THE CASE OF GUITEAU—A PSYCHO- LOGICAL STUDY BY GEORGE M. BEARD, M.D. NEW YORK [Reprinted from the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Vol. ix. No. I, January, 1882] “ Whence comes it that we have so much patience with those who a?'e maimed in body and so little with those tvho are defective in mind?"—Pascal. THE CASE OF GUITEAU—A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY. GEORGE M. BEARD, M. D.f NEW YORK. IN regard to the case of Guiteau, the murderer of Presi- dent Garfield, these conclusions are, to my mind, in- evitable, and will, no doubt, be sustained by the experts of the future. First.—Guiteau was taken insane at the age of eighteen years, while attending school at Ann Arbor, Michigan, and has been insane ever since. Secondly.—The special type of his insanity is what is commonly and correctly called religious monomania. Al- though only a part of his delusions were of a distinctively religious character, they all, when traced to their ultimate radicals, had a religious origin, and were complicated with distinctive religious delusions from which he was never free. This positive diagnosis is based solely on the conversa- tion, conduct, and writings of Guiteau up to the time when he went to Washington to seek for ofifice. His conduct while in Washington—including the murder of the President—is not taken into account in this opinion; neither, on the other hand, is his remarkable family history Reprinted from the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Vol. ix, No. I, January, 1882, 2 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. of insanity and consumption. Even though he had never gone to Washington to seek for office, and had never mur- dered the President; though he had no family history of insanity or other forms of mental degeneracy; even if he had come as a waif from an unknown land, without a past, there would still be evidence sufficient—and more than suf- ficient—to convict him of insanity, in his conversation, con- duct, and writings between the period of his residence at Ann Arbor and the time when he began to make applica- tion for office. Very few monomaniacs for whom I have been consulted have given as much evidence of monomania as he displayed in that period. In the study of this subject, on which 1 had entered some time before I was summoned to testify,—l have looked up the histories of the most noted criminal lunatics of Europe and America, and I find that Guiteau went into court with a more abundant and more varied record of insanity than any criminal monomaniac that has ever been brought to trial in any country. SCIENCE VS. POLITICS HAD HE BEEN PROPERLY DEFENDED THIS FACT WOULD HAVE BEEN MADE CLEAR ON THE TRIAL. In the presence of political assassination, science and law and reason are alike dumb ; for politics like religion is rooted in emotion. Not until weeks had elapsed after the murder of President Garfield was it possible even for cold and resolute and disciplined natures to consider the question of the insanity of the murderer. Although it was a dishonor to jurisprudence that Guiteau should have been tried at all, inasmuch as, from a scientific point of view, it was as unnecessary, and grotesque, and comical an act to try him, as it would have been had he spent all his life in an asylum, where he belonged; yet as the trial must be held, it was a proof of the advance that has been made in American civilization that it was not anticipated by GEORGE M. BEARD. 3 lynch-law or vigilance committees, and that the prisoner had the same chance that he would have had if the victim of his insanity had been only a private citizen. A quarter of a century ago his trial would probably have been cut short, if not utterly frustrated, by an extemporaneous exe- cution ; or the jury would have considered their verdict— as long ago, in the case of Baker—in the presence of threat- ening bayonets. It is a further evidence of the progress that our country has made in science, as well as in civilization, that authorities on the nervous system could be found to testify for science against the mob; and that of our leading authorities in dis- eases of the nervous system, not one testified that Guiteau was sane. The Salem witchcraft executions were not only not opposed by physicians, but were started and stimulated by them. With politics, science in its relation to the present ques- tions has only this concern—that it should ignore them. Likewise, the question whether the insane should be punished like the sane; whether, indeed, they should not be doubly punished—first, for being insane, and secondly, for the crimes they may commit as a result of their insanity,—is a separate and legal issue, with which the question of the insanity of Guiteau has simply nothing to do. Although the reconstruction of psychology in its rela- tions to insanity has been a long-standing want of science, yet such reconstruction was not necessary for a right under- standing of the case of Guiteau. Long before most of those who were connected with this case were born, the main problems connected with the form of insanity that he represents had been analyzed, though not exhaustively, yet with intelligence and thoroughness, so as to eliminate RECONSTRUCTION OF PSYCHOLOGY. 4 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. therefrom the elements of mystery and difficulty. Both in France and Germany, this special type of insanity—mono- mania—has been understood and described, with various illustrations, in authoritative literature, to which during the long trial but little reference was made. But although the reconstruction of psychology is not necessary to solve the mystery either of the Whittaker or the Guiteau case, yet such reconstruction is a great aid in solving them; and he who clearly understands what such reconstruction should be, is better prepared to understand either of these cases. He who has a clear and correct definition of insanity,—which it is entirely possible to have, —he who knows and can state the symptoms of sanity, has already solved for himself half the problem of such cases ; but he who has no definition, or who has a bad one, who does not know what either sanity or insanity is, or if he do know cannot tell, may study such a case as that of Guiteau for centuries, and never come near its solution, Newly discovered seas require new charts to aid those who would navigate them, although one may, with difficulty, proceed without such charts, by soundings and observations made as he explores. But the case of Guiteau is not a newly discovered phase of insanity ; it has been understood in a general way for decades, and the distinctive phenomena connected with it have been marked out, explained, and made clear by those who are well organized for right rea- soning on psychological problems. PERSONAL EXAMINATION NOT ALWAYS NECESSARY IN CASES OF INSANITY AND NERVOUS DISEASE. There is a belief rooted in the profession and in the people, so deeply that it will probably remain for centuries, that all that is necessary is to see a patient in order to make a diagnosis. With many forms of disease, probably GEORGE M. BEARD. 5 with the majority of diseases as they occur—acute and chronic,—a personal examination of the patient is either necessary or at least a very great aid in making a diag- nosis ; but there are many cases of nervous disease, and particularly of functional nervous disease, and certain phases of insanity, where a personal examination is need- less, provided all the facts of the patient’s life bearing on the question of his disease can be obtained from trust- worthy sources. A physician who is not competent to make a diagnosis in certain forms of nervous disease without see- ing the patient, is not competent to make a diagnosis after seeing him, and would be quite as likely to err after making- a careful examination as before; and this applies with full force to some cases of monomania, and it applies very well to the case of Guiteau. The physicians who gathered at Washington at the beginning of the trial had, or seemed to have, a hope that a personal and protracted examination of the prisoner would aid them in answering the question whether he was insane ; but if an expert in this particular type of insanity could not make a diagnosis before going to Washington, he would not be very likely to make a correct diagnosis after going there; for there was little or nothing in his personal appearance, or in his conduct or conversa- tion, to assist in making a diagnosis, for one who had before him all the facts of his life, and his history from childhood and youth. Probably no monomaniac patient was ever put into an insane asylum with such a detailed history as has Guiteau ; and