The politeness which may be traced in his manners, is evidently the result or remains of his old habits, as he is so absorbed in abstract speculations that all attention to himself or external objects is utterly excluded; he is always solitary, but it is like the solitariness of one whose intense studies allow him no time for fellowship or the exercise of social feelings, so much so, that notwithstanding a consciousness of kind and respectful treatment towards him, he scarcely yet seems to know the name of his attendant.
Although his system is delicately susceptible of changes of temperature, he scarcely ever notices it himself; and when roused to pay attention to his feelings, he says that it is the clown in the air that has teased him with the iron ague.
He has been subject to occasional attacks of asthma, brought on, apparently, by exposure to cold in the night time, during these operations, (for he frequently jumps out of his bed to carry on this great patriotic duty.)
Though he can, if properly roused and managed, still answer questions much more correctly than all these appearances would indicate, yet it is evident that his mind is gradually declining, from age, exertion, and the nature of his case; he is an object of interest and sympathy, and nothing can exceed the way in which it is shewn towards him by his attendant.
OBSERVATION XII.
The correspondence between the insane state and the previous character and habits are in most cases, and certainly in this, very striking. On this subject I refer to the Essay on the Changes and Correspondence between the previous Natural Character, and that which they exhibit in their Insane State.
There is another fact in this last case, which may conveniently serve the purpose of introducing some observations ON THE EFFECTS OF HEAT AND COLD AND THE STATE AND CHANGES OF TEMPERATURE IN INSANE PERSONS, which may be considered as an Appendage to the remarks made in Observation V. and IX.
The fact to which I allude in this case is this, viz. that his system “is delicately susceptible of changes of temperature, but that he himself scarcely ever notices it.”
When the hallucinations of the insane are purely intellectual, and wholly and intensely occupy the attention, the generation of animal heat appears less than usual; and decidedly less than in those cases where the aberrations of the mind are connected with the stimulus of selfish and exciting passions,—hence the system is cold. But this arises rather from defective quantity of heat, than from any irregularity in its distribution; and thus, while the mind, from its state of abstraction, either disregards, or is wholly unconscious of exposure to the cold, the body is very sensibly and strongly affected by it.
In the last stages of gradual decay of mind, the changes and disturbances in the quantity, state, and diffusion of heat, resemble that observable in paralytics; there is great insensibility to heat and cold, and the infliction of pain; and, previous to the period of their dissolution, the slightest pressure, even so slight as to give no pain, produces ulcerations, which rapidly degenerate into gangrenous ulcers.—In old torpid cases of neglect—cases of suspension of mind; and in cases of pure mental abstraction, it is deficient in quantity, although equable in its diffusion.