powers--is
strictly a _disease_, the definition of which, according to the best
authorities, is "an alternation from a perfect state of bodily
health." Both parties may, to a certain extent, be right; for the one,
including chiefly the metaphysicians, can successfully exhibit a
gradation in the scale of derangement: beginning at the slightest
peculiarity; passing on to an eccentricity; from that to idiosyncrasy;
from that to a decay or an extraordinary increase of strength in a
particular faculty--say memory; from that to a decay or an increase in
the intensity of a feeling, an emotion, or a passion; from that to
false perception--such as monomania, progressing to derangement as to
one point or subject, often called madness, _quoad hoc_; and so on,
through many other changes, almost imperceptible in their differences,
to perfect madness--all without the slightest indication of a
pathological nature being to be discovered or detected by the finest
dissecting-knife. On the other hand, again, it is indisputable--for we
medical men have demonstrated the fact--that a certain _degree_ of
madness is almost always accompanied with derangement in the cerebral
organs--the most ordinary appearance being the existence of a fluid of
a certain kind in the chambers of the brain.

The best and the cleverest of us must let these questions alone; for,
so long as we remain--and that may be, as it likely will be, for
ever--ignorant of the subtle principle of organic life--the nature of
the mysterious union of mind and matter--we will never be able to tell
(notwithstanding all our mental achievements) whether madness has its
primary beginning in the body or in the mind. We must remain contented
with a knowledge of exciting causes, and with that melancholy lore
which treasures up--alas! for how little good!--the dreadful symptoms
which distinguish this miserable state of proud man from all other
conditions of his earthly sorrow; exhibiting him conscious of being
still a human creature impressed with the image of God, yet incapable
of using the proudest gift of Heaven--his reason; susceptible of and
suffering the most excruciating of all pains--imaginary evils,
torments, agonies--yet placed beyond the pale of human sympathy; bent
upon--following with cunning and assiduity the cruellest modes of
self-immolation; and sometimes calmly _reasoning_ on the nature of the
mysterious power that impels to a horrible and revolting suicide.

I have bee