurgie Pratiques, art. Epilepsie; and article on Epilepsy in Reynolds' System of Medicine, vol. ii., p. 251; also, Dr. Hughlings Jackson's articles recently published in The Medical Press and Circular.

CHAPTER XV.

SOMNAMBULISM.

325. Sleep and Dreams. [235]“Half our days," says Sir Thomas Browne, "we pass in the shadow of the earth, and the brother of death extracteth a third part of our lives." Well has sleep been called "death's brother." In sleep men are in another world-they are in a delirium of dreams. Consciousness is scarcely maintained, identity is sometimes lost, memory is chaos, reason is a lord of misrule. All the mysteries which are brought before us every day are likely to remain mysteries. Their commonness makes the trouble of solution a trouble scarcely ever undertaken. So it is we know little or nothing of the physiology of sleep or dreams. The subject has been as unfathomable as the ocean, to which sleep has been so often compared.

"And the beasts, and the birds, and the insects, were drowned

In an ocean of dreams, without a sound;

Whose waves never mark, though they ever impress,

The light sand which paves it--consciousness."

That sleep is a succession of ever-varying states has been pointed out; and the alternating passage from waking to sleeping has been quoted as an illustration. A man may sleep deeply or shallowly, and as Bichat has said, “Le sommeil général est l'ensemble des sommeils particulièrs," which shows that it was his opinion that each separate faculty or sense may be at the same moment in totally different conditions. We have all along held that any sense may sleep while others are awake, just as any sense may be deadened and lost while others are still intact; and we have held that

'Chapters on Mental Physiology. Sir H. Holland.

the appreciation of this fact in all its bearings would explain many of the circumstances of mesmeric sleep or hypnotism, as it is evident that the circumstances of the production of the sleep must (236) materially influence the phenomena of dreams. The same may be said with regard to trances and catalepsy; and we believe all the mysteries which have so long perplexed the world with regard to those semi-conscious conditions are explicable on the hypothesis that sleep is a series of complex and ever-varying states.'

326. The Physical Causes of Sleep.-It has been fancifully argued by one physiologist at least that sleep was a change of the brain from the choloidal to the crystaline condition, his theory being founded upon the phenomena he had observed from certain ingenious experiments in freezing the brains of pigeons and other animals. Others seem to think that sleep is a phenomenon of defective nutrition. But little need be said as to the physical causes of sleep in this place. It has always been regarded as the reparation of exhausted power, or as Professor Bain has more recently termed it, the storing up of vis nervosa. Professor Bain's theory is perfectly consistent with the views advanced above, for it is eviIdent that the nerve force which is accumulated at diferent nervous centres will require more thorough recuperation in one place than another, and hence it will follow that a man will fall into a deeper and more profound sleep with one part of his organism than another-a fact that seems to have been recognized with the stupid naked eye of common sense, for we find that in ordinary parlance men speak of their foot sleeping, which seems to us a recognition of the possibility of the insensibility of certain organs at the same time that others are hyperacute. This fact seems to explain many of the peculiar phenomena of somnambulism. In this state, while we find such a condition as can fairly be called sleep, yet at the same time many of the mental faculties are in full activity. The following case will illustrate this fact: "A

See Pascals Pensées, partie i., Art. VI., § 20; Ancellon Essays Philos, vol. ii., 159. With regard to sleep and dreams, Dr. Addington Symonds' Lectures (London. 1855) may be consulted, and some light will be thrown upon the subject by reference to De Quincey's Confessions.

Dr. B. W. Richardson, F.R.S.