[From The Journal of Inebriety, January, 1888.] 
THE MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE OF 
INEBRIETY. 
By Joseph Parrish, M. D., Burlington, N. J. 
Read before the Medico-Legal Society of New York, at its Annual Meeting 
held December 14, 1887. 
Before entering upon the discussion of the subject we 
have in hand, it is essential to an intelligent view of it, that 
we agree upon the meaning and application of terms. The 
words, Drunkenness, Intoxication, Alcoholism, Inebriety, etc., 
are so carelessly and interchangeably used, that I shall con- 
fine myself to Inebriety the Disease, as distinguished from 
other forms of alcoholic effects, and especially from the daily 
drunkenness of the saloon and the street. The typical 
inebriate comes into the world, with the "mark of the beast 
upon his forehead," or it may be with a vestige only, of an 
ancestral taint, which inclines him to seek indulgence in 
intoxicants of some kind. In other words, he is born with a 
decided alcoholic diathesis, or with a positive tendency to 
form one. That is to say*, that where the hereditary impulse 
is not sufficiently potential to impart a complete diathesis, it 
leaves only an inclination or tendency to free indulgence, 
which, if continued in excess, will grow into a constitutional 
demand, as imperious and exacting, as in the other case. 2 
The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
Such persons are moved at times by a passion for indul- 
gence, which is beyond their control. It comes at intervals, 
it may be of weeks, or months, during which periods of time 
they not only have no desire for alcohol in any of its forms, 
but a loathing and disgust for them. It is not the taste or 
appetite for them that is to be satisfied, but the effect. They 
long for a condition of oblivion, of forgetfulness of self, and 
of all selfish and annoying cares and troubles and moods. 
Neither have they any desire for convivial companionship. 
The glitter and glow of public resorts, where liquor is the 
prime factor of wrong and ruin, have no attractions for them. 
They are not tempted by such displays. The temptation, 
with which they are tempted, is within. It is subjective. It 
circles in the stream that gives them life. It may be likened 
to a battery that is hidden somewhere in the cerebral sub- 
stance- connected by continuous fiery wires, with a coil in 
every ganglion, from whence they continue to extend - 
attenuating and distributing, as they go, reaching after the 
minutest nerve fibrils, which need only a throb from the 
inborn impulse, to transmit a force that quivers in every 
muscle, and burns in every nerve, till the victim is suddenly 
driven from himself, into the ways of unconscious debauch- 
ery. Technically, it is a brain or nerve storm, which 
dominates all other conditions, and leaves the patient, for 
the time, without any power to control his own acts. 
Dr. J. M. Howie of Liverpool, England, says, that such a 
man possesses no power of resistance, " That he drinks as 
naturally as a fish swims, or a dog barks ! " Dr. I. B. Hurry, 
also of England, describes the craving for drink as "coming 
in the form of a paroxysm, which runs a more or less 
cyclical course." He calls it " uncontrollable drunkenness ! " 
and quotes Dr. Hutcheson as saying, "That this sort of 
mania differs entirely from drunkenn'ess, the diagnostic sign of 
the disease being an irresistible propensity to swallow stim- 
ulants in enormous doses, whenever and wherever they can 
be procured." This form of inebriation is often, if not 
usually, found in our most useful professions-men of The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
3 
letters and culture, of refined tastes and manners, who scorn 
the low-lived friendships of the groggery, and who vainly 
strive for liberty. 
Dr. Norman Kerr of London, the faithful friend of the 
inebriate, and eloquent advocate for legislative aid in his 
behalf, has used the following most impressive language. 
" The struggle of the intemperate for freedom, is a combat 
more terrible than any other' fight on earth. It is more 
arduous than the most celebrated of those, the praises of 
which have been from remotest ages immortalized by 
undying verse." 
It remains yet to notice a most important and prominent 
symptom of inebriety, which, together with periodicity, con- 
stitutes its real pathognomo'nic sign, namely, loss, or sus- 
pension of consciousness and memory, without sleep or 
stupor, during which the patient acts automatically, being 
without knowledge of his actual condition, at the same time 
appearing to be, and to act, naturally. I have had numer- 
ous cases of the kind, of which the following are examples. 
