Erasmus Darwin

“ Suspicion is a voluntary exertion of the mind arising from the pain of fear, which it is exerted to relieve: shame is the name of a peculiar disagreeable sensation, see Fable of the Bees, and delicacy about cleanliness arises from another disagreeable sensation. And therefore are not found in the minds of maniacs, which are employed solely in voluntary exertions. Hence the most modest women in this disease walk naked amongst men without any kind of concern, use obscene discourse, and have no delicacy about their natural evacuations. ”

“ When any one moves his hand quickly near another person's eyes, the eye-lids instantly close; this act in common language is termed involuntary, as we have not time to deliberate or to exert any contrary desire or aversion, but in this work it would be termed a voluntary act, because it is caused by the faculty of volition, and after a few trials the nictitation can be prevented by a contrary or opposing volition. ”

“ Helvetius, has deduced almost all our actions from this principle of their relieving us from the ennui or tædium vitæ; and true it is, that our desires or aversions are the motives of all our voluntary actions; and human nature seems to excel other animals in the more facil use of this voluntary power, and on that account is more liable to insanity than other animals. But in mania this violent exertion of volition is expended on mistaken objects, and would not be relieved, though we were to gain or escape the objects, that excite it. ”

“ Thus when our muscular actions are excited by our sensations of pleasure, it is termed play; when they are excited by our volition, it is termed work; and the former of these is attended with less fatigue, because the muscular actions in play produce in their turn more pleasurable sensation ”

“ When agreeable ideas excite into motion the sensorial power of sensation, and this again causes other trains of agreeable ideas, a constant stream of pleasurable ideas succeeds, and produces pleasurable delirium. So when the sensorial power of volition excites agreeable ideas, and the pleasure thus produced excites more volition in its turn, a constant flow of agreeable voluntary ideas succeeds; which when thus exerted in the extreme constitutes insanity. ”

“ Nor are maniacal people more attentive to their natural appetites, or to the irritations which surround them, except as far as may respect their suspicions or designs; for the violent and perpetual exertions of their voluntary powers of mind prevents their perception of almost every other object, either of irritation or of sensation. Hence it is that they bear cold, hunger, and fatigue, with much greater pertinacity than in their sober hours, and are less injured by them in respect to their general health. ”

“ Now the first muscles, which infants use most frequently, are those of respiration; and on this account we gain a habit of holding our breath, at the same time that we use great efforts to exclude it, for this purpose of alleviating unavoidable pain; or we press out our breath through a small aperture of the larynx, and scream violently, when the pain is greater than is relievable by the former mode of exertion. Thus children scream to relieve any pain either of body or mind, as from anger, or fear of being beaten. ”

“ In some of the unfortunate patients I have observed, the pain has risen to an inexpressible degree, as above described, before the convulsions have supervened; and which were preceded by screaming, and grinning; in others, as in the common epilepsy, the convulsion has immediately succeeded the commencement of the disagreeable sensations; and as a stupor frequently succeeds the convulsions, they only seemed to remember that a pain at the stomach preceded the fit, or some other uneasy feel; or more frequently retained no memory at all of the immediate cause of the paroxysm. ”

“ The objects of desire and aversion are generally at a distance, whereas those of pleasure and pain are immediately acting upon our organs. Hence, before desire or aversion are exerted, so as to cause any actions, there is generally time for deliberation; which consists in discovering the means to obtain the object of desire, or to avoid the object of aversion ”

“ An elderly woman labouring with ascites I twice saw relieved for some weeks by insanity, the dropsy ceased for several weeks, and recurred again alternating with the insanity. A man afflicted with difficult respiration on lying down, with very irregular pulse, and œdematous legs, whom I saw this day, has for above a week been much relieved in respect to all those symptoms by the accession of insanity, which is shewn by inordinate suspicion, and great anger. ”

“ Another phænomenon in palsies is, that when the limbs of one side are disabled, those of the other are in perpetual motion. This can only be explained from conceiving that the power of motion, whatever it is, or wherever it resides, and which is capable of being exhausted by fatigue, and accumulated in rest, is now less expended, whilst one half of the body is capable of receiving its usual proportion of it, and is hence derived with greater ease or in greater abundance into the limbs, which remain unaffected. ”

“ The excess or defect of voluntary exertion produces similar effects upon the sensual motions, or ideas of the mind, as those already mentioned upon the muscular fibres. Thus when any violent pain, arising from the defect of some peculiar stimulus, exists either in the muscular or sensual systems of fibres, and which cannot be removed by acquiring the defective stimulus; as in some constitutions convulsions of the muscles are produced to procure a temporary relief, so in other constitutions vehement voluntary exertions of the ideas of the mind are produced for the same purpose ”

“ At the same time those motions, which are excited by perpetual stimulus, or by association with each other, or immediately by pleasureable or painful sensation, may properly be termed involuntary motions, as those of the heart and arteries; as the faculty of volition seldom affects those, except when it exists in unnatural quantity, as in maniacal people. ”

“ Madness is distinguishable from delirium, as in the latter the patient knows not the place where he resides, nor the persons of his friends or attendants, nor is conscious of any external objects, except when spoken to with a louder voice, or stimulated with unusual force, and even then he soon relapses into a state of inattention to every thing about him. ”

“ Whilst in the former he is perfectly sensible to every thing external, but has the voluntary powers of his mind intensely exerted on some particular object of his desire or aversion, he harbours in his thoughts a suspicion of all mankind, lest they should counteract his designs ”

