II. Acquired Insanity.—So far as the mental symptoms of acquired insanity are concerned, Pinel’s ancient classification, Acquired Insanity. into Mania, Melancholia and Dementia, is still applicable to every case, and although numberless classifications have been advanced they are for the most part merely terminological variations. Classifications of the insanities based on pathology and etiology have been held out as a solution of the difficulty, but, so far, pathological observations have failed to fulfil this ideal, and no thoroughly satisfactory pathological classification has emerged from them.
Classifications are after all matters of convenience; the following system admittedly is so:—
Melancholia.
Mania.
Delusional Insanity.
Katatonia.
Hebephrenia.
Traumatic Insanity.
Insanity following upon arterial degeneration.
Insanities associated or caused by: General Paralysis; Epilepsy.