“Doctor, are you the author of a work entitled, ’Pathology of Mind Popularly Expounded’—published, as I see by the title page, in 1873?”
“I am, sir, yes.”
“Does that book express with tolerable accuracy your views on the subject of insanity?’
“It does—certainly.”
“Very well. Now, doctor, I will read aloud from Chapter III., page 75. Be good enough to follow.—’It is then a fact that there exists a borderland between pronounced dementia, or mania, and sound mental health, in which it is impossible to apply the terms, sane and insane, with any approach to scientific nicety. Nor is it to be disputed that a person may have entered this borderland may have departed from the realm of unimpaired intelligence, and not yet have attained the pandemonium of complete madness—and withal, retain the faculty of distinguishing between right and wrong, together with the control of will necessary to the selection and employment of either. This borderland is a sort of twilight region in which, though blurred in outline, objects have not become invisible. Crimes committed by subject? in the state thus described, can not philosophically be extenuated on the ground of mental aberration.’—I suppose, doctor, you acknowledge the authorship of this passage?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And subscribe to its correctness?”
“It expresses the opinion which prevails among the authorities.”
“Well and good. Now, to return to the case at bar, are you willing to swear that on the night of July 30th, the ’disturbance of cerebral function’ which, you have told us, Mrs. Peixada was perhaps suffering from—are you willing to swear that it had progressed beyond this borderland which you have so clearly elucidated in your book?”
“I am not willing to swear positively. It is my opinion that it had.”