Curiosities of Medical ExperienceMillingen, J. G. (John Gideon)
Philosophy
Curiosities of Medical Experience
Millingen, J. G. (John Gideon)
Medicine
"About the age of twenty-one she became immoral in her conduct, and was
dismissed the family. Her propensity to talk in her sleep continued to the
time of her dismissal, but a great change had taken place in her nocturnal
conversation. It had gradually lost its acuteness and brilliancy, and
latterly became the mere babbling of a vulgar mind, often mingled with
insolent remarks against her superiors, and the most profane scoffing at
morality and religion. It is believed that she afterwards became insane."
To what serious reflections does not this curious history give rise. Here
there did unquestionably exist a double existence. The one a relative
being surrounded with the realities of life; the other a natural
condition, unshackled by constraint, and left entirely to the wild
enjoyment of a luxuriant fancy and an apprehension quick and brilliant. In
the former, the young creature found herself derided and degraded by her
vulgar companions; her generous infirmities, if such they may be called,
made the subject of low ribaldy. In her second existence, she became the
free child of nature.
Might not proper care have saved this interesting creature from misery!
It is admitted that "much care had been bestowed upon her instruction,"
but was she withdrawn from the low circle that surrounded her and placed
in a society where, in her waking hours, she could have derived those
advantages of a superior intercourse, which might have worked upon her
vivid imagination as powerfully as the melodious sounds she had heard at
other times? "She became immoral--scoffed at religion"--_in her sleep_.
She was then in a state of nature; unconscious, to a certain extent, of
immorality and religion, although conscious, no doubt, of relative good
and evil. Is it not more than probable that when awake, not only were her
ears assailed by profane and improper language, but is it not most likely
that her ruin was perpetrated during her visionary slumbers, and ever
after visited her mind during her paroxysms? Nor is it improbable that her
affections had been bestowed upon her despoiler. Instead of being
dismissed and cast upon the wide world, helpless, stigmatized, perhaps,
with the odious epithet of witch--for we have seen that the lower order
considered her such--might not a friendly hand have secured her in an
abode where she might have been invited _to_ COME _and sin no more_! Alas!
no wonder that the poor creature should have become insane! It is said
that she was obtuse in intellect when awake. May not this be accounted for
in some measure, by the exhaustion of her mental faculties during her
paroxysms? It is to be lamented that the learned and philosophic Dr.
Abercrombie, who has given this history, did not comment upon it. True
Christianity and its benevolence breath in every line of the eloquent
writer, and the poor Scotch _lassie_ might have afforded him a valuable
theme. How proud would any humane person have felt in making this
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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