G. A., a young gentleman who resided about fourteen 
miles from the city, left home to visit friends, and attend to 
a few errands, agreeing to return by an early evening train. 
He called on his friends, attended to his business, accom- 
plishing all that he intended to do on leaving home, but did 
not take the early evening train to return Instead of doing 
so, he unfastened a fine looking horse and vehicle from a 
hitching post on the sidewalk, mounted the carriage, and 
drove safely to his home, fourteen miles away. He crossed 
the river by a bridge, avoided collision with vehicles of all 
sorts on a crowded thoroughfare, paid toll at all the turnpike 
gates through which he passed, and reached home in safety 
and in good season, with the horse in good condition, show- 
ing that he had not been abused by fast driving. He was 
taken to the stable, and the young man retired to his room. 
In the morning having slept off the effects of a few potations 
of whisky, he met his family in the breakfast-room, having no 
knowledge of having reached home in the way he did, and 4 
The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
was surprised to find in a morning paper an advertisement 
for the horse and wagon. Ashamed and humiliated by the 
discovery, he proceeded at once with an attendant to answer 
the advertisement. The owner, being a physician and taking 
in the situation, was thankful to find his favorite horse un- 
abused. The two gentlemen shaking hands and congratulat- 
ing each other upon the safe and satisfactory issue of a 
bold and reckless experiment, with abundant apologies on 
one side, and full forgiveness on the other, separated, having 
left for you and for me a record of an interesting case of cere- 
bral automatism, to become a part of the proceedings of this 
society. 
Another, Professor W , a Christian gentleman and 
scholar, a popular and successful teacher. The passion 
comes to him unbidden, and even without previous thought 
on the subject, and sometimes suddenly. He may be en- 
gaged in his study preparing to meet his class, and there 
comes over him a seeming cloudiness which darkens his 
mind, and he seems lost to things about him. Without 
seeming to know why, he leaves his study and his home, 
seeks the village near which he lives, takes a few drinks of 
whisky, casts aside all sense of self-respect, all care for the 
opinion of others, resists all appeals to stop and stay, and 
with a recklessness unknown to him in a state of sobriety, 
abandons himself to his cups and their consequences. Dur- 
ing his carouse, he hires a horse and buggy, drives into the 
country, visits friends, dines or sups with them, remains till 
the next day, returns to the village, pays for his horse and car- 
riage, settles his saloon bills, and when quite himself again 
goes to his home, seats himself in his study, resumes his prep- 
aration for his classes, without remembering anything that 
was done during his absence. The interval between the 
cloudy feeling in his study and his return, sobered, mortified, 
and overcome with self-reproach and remorse, is a complete 
blank. 
My friend and colleague, Dr. Crothers of Hartford, Conn., 
has brought to light a number of similar cases, and published The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
5 
them in a valuable brochure which every student of this sub- 
ject should read; it is called "Cerebral Trance, or Loss of 
Consciousness and Memory in Inebriety." 
The phenomenon of unconscious cerebration, of which I 
have produced two examples, is seen, and sometimes in a 
more marked degree, in the disorder known as Somnambu- 
lism, which has no connection with alcohol as a factor, and 
yet its exhibition of amnesia under remarkable conditions, 
leads to the suspicion that both disorders may be traced to a 
want of equilibrium in the same nerve centers, or in those 
that are closely allied to each other, by which, in both, there 
is impaired consciousness. Dr. Clouston tells us of one 
Simon Fraser, a highly neurotic subject, who had been a 
sleep-walker all his life, and did all sorts of things in accord- 
dance with his illusions and false beliefs, during his somnam- 
bulistic state. He once went up to his neck in the sea of 
Norway, and did not awake. At last one night, while in a 
somnambulistic state, he seized his child to whom he was 
much attached, thinking it was a white animal, and dashed 
it against the wall and killed it.* 
From Dr. Crothers' pamphlet we learn of a record made 
by Dr. Forbes Winslow, "Of a somnambulist, who while 
walking about, his night dress caught fire, and with excellent 
judgment and coolness he threw himself on the bed and 
extinguished the flames, resumed his walk, and next morning 
had no knowledge or memory of the event, and wondered 
greatly how his dress became so charred." 