if from that history an expert could not judge whether he was sane or insane, I do not see how he could judge at all. With all the facts before him—as they were correctly published long before the trial began,—an expert in mono- mania living in the heart of Germany or far up in the Appenines, can make the diagnosis as well as if he lived under the shadow of Washington jail. 6 THE CASE OF GUITEAU. I had four interviews with Guiteau, at different times,— once in a private room in the court-house, and three times in the jail,—and I watched his conduct in the court-room at different times, and I cannot say that any information that was obtained from those interviews or from watching him in court was of any important assistance save in illustrating diagnosis. Probably no one of the experts summoned to testify spent as much time in studying Guiteau as I did. When there is a question of feigning, special and re- peated personal examination is necessary, and it may be necessary to keep it up for weeks, but in the case of Guiteau—as we shall see—the question of feigning these symptoms could not arise. In most or all of the cases of criminals that have puzzled experts for months there has not been a history-of the case extending from childhood up to the time of the commission of the crime, and it has been necessary to rely in part upon personal examination in making up the diagnosis. In the Whittaker case, on cross-examination, I was asked if it were possible to make a diagnosis without seeing the patient, and I replied that it was. If I could not make a diagnosis without seeing the patient in some cases of ner- vous disease I would burn my diploma. The treatment of patients by medicine and hygiene is quite a different matter; for this, personal examination and watching may be necessary for weeks or months. CONFINEMENT IN ASYLUM NOT THE ONLY SURE SYMPTOM OF INSANITY. While the Guiteau trial was going on, an inmate of one of our asylums killed one of the physicians (Dr. E. A. Adams, of Michigan Asylum), and the murderer was not tried, nor, I believe, arrested ; and if Guiteau had been in a?i asylum, or had just escaped from one, at the time he com- GEORGE M. BEARD. 7 mittted the murder, he would never have been tried. Some years since I went to visit the Blackwell’s Island Asylum; I found that Dr. Parsons, the superintendent, had been stabbed in the neck by one of the patients, who had made a knife out of an iron bar that was in his cell, and had kept it secreted for weeks, in readiness to do this deed, showing not only great skill and ingenuity but also elaborate pre- meditation ; this man was neither tried nor arrested, A few years ago, also, a well-known physician connected with one of our asylums was killed by a lunatic who, if I remem- ber rightly, was not arrested or tried. These facts suggest two professional and popular de- lusions relating to insanity. First, that inmates of asylums are necessarily more in- sane than many who are out of asylums; and the fact that the murder is committed by a patient in an asylum is logically a reason why he should not be tried, convicted, and hanged. The second delusion is that if an insane person has not yet reached an asylum, the presumption is that he is not insane, provided he commits no crime. There are in this country hundreds and thousands of monomaniacs, melancholiacs, and dipsomaniacs, some of whom are liable under excitement to kill some one; and many of these are quite as insane—by any standard of insanity—as many of the inmates of asylums. It will probably take many years to disconnect in the popular mind the idea of insanity with asylums, and to overcome this delusion—that all those who are in asylums cannot know right from wrong. It is probable that if in any of the above-mentioned crimes and murders committed by asylum patients, the murderers had not reached the asylum, they would have been tried, and, unless they had strong influence in their favor, they might have been convicted of murder. The 8 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. asylum shields them, although a very slight amount of tes- timony—two physicians, non-experts in psychology—is needed to put them in an asylum. It is quite safe to assert that there is not in any insane asylum in this country a per- son who had given as much evidence of monomania before he was committed as Guiteau had given before he murdered President Garfield, or before he went to Washington to seek for office. On the trial several physicians testified to the insanity of Guiteau—far more than were needed to send him to an asylum. Dr. C. L. Dana, of this city, presented at the last meeting of the “ National Association for the Protection of the In- sane and the Prevention of Insanity ” an important statis- tical statement, that of the more than sixty thousand luna- tics in this country, upward of twenty thousand were out- side of asylums. If any one of these twenty thousand lunatics commit murder, he is to be arrested, tried, and, if possible, convicted, the distinctive diagnostic symptom of his insanity—moral decline—being brought in evidence against him. If any one of the forty thousand lunatics who happen to be confined in asylums commit murder, he is not arrested or tried, nor even hunted by the press or the peo- ple. If this be science, what is non-expertness ? if this be justice, what is injustice? These three facts, then, should not be forgotten by those who are trying to make themselves experts in the case of Guiteau. First.—Had he been in an asylum at the time he com- mitted the murder, he would never have been arrested, nor even damned by the people or the press, even although he had not been half as insane as he is now. It was only by a series of accidents and neglects on the part of relatives and friends that he was kept out of an asylum during all these years. On his friends rests the real GEORGE M. BEARD. 9 responsibility for the assassination ; Mr. Scoville is the real murderer of President Garfield. Second.— There is no asylum in the zvorld—public or private—that wou,ld not have taken Guiteau at once, at any time during the past twenty years, and kept him as long as his friends desired to have him remain, on the certificate of any physicians who might, or might not have known any thing about insanity. One physician, Dr. Rice, was ready with his certificate years ago, but while waiting for another, Guiteau left the town. Third.—If he had murdered a common citizen instead of the President, he would probably never have been tried. In the case of the modern Abraham, Freeman, of Pocas- set, who, under divine inspiration, murdered his favorite daughter, there was not even a trial, although he had not exhibited one thousandth as much insanity as Guiteau. If Guiteau had failed to hit the President, it is probable that he would not have been tried. PSYCHOLOGY IN COURT. A court of justice is the last and worst of all places in which to attempt to make clear the facts of any science. Of all the processes known to the human mind for investigat- ing scientific truth, this is perhaps the most awkward and amusing, being in all respects more non-expert than com- mittees that in our societies are sometimes appointed to re- port on scientific problems. All the science of the world has been originated, devel- oped, and organized by men working mostly in obscurity and silence ; and even for the comparatively inferior task of popularizing truths that others have discovered, a court of justice is, on the whole, the most unscientific arena that civ- ilized non-expertness has ever yet conceived, or could con- THE CASE OF GUITEAU. ceive. Two sides, two lawyers, neither trying to get the truth, but the opposite of the truth; both seeking not to inform, but to deceive the jury ; non-expert experts hired as horses are hired, to go whither they are driven, to be harnessed and let loose as they are wanted ; a jury whose chief and highest recommendation is that they do not read, or cannot understand what they do read, and have not understood sufficiently to form an opinion, and who serve because they have little else to do; a judge knowing less than the least of any science, and in this country not ex- pected to question witnesses, only to attend questioning, as the witnesses are alternately insulted and pressed to perjury—like an umpire in a cock-fight, to call off one side or the other if too much blood is drawn ;—such is science as it appears in English-speaking courts, and has always ap- peared, and for a long time to come is likely to appear; insanity faring no worse than any of its sister sciences, save in this, perhaps, that it draws more severely on the emo- tions, and is less understood than any other science, and one in which experts are very rare indeed. Not only scien- tific facts and philosophizings, but simple matters of every- day observation that relate to medico-legal cases can be better obtained outside of than in a court of justice, even when, as might possibly happen, the lawyers and the judge are men of force and culture and conscience. The mysterious power that the oath once had has passed away, and many who will not lie will, under the pressure of emotion, cheerfully and conscientiously commit perjury ; and if they do not so directly, will do so by suggestion, by telling half truths, the sections of which are so far apart that their connection cannot be seen by the jury. Convic- tion for perjury is hard and rare; and hell is doubtful or far away. A very graceful, attractive, and popular way of deceiving the jury, is for the witness to substitute his own GEORGE M. BEARD. 