Letters of a Lunatic
Book Excerpt
1st, The Dr's. letter is itself a contradiction and an egregious symptom of insanity on his part, which is, moreover, confirmed by his previous conduct from his first entrance into the institution. In comparing the University with the Lunatic Asylum, I find that the former during the winter of 1852-'53 (I may add, ever since my return from Europe in 1850) was a far more disorderly and irrational place than the latter, where the occasional confusion or the perpetual (sane and insane) perversity of men is the lamentable, but natural and necessary (consequently irresponsible) result, of an internal physical or intellectual disorder or defect, which is moreover susceptible of classification and of a psychological exposition, while in the former it was "got up" for the particular purpose of subjugation or of expulsion, and where consequently it was the result of responsible perversity and malice, susceptible of moral reprobation.