Insanity and intemperance : a paper read before the Psychological Section of the British Medical Association at the Annual Meeting in London, August, 1873 / by D. Yellowlees.

  • Yellowlees, D. (David)
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Insanity and intemperance : a paper read before the Psychological Section of the British Medical Association at the Annual Meeting in London, August, 1873 / by D. Yellowlees. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

    6/12 (page 6)
    deed lie has committed; he is sane or apparently sane on trial; the prison officials have seen no insanity; the jury are instruct- ed that driTnkenness is no palliation of crime, and the prisoner is found guilty. This actually occurred in the case last men- tioned, where a man, who murdered his wife under the influence of this halluciaation, was condemned to death, and subsequently reprieved on medical testimony as to his true condition. When this form of insanity occurs before middle life, or early in the career of indulgence, the patient recovers; but, of course, the same cause is too apt to induce subsequent attacks. Ultimately, or in less favourable cases, the disease subsides into the chronic condition, presenting the same symptoms, but in a milder or more intermittent form. The patient is habitually moody, self- contaraed, irritable, and repellent; forms no friendships; shows no interest in anything; does no work, or does it in a grumbHng or in a listless fashion; often detects poison in his food; often fancies himself slighted or put up6n by others; has hallucina- tions of the senses, chiefly of hearing, and under their influence often scowls and threatens, or has a brief outburst of noisy abuse. This condition is hopeless, as regards recovery. Phthisis, the result partly of the previous habits, partly of the insanity, is a frequent cause of death; and this class of cases has helped not a little to give suspicion so prominent a place in the descriptions of phthisical insanity. Another distinguishable type of the insanity caused by intem- perance is— 4. Tlie Insanity luhich occurs in persons who liad previously been