11 limited and oft-times useless personal experience and recol- lection for the recognized and established truths of science. In the case of Guiteau this was done to a degree unap- proached in the history of Anglo-Saxon non-expertness. In this case, as in most of the great cases that come before the courts, many of the most important facts—those which are of the highest use to a scientific man who is aiming, not to gain a cause, but to solve a problem, rather than to serve an employer—were kept out of court entirely, and from the beginning to the close of the long trial were not referred to by either side. Several times in my presence the lawyers in that case declared that an expert should not decide except on the facts obtained through the trial; but the trial—long as it was—brought out little on either side that was not well known before, and known to be substantially correct, and left out many of the most important and demonstrable facts that were far more worthy of credence than the tes- timony of any of the witnesses on the stand. There is probably no disease known to medical science but can be disproved before an American court of justice, provided great interests are at stake, and hot passions and professional ambition aroused to prove the contrary. lam sure that I have never seen a case of nervous disease, or- ganic or functional, local or general, mild or severe—insanity or any kindred affection, hysteria, epilepsy, neuralgia, or neur- asthenia—that could be established before such a court as the one at Washington, however clear and sure the case might be—perhaps on the borders of death,—or of however long standing; and there would be no difficulty, if the emotions of the other side were on fire, and financial, political, or re- ligious interests were involved, to produce hundreds and thousands of witnesses to swear unitedly, in caucus, as has been done in the case of Guiteau, that the patient was well 12 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. or nearly so, that he was shamming or might be shamming; and the jury, knowing no more of the subject than the chairs in which they sit,—the court knowing no more than the jury, the lawyers on either side knowing no more than the court,—would be as likely to decide against, as for, sci- ence and justice. Such is the status of science in American courts in this latter part of the nineteenth century ; such it must remain, until we reach a far higher civilization than now seems very near at hand. Believing heartily in the principle of trial by jury—and by non-expert jurors, for psychological reasons to be stated elsewhere,—it is yet a question in protracted and complex cases, where science enters or professes to enter, whether a toss of pennies—heads or tails—would not often come as near to justice as a jury is likely to do. THE FOUR CORNER-STONES OF INSANITY. Insanity is a disease of the brain in which mental re- sponsibility is seriously impaired. The science of insanity has for its foundation these four corner-stones. First.—All insanity implies irresponsibility in some direc- tion, if not in many directions ; an insanity entirely responsi- ble is a contradiction. Mental responsibility may be im- paired without being seriously impaired, but that is not insanity. If a person be mentally responsible in all direc- tions at all times, he cannot be called insane, however se- verely he may suffer from physical disease. The instincts of the world recognize this fact, and, despite the charges of judges and the feeling of the people, juries will rarely con- vict a lunatic of crime, unless, as in the case of Guiteau, he be without money and without friends. To be insane and to be responsible is a contradiction of GEORGE M. BEARD. 13 terms, since the very essence of insanity is irresponsibility. To say that a lunatic is responsible, is to say that a sick man is well, that a bad man is good, that vice is virtue, that er- ror is truth, that black is white, and that what is is not. He who is responsible along the whole line of Tis being, and at all times, is no longer insane ; the appearance of responsi- bility involves the disappearance of insanity. Second.—All insanity is partial insanity. The belief in total insanity is one of the same delusions of our civili- zation, Even in the nearest approach toward a total eclipse of the mind, as in dementia, in raving mania, and imbecility, the light yet breaks through the cloud at times, if not all the time, and over the dark border appears the splendor of the corona. We cannot utterly shut out the mind any more than we can utterly shut out the sun ; death is the only total insanity; and by the decisions of English judges, and by the talk of the streets, and the cries of the mobs, it is the only condition that should be urged in excuse for crime. Not only is all insanity partial insanity, but insanity is usually very limited and narrow in its range. The storm that sweeps through the forest does not prostrate every tree, but leaves many leaning or stand- ing here and there, though perhaps shaken, their branches torn and fallen, the fruits, leaves, or blossoms scattered on the ground or flying in the air ; successive storms appear, each more violent perhaps than its predecessor; and yet, after these, some shall be standing still. What we call insanity is really not insanity but the resultant of the struggles of insanity with sanity—a composition of forces, a resultant of the interaction of the elements of health with the elements of disease. While it is not true that no man is wholly sane, it is true that no man is wholly insane. To argue, as the world does, that because a suspected lunatic exhibits sanity, has memory, or reason, or acuteness THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. of intellect, or apparent physical health, he must, therefore, not be insane, is as unphilosophic and as inexpert, as to infer that all physical disease is a delusion, so long as a single atom of health remains. The worst cases of small- pox, or of yellow fever, or of leprosy, are only partially sick; cancer does not wholly eat us up, and the fatal poisons leave most of the body unaffected. All disease is partial disease; until we reach death, we are partly well. If only those who are totally insane should be relieved from responsibility for crime, then no lunatic could ever escape. As there is no such thing as total lunacy, and as what we see of the conduct of the insane—including their con- versation and their writings is but the result of the struggle of insanity with sanity, it follows that their state- ments in regard to themselves are likely to mingle truth with error, and so by experience it is proved; the insane man will sometimes admit his insanity, and quietly and scientifically recognize it. Not long ago, a man who was under my care for disease of the brain sent me word that he was crazy as he could be. This was almost the only true statement relating to himself that he made for weeks. Sometimes the insane will deny their insanity one minute, and admit it the next ; but neither their denial nor admis- sion of their insanity has of itself any scientific value. In one remarkable case of artificial insanity that I know of, a letter was v/ritten by the patient while in an insane condition. Of the writing of this letter he had no remem- brance ; but about half his statements were true, and half untrue. The changing and inconsistent talk of Guiteau in regard to his sanity and insanity was of as little worth as the in- ferences that were drawn from it. In insanity those mental phenomena that are sane will be all the brighter and more conspicuous by contrast with GEORGE M. BEARD. 