Cesare Lombroso, a modern man of science

by Hans Kurella

In order to give us a more vivid idea of these epileptoid states, Lombroso groups them as follows:

First degree, larval epilepsy.

Second degree, chronic epilepsy.

Third degree, moral insanity.

Fourth degree, congenital criminality.

Fifth degree, criminality by passion.

This view has been opposed in various quarters on the ground that Lombroso, in other parts of his leading work, explains criminality as an atavistic reversion to primitive human types, and that, consequently, in accordance with the same principle of equivalent values, the type of the epileptic must also be identical with that of primitive man. This conclusion being an impossible one, it is held that Lombroso’s whole chain of reasoning is false. But Lombroso invokes the principle of equivalent values in relation, not to qualitative, but to quantitative, relations. His opponents have just as little right to use this principle for a reductio ad absurdum as Lombroso himself had to speak of “identity” instead merely of “analogy.” It must be admitted that the criminal and the epileptic temperaments are very closely allied, that epileptics provide a disproportionately large contingent to the world of crime, and that it is quite possible that genetic relationships exist between the born criminal and the epileptic. It may well happen that when a mother suffering from nervous or mental disorder becomes pregnant, the brain and the whole organism of her child will be poorly nourished, and will, therefore, not develop normally. The child may have its development arrested at an earlier and more primitive stage, corresponding to the type of a remote ancestor, and, at the same time, these nutritive disturbances may lead to disturbances in the formation of the nerve elements, whereby the child is rendered epileptic throughout its life. The child is thus born an epileptic, and according to the nature of the arrest of development from which it suffers, it may happen that it is incapable of a normal development of the life of feeling, or it may be incapable of acquiring a normal power of resistance to anti-social impulses. It then becomes a criminal, and is, at the same time, an epileptic, with atavistic characteristics. These features may thus be united at the root, as we may see in every idiot asylum, and, unfortunately, also in numerous instances in every prison.

By this identification of the born criminal with the moral imbecile Lombroso has also given occasion to misunderstandings. It was not his intention to define the criminal with reference to the still insufficiently studied moral insanity; but, contrariwise, to say that we are only justified in speaking of moral insanity in cases in which his (Lombroso’s) “criminal type” is seen to exist. Thus moral “insanity” is defined by means of criminality, and thus an entirely new and very vivid conception of moral insanity is rendered possible; for Lombroso’s “moral insanity” is not an acquired disease suddenly attacking the brain and suddenly introducing psychical disturbances, but it is the psychological expression of criminal degeneration. Thus, also, he always contrasts the moral lunatic with the ordinary lunatic, and a large proportion of his material is grouped in such a way that this contrast is clearly exhibited with the aid of all the methods of anthropological and psychological study. If he goes on to describe moral insanity as a mere variant of epilepsy, the principal difficulty he has to face is the contradiction this involves with his atavistic explanation of the criminal nature. But if, in the appearances of atavistic traits, we see nothing more than a coordinated element of criminality, this contradiction disappears, while the marked similarity remains, which harmonizes, above all, with Samt’s description of epileptoid states; and the theory is further supported by the fact that the stigmata of degeneration are commonly present in both types. The extraordinary frequency of epileptoid types in prisons has also been pointed out by Sommer, Knecht, Sander, Moeli, and Kirn.

This view of Lombroso’s is, above all, supported by the fact that criminality and epilepsy are hereditary equivalents—that is to say, that criminals frequently have epileptic children, and conversely. If, however, we find no lack of relationships between epilepsy and crime, these are not explained by the supposition of a simple identity between the two. What Lombroso has succeeded in proving is that in the wide group of degenerates who, under certain social conditions, may become criminals, the epileptics are notably represented. Epileptics, indeed, unquestionably belong to the less valuable constituents of society.

The importance of the “stigmata” described by Lombroso as indications of psychical degeneration can no longer be disputed, however difficult it remains to understand what relationship handle-shaped and projecting ears, facial asymmetry, dental abnormalities, hypospadias, epispadias, etc., can have to psychical degeneration. We have, in fact, no better explanation than the phrase “correlation of growth.” Our present knowledge of the functions of the brain certainly does not suffice to elucidate the causal chain by means of which anomalies of the skull are associated with moral imbecility. But, after all, there is no single problem of psycho-pathology in which the chain of causation is completely known to us. However, it should not be difficult to understand that a brain enclosed in an abnormal skull can never develop to the full its most complicated function—viz., the coordination of the voluntary activities for the purposes of a course of conduct adapted to the conditions of social life.