“ Hence to desire without an object, that is, without a motive, is a solecism in language. As if one should ask, if you could eat without food, or breathe without air.
From this account of volition it appears, that convulsions of the muscles, as in epileptic fits, may in the common sense of that word be termed involuntary; because no deliberation is interposed between the desire or aversion and the consequent action ”

“ Hence to deliberate is to compare opposing desires or aversions, and that which is the most interesting at length prevails, and produces action. Similar to this, where two pains oppose each other, the stronger or more interesting one produces action; as in pleurisy the pain from suffocation would produce expansion of the lungs, but the pain occasioned by extending the inflamed membrane, which lines the chest, opposes this expansion, and one or the other alternately prevails. ”

“ A slighter degree of this disease is experienced by every one after great fatigue, when the muscles gain such inability to further action, that we are obliged to rest them for a while, or to summon a greater power of volition to continue their motions.
In all the syncopes, which I have seen induced after convulsive fits, the pulse has continued natural, though the organs of sense, as well as the locomotive muscles, have ceased to perform their functions ”

“ Whence laughable wit consists of frivolous ideas, without connections of any consequence, such as puns on words, or on phrases, incongruous junctions of ideas; on which account laughter is so frequent in children. ”

“ In the minds of mad people those volitions alone exist, which are unmixed with sensation; immoderate suspicion is generally the first symptom, and want of shame, and want of delicacy about cleanliness. ”

“ For as the pains from excess of motion either gradually subside, or are in general succeeded by inflammation; so those from defect of motion either gradually subside, or are in general succeeded by convulsion, or madness. ”

“ Hence it is curious to observe, that those animals, who have more frequently exerted their muscles of respiration violently, as in talking, barking, or grunting, as children, dogs, hogs, scream much more, when they are in pain, than those other animals, who use little or no language in their common modes of life ”

“ If a person has a desire to be cured of the ague, and has at the same time an aversion (or contrary desire) to swallowing an ounce of Peruvian bark; he balances desire against desire, or aversion against aversion; and thus he acquires the power of choosing, which is the common acceptation of the word willing. But in the cold fit of ague, after having discovered that the act of shuddering, or exerting the subcutaneous muscles, relieves the pain of cold ”

“ Pains from excess, and from defect of motion. No pain is felt during vehement voluntary exertion; as in cold fits of ague, labour-pains, strangury, tenesmus, vomiting, restlessness in fevers, convulsion of a wounded muscle. 3. Of holding the breath and screaming in pain; why swine and dogs cry out in pain, and not sheep and horses. Of grinning and biting in pain; why mad animals bite others. 4. Epileptic convulsions explained, why the fits begin with quivering of the under jaw, biting the tongue, and setting the teeth ”

“ Many instances have been given in this work, where after violent motions excited by irritation, the organ has become quiescent to less, and even to the great irritation, which induced it into violent motion; as after looking long at the sun or any bright colour, they cease to be seen; and after removing from bright day-light into a gloomy room, the eye cannot at first perceive the objects, which stimulate it less. ”

“ Hence when a person is in great pain, the cause of which he cannot remove, he sets his teeth firmly together, or bites some substance between them with great vehemence, as another mode of violent exertion to produce a temporary relief. ”

“ The restlessness in some fevers is an almost perpetual exertion of this kind, excited to relieve some disagreeable sensations; the reciprocal opposite exertions of a wounded worm, the alternate emprosthotonos and opisthotonos of some spasmodic diseases, and the intervals of all convulsions, from whatever cause, seem to be owing to this circumstance of the laws of animation; that great or universal exertion cannot exist at the same time with great or universal sensation, though they can exist reciprocally ”

“ The disagreeable irritation of a diseased liver produces exertions and consequent quiescence; these by the accidental concurrence of other causes of quiescence, as cold, solar or lunar periods, inanition, the want of their usual portion of spirit of wine, at length produces paralysis.
This is further confirmed by observing, that the muscles, we most frequently, or most powerfully exert, are most liable to palsy; as those of the voice and of articulation, and of those paralytics which I have seen, a much greater proportion have lost the use of their right arm ”

“ The next most frequent or most powerful efforts, which infants are first tempted to produce, are those with the muscles in biting hard substances; indeed the exertion of these muscles is very powerful in common mastication, as appears from the pain we receive, if a bit of bone is unexpectedly found amongst our softer food ”

“ Soldiers, who die of painful wounds in battle, are said in Homer to bite the ground. Thus also in the bellon, or colica saturnina, the patients are said to bite their own flesh, and dogs in this disease to bite up the ground they lie upon. It is probable that the great endeavours to bite in mad dogs, and the violence of other mad animals, is owing to the same cause. ”

“ Now as two equal and opposite desires are thus supposed to balance each other, and prevent all action, it follows, that if one of these hay-stacks was suddenly removed, that the ass would irresistibly be hurried to the other, which in the common use of the word might be called an involuntary act ”

“ The reason why the cramp of the muscles, which compose the calf of the leg, is so liable to affect swimmers, is, because these muscles have very weak antagonists, and are in walking generally elongated again after their contraction by the weight of the body on the ball of the toe, which is very much greater than the resistance of the water in swimming. ”

“ It is said, that many people in Holland have died after skating too long or too violently on their frozen canals; it is probable the death of these, and of others, who have died suddenly in swimming, has been owing to this great quiescence or paralysis ”