15 the insanity, as the corona on the border of the eclipse is more brilliant than the full light of the sun. In insanity, as in trance, the force which is turned away from some channel that is blocked up by disease rushes through the channels of sanity that remain unobstructed, with heightened velocity. In such cases as that of Guiteau there is in special and restricted spheres an abnormal brilliancy, a kind of com- pensation for the impoverishment and destruction of the rest of the moral nature. Those witticisms and epigrams of George Francis Train, Guiteau, and other monomaniacs of that kind, are paid for by the overthrow and dislocation of a large part of the faculties. These symptoms of sanity in a monomaniac may be preserved in their force and splen- dor for years and years : as the eyes of the Cuban beauty, it is said, retain their lustre long after all her other charms have faded. In mental as in physical disease, health is in perpetual conflict with disease, and the forces of health are usually stronger than the forces of disease. Our bodies are battle- grounds for contending armies,—health on one side strug- gling with rheumatism, gout, neuralgia, cancer, consump- tion ; on the other, cancer is cancer none the less though its phase be local and years may pass before the whole body becomes cancerous. One lung may be gone, eaten away by tubercles; the patient is a consumptive, and may die, though the other lung be sound. If the knee or the ankle be inflamed by chronic rheumatic disorders, the patient is a rheumatic, though the arms and back be well. So insanity is still insanity though the mind be not wholly impaired. Third.—ln all insanity there is moral impairment. The term “ moral insanity ” is as unscholarly and tautological as the term muscular paralysis; for as there can be no THE CASE OF GUITEAU. paralysis without paralysis of the muscles, so there can be no insanity without moral impairment. As well might one believe that a frost could smite a tree all filled with flowers and leave those tender blossoms un- touched, as that insanity could smite the brain and leave the delicate and sensitive moral nature undisturbed. Moral decline is indeed one of the forerunners—almost always the primary symptom—of approaching insanity, coming to the front long before any other symptom, and forcing itself even on non-expert eyes,—the first, as well as the last symptom of disease of the mind. Insanity without moral decline is not insanity. The existence of insanity without disturbance of the moral nature is inconceivable to the human mind. In any case of mental disturbance, where responsibility is per- haps slightly impaired, the absence of moral decline would of itself establish the diagnosis, and make it clear that the person was not insane. While it is true that in some cases the moral nature is more affected than in others, yet in all cases the moral nature is, and must be affected. The term “ intellectual insanity ” is as needless and tauto- logical as the term “ moral insanity,” and should be disal- lowed for the same reason that the term “ muscular paraly- sis ” is disallowed. Fourth.— The insane, when they commit crimes, usually know right from wrong, not only in the abstract, but very often in the concrete ; and it is this very knowledge that causes them to commit crimes. When they murder they know that they are violating the law, and they are conscious of such violation before and after the commission of the crime and during the time of such commission. The sane commit crime for some purpose, to gain something, imagined or actual—money, fame, revenge,—to gratify love, hate, am- bition, or greediness ; but the insane commit crime for crime's GEORGE M. BEARD. 17 own sake, without hope or chance of reward ; they kill, not to gain any thing, but simply because killing is a dreadful thing to do ; they kill their dearest and most loved ones, because such murders are more terrible than ordinary mur- ders. When the insane commit suicide, it is not always to relieve their distress or to escape from evil, but because self-murder is a horrid and criminal act; they kill them- selves for the same reason that they swear, talk obscenity, and eat their own excrements, and defile themselves. According, therefore, to the laws and decisions of courts no insane murderers should ever escape—in or out of an asylum,—but they should be punished more severely than the sane, since they not only know right from wrong, but do the wrong simply and solely because it is wrong; insane murders are more fiendish than sane murders. INSANITY NOT SO MUCH LOSS OF KNOWLEDGE AS LOSS OF POWER. Knowledge is weakness. Standing on a dizzy height we are sick and trembling, and perchance we fall, through our very knowledge that we are are on a height ; if the eyes had been blinded, if we had not known where we were, we should have been safe. A man in the rapids of Niagara, borne down toward the falls, may know the danger just as well as his friends standing over on the shore ; but it is this very knowledge that unnerves him ; his whole force is concentrated in this knowledge, and in the fear that is the offspring of that knowledge, so that no force is left to escape the danger ; did he not know that the falls were near he might, without aid, reach the banks in safety. Such is the philosophy of the crimes of the insane: their knowledge of the zvrong makes them do the wrong. The other day one of my insane patients took a beautiful prayer book, a valued gift from her husband, and tore it up leaf by leaf and put in the flames ; and this she did because it THE CASE OF GUITEAU. was so beautiful, because it had sacred memories and asso- ciations, because it was a precious gift from a husband whom she absorbingly loves ; had it been but a common and cheap affair she might not have cared to burn it. For tearing and burning, substitute stealing and killing, and this tender and loving and most conscientious girl must, by the decision of Judge Cox, be hanged by the neck until she is dead. Fortunately for lunatics and society, juries, except in the height of popular storms, usually give no attention to the charges of judges that a knowledge of the distinction between right and wrong is evidence of sanity, or the want of such knowledge insanity. When a man has physical and mental force enough to commit a great crime, the presump- tion is that he knows right from wrong as well as a sane man ; and very often—though not always—he knows right from wrong in reference to the special act that he commits. The moral impairment of the insane is not in knowledge, but in power,—in the capacity to abstain from doing what they know to be zvrong. Lunatics lose their power of origi- nating, of discovering, of learning new truths, and striking out in new paths ; but they do not lose entirely what they have already known of morals, arts, sciences, politics, or re- ligion. Indeed, it is because these criminal acts are wrong, and they know they are wrong, that these lunatics commit them. Their delusions and impulses force them to seek relief by some terrible outward expression ; just as a man in a passion finds vent for his feelings in profanity, or in walking up and down the room in a violent manner. And the more horrible the crime, the greater, oftentimes, the relief they obtain by committing that crime ; so great in- deed, that in many cases they are restored to reason thereby, and begin to take measures for escaping from the consequences of the act. All the facts connected with Guiteau’s history tend to GEORGE M. BEARD. 19 confirm his own statement that he was greatly relieved after the murder of the President; his own expression was, “ I never felt so happy in my life.” If we could suppose a society in which murder was not regarded as a crime or a wrong, but a sweet and pleasant thing to do, it is doubtfid whether lunatics would commit murder. A powerful emotion, sane or insane, calls for a corre- sponding powerful expression of that emotion ; whence it is that the crazy fancy themselves to be divinely commis- sioned, or in partnership with the gods ; the natural is too small and mean for their feelings, which can only be grati- fied by taking hold of forces above and outside of nature. The more diseased the brain, and the more helpless, oft- times, the insane may be, the grander and more magnificent and more supernatural their delusions. PSYCHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF GUITEAU. In the investigation of the Guiteau easel have availed my- self of various sources of information. I had given the sub- ject my careful attention before I was summoned to testify. I spent three days in different weeks in Washington ; had four separate interviews with the prisoner, at three of which prolonged conversations were held ; I had numerous con- versations with his brother-in-law and counsel, Mr. Scoville ; his sister, Mrs. Scoville; and his brother, J. W. Guiteau ; and also conversed with several other persons, whose names have not yet been brought before the public. In my interviews with the prisoner at the jail and the court-house I have discussed many topics, and went over the leading events in his life; and at my first long interview, be- fore he came on the stand, I subjected him to a cross-exam- ination which was very much like that to which he was subjected to by Judge Porter, and he gave to my questions 20 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. very much the same answers that he gave on the stand. I made minute inquiries in regard to his habits, his amusements, his reading, his friendships, his education, his disappointments, his love experiences, and his domestic life ; and also made a detailed investigation in regard to the his- tory of disease in the different branches of his family. Among the facts which I thus learned, and which were not brought out on the trial, are the following: In his childhood and boyhood he was called studious, energetic, and very ambitious; he was an extravagant admirer of Henry Ward Beecher and Horace Greeley; when Mr. Greeley died he felt severely afflicted. The writings of these men, the Bible, and the newspapers were about all the literary nourishment that he has ever had in his life. Of the poets and the classics he has known but little; and modern science—which has been more popular- ized in his day than ever before in the history of the world—is to him as though it had never been. I could not ascertain in my conversation with him that he had even known the names of the leading scientific men of the world. In his school days he was somewhat distin- guished as an orator, and during the trial his oratorical ability was conspicuous, despite the craziness of his manner. There is no evidence that up to the time when he was at Ann Arbor, when he was eighteen or nineteen years of age, he had been other than a well-behaved boy; he had but very few friends, was retiring in his tastes, was obstinate, but, to say the least, was not a bad boy, nor did he promise to be a bad citizen. These points were not brought out as clearly and in as much detail on the trial as they might have been. From his conduct and conversation during this period we have a standard by which to judge his conduct and conversation in later years, after he became insane. GEORGE M. BEARD. 21 In estimating the character of Guiteau we have three sources of information. i. Evidence as to his character during boyhood. 2. Evidence as to his character from the time he left Ann Arbor to the present time. 3. Behavior since the assassination, in and out of court, including his conduct, his conversation, and his writings. On the trial he has been his own counsel, his own witness, his own expert, and his own judge, for he decided points of science and law, and gave an address and charge to the jury. The facts gathered from all these sources, including those which are well known, and those that I have obtained my- self and which have not been published heretofore, make it clear that Guiteau was originally a person of more than ordinary intellectual force. There is no evidence that he had any genius for science; but he surely had qualities of thought and of expression that might have made him successful either as a public speaker at the bar or in the pulpit. He certainly is the flower of his family; his power of statement is far above the average of uneducated men, and has not been destroyed by his cerebral disease. It is this power of putting things which has made his trial at once a disgrace and a comedy, and which has confused and puzzled and exasperated experts and non-experts; for it must be allowed that no one in that court-room could compete with him in the simple power of isolated state- ments, and this gift he has shown not only since the assas- sination, but in all his active life. His rhetorical strength, however, is in limited, single, detached statements; logi- cal, profound, connected paragraphs are, and have been, beyond his capacity. In the immense amount of literature that he has given to the world, it is doubtful whether 22 THE CASE OF GUITEAU. twelve consecutive, clear, and coherent sentences can be found; certainly not in those that relate even incidentally to his delusions. All the links of the chain are there, but they are not joined, but rather tossed about hither and thither, singly, like quoits, each one good and strong of it- self, but without relation to any other; he is incapable, and has all along been incapable, of prolonged argument or illus- tration ; his insanity forces itself constantly to the front, breaking in upon his eloquence and his rhetoric. His utter- ances in and out of court that so startle the nation are like fiery shafts of sunlight breaking through the cloud, that seem all the stronger and more surprising from the contrast to the darkness through which they pierce. The mind of Guiteau is never free from eclipse, though it is never totally eclipsed ; but the splendor of the corona, the unexpected streams of light, keep us in constant sur- prise. His mind revolves rapidly and in obedience to law, but in a very narrow orbit that is easily calculated. Analyze all that Guiteau has done during the past twenty years or more, and we find that he has been walking around and around in a peck measure ; a repetition, without end, of words, thoughts, and arguments mostly borrowed, though often true and sagacious, but never coherent, when consid- ered in relation to each other. Even his power of black- guardism is limited ; he does not swear, he does not use obscene language, and his list of terms of reproach is as short as it is uninteresting and repelling. His memory is good, has always been good, as it usually is, in these cases of monomania; but of judgment that requires connected thought and the recognition of the relation of things to each other, and of one’s self to external nature, he has little. The most unfortunate and unscientific defence that was at first attempted—that he was naturally an imbecile or fool—was abandoned ; for very GEORGE M. BEARD. 23 soon it was found that, like George Francis Train, he was not originally a failure, but endowed with power of thought and of epigrammatic statement; and though he is now a ruin, yet an interesting ruin—the wreck of a ship that might have made a noble voyage,—amid all these flashes of smartness and unintentional wit Guiteau has been doing the most in- sane things that are possible to one afflicted with monoma- nia. Insanity has been struggling with sanity, as it has been all his life, and the sanity has attracted more notice than the insanity ; for the same reason that we are dazzled more by the light of the sun as it breaks through the cloud, than by the cloud itself. Like all the insane, Guiteau has been immoral; he has been a cheat, an adulterer a murderer, a literary thief, a religious and political tramp ; but if he were moral, he must be sane, for the essence of insanity is immorality. To bring up his immoralities as proofs of his sanity, as was done in the court, is as non-expert as it would be to point to the pitting in a case of suspected small-pox as a sign that the patient did not have the small-pox. While the immoral are not usually insane, the insane are always immoral. The philosopher who said that he learned manners from the unmannerly, by avoiding what they did, would do well to visit asylums for the insane, where love and tenderness, mercy and sympathy, charity and benevolence, kindness and reciprocity, forbearance and courtesy, sweet and deli- cate attentions and affections,—all minor, all major virtues are almost unknown. Insanity makes us children, makes us savages, makes us animals. Guiteau is without malice, incapable of revenge ; neither nature nor brain disease has given him the power of pro- longed emotion, evil or good ; he is, and has ever been, with all his insanity, an animal of impulses and transient attacks of passion. Under excitement he has used—very often uses 24 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. —language that seems to show that he hates his relatives, even his sister, who, alone of all his family, understands him, and his brother-in-law, who has given his time and strength to his defence ; but I have seen the members of the family sufficiently, and talked with the prisoner and relatives enough to make it certain to my mind that his permanent feeling toward them is not unkindly, and that he appreciates in a fractional, disconnected way—as far as a lunatic can—what they have done and tried to do for him. In his relations to his friends, as in all other respects, he is out of harmony with his environment; he is violent be- cause