patient by fierce distractions of
the mind, and excessively strong, tho' involuntary, motions of the
body. But most certainly we find nothing sacred in all this, nothing
but what may arise from a natural indisposition of body. And in order
to place this my opinion in the stronger light, it may not be improper
to give a short discourse on madness; not indeed on that species,
which comes on in an acute fever, and goes off with it, which is
called a phrenzy, and is always of short duration; but that other
sort, which is rivetted in the body, and constitutes a chronical
disease.

Wherefore all madness is a disease of an injured imagination, which
derives its origin from the mind, having been too long a time fixed
on any one object. Hence proceed uneasiness and anxieties of mind
concerning the event. And by how much the things, whose images
incessantly occur to the imagination, are of greater moment in life,
the more violently they disturb the person; examples of which we see
particularly in love and religion, wherein hope, fear, despair, and
other contrary passions, succeeding each other by turns, drag the
person different ways. That this is the case, will not be doubted by
any one, who recollects, that a madman often has a good memory;
manages his affairs, except when some vain ideas come across his mind,
with tolerable prudence, nay sometimes with more than ordinary
cunning; and that he ofttimes recovers the intire and permanent use of
his reason, by a course of proper medicines. Therefore in this
disorder the person is first over-whelmed by terrifying ideas, which
are followed by wrath and fury, as attendants on anxiety: whence he
threatens and attempts to do acts of the utmost cruelty to those who
approach him, and thro' excess of anguish, frequently lays violent
hands even on himself: then he grows again melancholic; and thus rage
and dejection of spirits affect him alternately: moreover it is no
uncommon thing to see a person under these circumstances, especially
when the disease has taken deep root by length of time, seeking
unfrequented and solitary places, in order to avoid the conversation
of his fellow creatures,

_Ipse suum cor edens, hominum vestigia vitans._[107]

Gnawing his heart, shunning the steps of men.

[107] _Cicero, Tuscul. Disp. Lib. iii. 26. who has turn'd
into Latin this verse of Homer:_ "[Greek: Hon thumon katedon,
paton anthropon aleeinon]." _Il. Z. v. 202._

Now, peopl