Another exhibit of cerebral automatism, whose conscious- 
ness was either obliterated or suspended, is the most re- 
markable case of the Massachusetts farmer. His rye har- 
vest had been carefully stored ; and when the threshing 
season came, he arose from his bed, went to the barn, climbed 
to the mow, and threw down a flooring of sheaves, threshed 
them, raked the straw away, and deposited it in a place pro- 
vided for it, swept into a heap the rye, and after repeating 
*A full account of the case and the trial, is given in The Journal of Mental 
Science, Vol. XXIV, p. 451. 6 
The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
this act four times, returned to his house and bed, and in the 
morning was surprised to find that he had threshed several 
bushels of rye while in the state of automatism. 
Epilepsy has some likeness to inebriety in the same 
direction of unconsciousness, and alcohol may or may not 
play any part in the r61e of aetiology. The fact being now 
established that inebriety is a disease, characterized by peri- 
odicity, unconscious cerebration, amnesia, with automatic con- 
duct, as if in a normal state, taken together with the fact of 
paralysis of will during the attack, constitutes a series of 
morbid phenomena' that are worthy of special study. The 
eminent physicians, Dr. Hulings Jackson of England, says 
"that the force of automatism depends upon the disposition 
of the man. He might have a train of murderous thoughts 
which he would proceed to execute, or he might have con- 
ceived the most absurd and irrational theories, which would 
have involved him in crime, for which he would have been 
punished, and of which he was thoroughly unconscious at 
the time." While it seems to be true that the feature of 
automatism has not been described as belonging to the natu- 
ral history of inebriety until within the past few years, it is 
quite clear that the constitutional susceptibility to the alco- 
holic impression which has been so strongly and yet so 
readily formed as to create a diathesis, and consequently a 
necessity, has been abundantly confirmed. Not only has 
the confirmation come from modern observers, but from the 
last century we may name Blackstone of England, Montes- 
quieu of Europe, and Rush of this country, who have borne 
testimony to the dogma. In Blackstone's Commentaries, 
vol. iv, p. 26, under the head of drunkenness, that distin- 
guished jurist says : "It hath been observed that the real 
use of strong liquors, and the abuse of them by drinking to 
excess, depends much upon the temperature of the climate in 
which we live." And quoting the distinguished president of 
the legislature of Bordeaux, and author of a standard work 
on jurisprudence, Montesquieu, he says, speaking of the 
German nation, that " a German drinks from custom founded The Medical Jurisprudence of Inebriety. 
7 
on a constitutional necessity!' This is a remarkable state- 
ment, seeing that it is in opposition to the common opinion 
then held, doubtless, as now, that the custom of drinking to 
excess brings on a fixed habit, which sooner or later termin- 
ates in death from some form of alcoholic disease affecting 
the viscera of the body. To transpose this sentiment to 
accord with the accepted truth of the present day, it should 
read thus: 
A necessity exists in some persons which is not the 
result of previous excess, but an inborn necessity which 
prompts the use, and thus establishes the custom. Now, in 
conclusion, we notice the relation between inebriety, som- 
nambulism, and epilepsy, as having a unity of source in their 
trinity of form, to which, severally and together, may be 
applied that principle of law to which I shall in a moment 
refer. Paralysis of will is a striking feature in each of these 
conditions, which holds preeminence of station during the 
reign of the dominating force already referred to. What 
now is the spirit and true meaning of law as applied to a 
condition of unconsciousness and loss of will or will power? 
I read it thus: "As punishments are, therefore, only inflicted 
for the abuse of that free will which God has given to man, 
it is highly just and equitable that a man should be excused 
for those acts which are done through unavoidable force or 
compulsion."-Blackstone. 
If the facts that I have stated are admitted to be true, 
and if the law I have quoted be applicable to the conditions 
represented by the facts, then the conclusion must be evi- 
dent that inebriates should not be punished for acts com- 
mitted while in a state of involuntary unconsciousness any 
more than somnambulists and epileptics are, for the same 
acts, under like conditions.