he is insane ; but neither his temper nor his insanity makes him revengeful. His striking his father, and raising the axe against his sister, years ago, were the effects of tran- sient exacerbations of insanity, and not of sustained and treasured ill-feeling. I have lately had under care a mono- maniac that is a duplicate of Guiteau in this respect. In the witchcraft trials and murders in Salem—between which and the trial of Guiteau there are interesting resem- blances,—the very facts, which, to an expert in psychology, established the innocence of the victims, were held to be the stoutest proofs of their guilt. In the Guiteau trial the worst insanities of the prisoner were daily bulletined as proofs of his sanity. Had he kept quiet in court it is possible that some of the jury might have brought in a verdict in accord- ance with the evidence. On the first of my three visits to Washington to study the case of Guiteau, I found that he was at that time com- posed in manner; he sat near his counsel, and although he interrupted occasionally, he spoke quietly, so that the court was interrupted but slightly. At that time I predicted that he might, and probably would, become worse as the trial V proceeded; this prediction was fulfilled; for, afterward, when he was placed in the prisoner’s dock, he became more GEORGE M. BEARD. 25 and more furious in behavior, declaiming with a loud and angry voice, so as to be heard all over the hall. I see no reason—despite the history of his family—why, if he had gone to Yale College and completed his educa- tion, as he wished to do, instead of going to the Oneida Community, as his fanatical father forced him to do, he might not have grown up to be a respected and able citi- zen ; for while the lower education, with its complications and repetitions, in early life may, and often does tend to de- velop insanity in a child, yet the training of the intellect in the higher branches of English study, rightly managed, and, indeed, in spite of the defects of our educational sys- tem, is one of the best preventives of insanity. Just the opposite course was urged and carried out by his father, who plied his son with superstition, and finally drove him to the Oneida Community, which has until lately existed as y a survival of mediaevalism in the midst of our civilization, where religious belief or profession of belief has been made the support of free-love and the violation of law. While the mere going to the Oneida Community was not in itself a proof of insanity, yet for an energetic, able, and ambitious man to leave his studies and break up all his plans of life, exile himself from home and friends and rush to this so- ciety, was as immoral and frantic an act as could well be committed ; and, even without connecting this with his sub- sequent life and the murder of the President, is proof to my mind that his insanity began at Ann Arbor, Guiteau is not specially heroic nor specially timid ; he does not wish to be hanged, but he is willing to be hanged, and if necessary will go to the scaffold as he would go to the breakfast-table. If he must die, he would die dramati- cally, picturesquely, publicly; with insane attention to de- tails, as the adjustment of the rope and the arrangement for the agents of the Associated Press ; with insane inattention 26 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. to the main and only issue, the deprivation of life; and with an insane speech on his lips. Those who believe that the primary object of civilized punishment is revenge—to get even with our criminals,—and who insist, as some have done, that Guiteau should be tortured as well as killed, have only to abolish the newspaper and their triumph will be complete. WORTHLESSNESS OF PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS BEFORE COURTS, The physical examination of Guiteau gave no informa- tion to one seeking an answer to the question whether he was or was not insane. In cases of this kind usually, and in all cases of asserted insanity before the courts, the physical symptoms are of no value, and should never be referred to by either side. The diagnosis of insanity for legal purposes is made only by the conduct and conversation, including the writings ; contrast- ing them with the conduct, conversation, and writings of the same individual before he was insane, and that of other individuals of the class and order to which he belongs. True enough, physical symptoms without number accom- pany insanity as premonitions, parts of the medical picture of the disease, but are not diagnostic of the disease, and have no value in court, except to confuse and confound judges and juries, and pervert science before the people. The hair may be stiff and long; there may be tumors in the external ear; the eye and the retina may be congested; the tongue very foul and coated ; the face and head more or less asymmetrical ; the pupils may be unequal, may flash, or glare, or be dull; the face may be very red, or very pale ; the lips may twitch; the tongue may tremble, or turn to the right or the left, or may be protruded ; there may be deviation of the palate; the skin may be harsh, cold, or dry; the nails may cease to grow, or grow more slowly, or GEORGE M. BEARD. become fissured ; hang-nails may abound ; the reproductive organs of both sexes may suffer in ways beyond number; all the secretions may be perverted and disturbed ; the per- spiration may be increased or diminished, or become un- pleasantly odorous, and the breath likewise; there may be profound constipation and great indigestion ; the voice may be changed ; the power of singing impaired; there may be drooping of the eyelids; there may be coldness of the extrem- ities ; there may be evil dreams and bad sleep, or no sleep at all. But not long, stiff hair ; nor tumors in the external ear; nor congested eyes and retinae; nor drooping lids ; nor foul and coated tongue ; nor asymmetrical face and head; nor unequal pupils ; nor flashing, glaring, or dull eyes ; nor very red or very pale face ; nor twitching lips; nor trembling tongue, nor tongue turned to either side, or protruded from the mouth; nor deviation of the palate; nor dry, harsh skin; nor changes in the nails; nor hang-nails; nor disturbances of the reproductive organs; nor perverted and disordered secretions; nor increased, diminished, or malodorous perspiration; nor indigestion; nor constipation ; nor changed voice; nor coldness of the extremities; nor analgesia, nor low body temperature; nor evil dreams, bad sleep, or no sleep at all;—not one of these symptoms, nor all of them combined, make for us a diagnosis of insanity. If, in any case of insanity that comes before the courts, some one, or many, or all of these symptoms appear, there will al- ways be enough of mental symptoms obtained from the conduct, conversation, or writings to make it possible for us to establish a diagnosis, provided we can get the facts in regard to their history; and if we cannot get these facts we cannot make a diagnosis. In the case of Guiteau there was a facial asymmetry; but I have seen cases of asymmetry again and again in persons who were not insane, and never would be insane; and at 28 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. Dunlap’s, where the experience in measuring heads is very- great, they tell me that the only person whom they ever knew to have a perfectly symmetrical head was a fool. I often see unequal pupils in persons in comparative health, or those who are simply neurasthenic. In one of my visits to Guiteau, there appeared to be a slight inequality of one of the pupils; but one of the law- yers, who appeared to be a strong, vigorous man, had ine- quality of the pupils of a very decided character. Guiteau informed me, on my first visit to him, that in early life he had masturbated, and that since he had been troubled with emissions, and was especially troubled in that way while in jail; but thousands have such a physical history who are not insane, and who, however severely they suffer physi- cally, are never to become insane. To refer to the physical symptoms of insanity before a court is the worst possible mistake, both on scientific and popular grounds. Even in studying a case medically, physi- cal symptoms are mere incidents ; aiding us, it is true, in de- termining the precise nature of the insanity, but they are never indispensable to a correct answer to the question whether a man is or is not insane. In the Hayvren case, lately tried in Canada, the expert testimony was injured by reference to physical symptoms. (See Dr. Kiernan’s excellent analysis. Chicago Med. Review, Feb. 5, 1882.) Insanity is a mental disease, and is to be studied by mental symptoms. FACTS THAT PROVE THE INSANITY OF GUITEAU The facts in the life of Guiteau that establish his insanity, to my mind, may be arranged in three groups. Ist.—Those which were obtained through the press, and from other sources, previous to the trial. 2d.—Those which I obtained, after I was summoned to 29 GEORGE M. BEARD. testify, by a number of protracted interviews with the pris- oner, and by conversations with his friends and relatives. Some of these facts, which were of the highest impor- tance, were not brought out at the trial, and were not made public until I called attention to them ; some of them were not known even to the family of the prisoner ; and are now published for the first time. These facts alone—the facts that I obtained myself,— taken in connection with my personal examination of the prisoner, would convince me that he was a monomaniac, even although I had known nothing else. 3d.—Those facts which were brought out under oath on the trial. These facts are, for the purposes of science, of the least importance of all; little or nothing was brought out on the trial that was not known before. The press and the people were substantially correct in their statements about the prisoner before the trial began, and little was done, or could be done on the trial, to make such state- ments more clear or more correct. On the other hand, some of the most important facts relating to the prisoner—facts which a scientific man trying to answer the question whether the prisoner was or was not insane, would consider of the highest importance—were not even referred to on the trial. This is usually the case with trials of this kind, where the question of insanity is raised. The rules of evidence and the custom of the courts in this country, as well as in England, whence we derive our laws, require the suppres- sion and distortion of evidence both in fact and in expert opinion, in all cases where the question of insanity is pre- sented ; and yet, in spite of these hereditary difficulties under which the court labored, it succeeded in bringing out more proofs of the insanity of the prisoner than were ever before brought against any monomaniac arraigned for 30 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. crime either in England or America. It was indeed this excess of evidence that helped to convict him, for to the non-expert public many of the symptoms of insanity are thought to be the symptoms of sanity. The murder of the President was only one of thousands of his insane deeds, and scientifically it was of far less value than many other facts in the career of this lunatic. The one mistake of the defence was in trying to make the jury believe that Guiteau was insane at the moment when he fired the pistol. If he was not insane twenty years ago he is not insane now. NEW FACTS OBTAINED INDEPENDENTLY BY MY OWN INVESTIGA- TIONS. It had been stated in the papers that there was some woman whom Guiteau hoped to marry, and that one of his hopes in relation to securing the foreign appointment was that it would enable him to obtain the hand of this woman. Although I made many inquiries in various directions, I could get no information on this subject; but at my last interview with Guiteau at the jail, in the presence of Mr. Scoville, I put the direct question to Guiteau, and asked him to frankly tell me all about it. He was a little dis- posed to be reticent, and I doubt whether at any of my previous interviews, or on any other occasion, he would have given me a direct answer. He blushed like a woman, hesi- tated a little, but finally gave me the following facts. While in New York last winter, after the election, he be- came infatuated with the idea of marrying the daughter of a millionnaire living on Fifth Avenue, whose name he would not give. This lady he followed—as so often happens with monomaniacs—wherever she went ; he went to the church which she attended, passed by the house where she lived, up and down the street, went twice to the house and asked to see her, and was told that she did not know him ; GEORGE M. BEARD. he wrote letters to which she sent no replies ; he watched and waited for her when she left her carriage ; in short, he acted just as erratic maniacs generally do ; and followed her thus for a long time, whenever and wherever he could find a chance. The lady, on the other hand, according to Guiteau’s own statement, never replied to his letters, never gave him a word or even a look of recognition, and, indeed, in all respects utterly ignored his existence. Guiteau after- ward found, to his disappointment, that this lady was not, as he had supposed, a daughter, but some other relative of the family; the daughter whom he supposed he was run- ning after being an invalid, and confined to the house. Guiteau’s statements in regard to his life are generally verifiable; in the heat of passion, under the influence of an- ger in court and out of it, he may say things that are not true; but when not angry, in his cool, calm moments, his statements in regard to himself are truthful, and have been confirmed by a large number of observers. He does not, as a rule, hesitate to tell the very worst things about him- self, and does not appear to care about the way they may appear to others, or the impressions others may derive from them. As he told this story to Mr. Scoville and myself he laughed, as any one else would do, over the absurd, gro- tesque denouement. This was not the only time in his life when he manifested this insane symptom. Out West, as Mr. Scoville told me, he followed a young lady in the same way, went to her house, and inquired for the lady, followed her repeatedly, paying—as in the other case—no attention to the snubbing he received, and was finally kicked or horse-whipped by the father of the lady. Not a few cases of monomania have been sent to asylums for symptoms like these, when in other respects they were 32 THE CASE OF GUITEAU. perfectly well and sane. A daughter of one of the wealthi- est men in New York City, a man whose name is known all over the world, was annoyed for months in this way by a man who was finally sent to an asylum and kept there for six months; and when let out and told that if he repeated the act he would be again sent to the asylum, he conducted himself in the same way as before, was returned to the asy- lum, and died there insane.1 A well-known merchant of this city had a clerk in his employ, a faithful, trustworthy, and useful man, who con- ducted himself every way properly, so far as is known, ex- cept that he was infatuated with his employer’s daughter. This man also was sent to an asylum. As New Yorkers will remember, Miss Nilsson, the singer, was annoyed in the same way by a man who persistently followed her, and she was relieved of his annoying atten- tions only by his being taken to an asylum. I am informed by satisfactory authority—a prominent member of Congress—that about thirteen years ago Guiteau pleaded the case of a criminal in a court of one of our Western towns. The style of the plea and his conduct during its delivery were such as to con- vince all the lawyers who were present that he was a mono- maniac. His talk was as senseless and grotesque as all his talk has been ever since he came before the public; and the whole speech in its matter was adapted best of all to injure his client, was indeed the speech of a lunatic ; the manner was even worse than the matter; he talked and acted like a crazy man. There was a bar between him and the jury; he came up to this bar, jumped over it like a monkey, put his fist in the face of a juryman, and talked with great ve- hemence, to the amusement of the spectators; and his client was convicted, without the jury leaving their seats. 1 My authority for these statements is Dr. T. H. Kellogg, who was then con- nected with the asylum. GEORGE M. BEARD. 33 Non-expert testimony of this kind would not be sufficient to convict him of insanity, but it is enough to call for in- vestigation ; and if his friends had brought such a fact to my attention at that time, I should have said the case de- manded investigation. This is non-expert testimony; but nearly all the testimony on the trial was non-expert testi- mony, and by this he was convicted. FACTS BROUGHT OUT IN COURT. The facts under this head are so familiar that it is not necessary to repeat them in great detail; some, if not all of them, were contained in the hypothetical questions which were prepared by the prosecution ; but were so stated and arranged as to give, in some instances, a wrong impression. The questions, however, as a whole, were sufficiently fair and correct to enable one familiar with this form of insanity to form a judgment, even without some of the inferences which were employed in a number of the phrases. I was, therefore, prepared to answer those hypothetical questions which had been prepared by the prosecution, and by them put to their witnesses, and to say that they were sufficient evidences of insanity, as they were. I went on the stand prepared with that testimony, as was stated in court, and should have given it if the court had allowed. The hypo- thetical questions prepared by Mr. Scoville for the defence I would not have answered, and I so told him ; although the prisoner was insane, and I knew he was insane, I did not obtain that knowledge from the facts contained in the hypothetical questions of the defence, but rather from facts some of which were contained in the hypothetical questions prepared by the prosecution. PHYSICAL ANALOGUES TO MONOMANIA. A very good physical analogue to monomania is the dis- 34 THE CASE OF GUITEAU. ease called “ writer’s cramp,” and the affections allied to it. Those who have had this disorder, or who have seen others suffering from it, know that while their muscles are ap- parently as strong, as firm, and as sure for all other move- ments as ever ; while they may sew, knit, or play on instru- ments, or do various sorts of work requiring complex play of the muscular machinery of the fingers and hands, yet, in the severe cases, as soon'as an attempt is made to grasp the pen and to write, cramp or convulsions follow; the writing becomes jerky, tremulous, and illegible, like that of very old age ; the pen slips or drops from the hand, and in some cases is hurled involuntarily across the room. The mental faculties of the monomaniac, like the condition of the muscles of a person affected by this disease, are strong and under control for all or nearly all combinations of movements, perhaps, except one,—and for that one as help- less and irresponsible as are the muscles in the worst stages of writer’s paralysis. Monomania is writer’s cramp of the mind. Yet another excellent physical analogue to monomania is in local St. Vitus’ dance, limited twitching of the mus- cles, as of the eyes or the face. General St. Vitus’ dance, where the whole body is thrown into convulsions, all know by observation ; but these limited and protracted choreas, the special insanities of certain groups of muscles, the mus- cular monomanias of the nerves, as they might be called, are not quite so familiar to the laity, nor so well understood by physicians. The facial spasms, which all have seen, are types of this special and limited chorea. And they are far harder to cure than general chorea, in which the whole body is thrown into spasms; partly because they are chronic, and are not treated until they have got strong, and become a fixed habit. Monomania is the local chorea of the mind. GEORGE M. BEARD. 35 When we look at a beautiful young lady, perfectly well in all other respects, and with no signs of chorea, except in a few muscles of the face, a twitching of the lips and eye- brows, and when even that is only shown under excitement, and stops entirely when we look at it and study it, or the patient is conscious that we are watching her, it is difficult to convince the observer that the person is really a sufferer, although she is afflicted with one of the most distressing and incurable of diseases. For the same reason it is hard to persuade any one that the monomaniac who appears healthy, whose mind even is strong and vigorous for certain acts in many directions, is thrown into spasms along certain lines of delusions, which are as much beyond his control as the muscular convulsions of the sufferer from writer’s cramp or St. Vitus’ dance. Another good analogue for monomania is ataxy. The ataxic patient is not thoroughly paralyzed ; his power of mo- tion is not paralyzed at all, though the nerves of sensation may be much altered. The ataxic patient can take a single step as well as a person in health, perhaps two steps ; but when he attempts to take a succession of steps he becomes irre- sponsible, for want of coordination ; he walks like a drunken man. Insanity is ataxy of the mind; the lunatic has single thoughts that, in themselves, are as sensible, clear, just, and wise as those of any other man ; but attempting to link a series of thoughts in a logical arrangement in the line where his delusion interferes, the insane man at once shows his infirmity, as the ataxic patient shows his ataxy when he attempts to walk across the room. Monomania is mental a,taxy. Guiteau, in his conduct in the court-room, was one of the best illustrations of this mental ataxy. In isolated state- ments of law, of fact, or even of science, as bearing on his case, he was as lucid and as wise as any one in that court 36 THE CASE OF GUI TEA U. room ; but during that long trial, in conversations touching the subject of his delusions, not once did he utter, nor could he utter, half a dozen sensible, rational sentences. He could ask a witness a single question, and there he stopped. A prolonged examination of a witness would have been as much beyond his power as it would be beyond the power of an ataxic patient to walk on a chalk line. I have gathered details of a large number of cases of monomania more or less analogous to that of Guiteau. Some of these cases are derived from my personal experi- ence with patients ; others are gleaned from French and German authorities. These cases, together with facts in the differential diagnosis of vice and insanity, of fanaticism and insanity, of genius and insanity, and the symptoms of sanity, will appear at a later date. THE JOURNAL OF NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASE WILLIAM J. MORTON, M.D., New York. EDITED BY PROFESSOR OF DISEASES OF THE MIND AND NERVOUS SYSTEM, UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT; PHYSICIAN TO DEPARTMENT OF NERVOUS DISEASES, METROPOLITAN THROAT HOSPITAL, N. Y.; ETC., ETC. William A. Hammond, M.D., Edward C. Seguin, M.D., Meredith Clymer, M.D., New York; J. S. Jewell, M.D., H. M. ASSOCIATE EDITORS : Bannister, M.D., Chicago ; and Isaac Ott, M.D., Easton, Pa. PROSPECTUS FOR 1882. The JOURNAL OF NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASE, with the issue of January, 1882, will pass into the ninth year of its existence. It is therefore the longest-continued journal on Diseases of the Nervous System ever published in this country, and it is speaking within bounds to say that it has proved a constant credit to American medical literature. During its term of life it has won its way to the highest recognition as an authority and guide in that branch of medicine of which it is an ex- ponent. To the specialist on Nervous Diseases it has ever been an inviting field in which to record his observations, and an unfailing source of information in his studies ; to the general practitioner it has proved the readiest means of keeping himself in- formed of the current thought of the times concerning a class of diseases that pass daily before his eyes and claim his acutest attention. To meet the wants of both these classes will still be its mission. It is hardly necessary to say that the JOURNAL represents no clique, school, or party. It will be in the widest sense independent and cosmopolitan. We cordially invite communications from all interested in Neurological Science, and we can promise an absolutely impartial consideration to all. COLLABORATORS. Paris, France—Prof. J. M. CHARCOT, M. D. Baltimore, Md.—Prof. F. T. MILES, M. D., JOHN VAN BIBBER, M. D. Boston, Mass.—Prof. HENRY P. BOWDITCH, M.D., JAMES H. DENNY, M. D., CHARLES F. FOLSOM, M. D., NORTON FOLSOM, M. D. Chicago, lII.—S. V. CLEVENGER, M. D., H. GRADLE, M. D., J. K. KIERNAN, M. D. Newport, R. I.—JOHN J. MASON, M. D. New Orleans, La.—H. D. SCHMIDT, M. D. New York and Brooklyn—R. W. AMIDON, M. D., GEORGE M. BEARD, M. D„ W. R. BIRDSALL, M. D., Prof. C. L. DANA, M. D„ V. P. GIBNEY, M. D., GRAEME M. HAMMOND, M. D., Prof. MARY PUTNAM JACOBI. M. D., WILLARD OSBORN, M. D., T. MITCHELL PRUDDEN, M. D., L. PUTZEL, M. D„ Prof. AMBROSE L. RANNEY, M. D., J. C. SHAW, M. D„ Prof. NEWTON M. SHAFFER, M. D., ALEXANDER J. C. SKENE, M. D„ THEO. H. KELLOGG, M. D. Philadelphia, Pa.—Prof. ROBERTS BARTHOLOW, M. D., CHARLES K. MILLS, M. D., Prof. ANDREW J. PARKER, M. D„ WHARTON SINK- LER, M. D., Prof. H. C. WOOD, M. D. San Francisco, CaI.—EUGENE DUPUY, M. D. St. Louis, Mo.—J. K. BAUDUY, M. D., CHAS. H. HUGHES, M. D. Syracuse, N. Y.—H, P. WILBUR, M. D. The JOURNAL will be Issued Quarterly, at a Subscription Price of $5.00 per year, payable in advance. The price per number will be $1.50. G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS, 27 $c 29 West Twenty-third Street, New York. G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, PRINTERS, 2~J & 2g WEST 23D STREET, NEWYORK.