to treat of anything else but matter; we see effect and we look for cause; we see that men differ intellectually, and we find the cause in the cortical substance of the frontal portion of the hemispheres of the brain. We find men differ morally, and we find the cause in the cortical substance of the parietal and occipital portions of the hemispheres of the brain. We find that irritation of the frontal cells, renders the most intellectual man a raving maniac; that irritation of the parietal cells, renders the most honest man a pick-pocket; and that irritation of the cerebral cells, renders the most pure being a filthy, impure creature. Now, if these be facts, and facts they are, we have no trouble in recognizing another fact, and that is, that every man, in virtue of some abnormal state of his moral faculties, has in him a criminal neurosis,-some to a greater, and some to a less degree. Just as men differ in degrees of intelligence, so they differ in degrees of morality. These are most reasonable, simple facts, gentlemen; nothing contrary to our reason, nothing contrary to our comprehension, nothing contrary to natural laws; indeed, I conceive one of the great difficulties in the way of men receiving these scientific truths is their simplicity. There is something yet remaining in man that makes him like the mysterious and cling to the inexplicable. Writers of fiction know this well, therefore they always write so as to mystify their readers. This abnormal state of man's moral faculties, which mental scientists call a criminal neurosis, and which we account for physically, others call by the terms, his sinful nature, his criminal nature, his rebellious nature, &c., and the cause they assign for it is the consequence of original sin. Well, I see here no cause of quarrel; all admit that the evil is there, and what was the first or original cause of this unhappy state of man is of but little consequence so long as we recognize the fact that man's criminal neurosis, as he is to-day, is due to a physical cause, and that cause is an abnormal or imperfect state of his moral faculties; whether his soul has anything to do with the matter or not is of no consequence to us so long as we treat the disease physically. But, say our law-makers, our lawyers, and our religious teachers, every man must be held responsible

for his acts. The scientist here joins issue and says every man must be held responsible to a degree, his degree of responsibility depending upon his degree of intellectual and moral faculties and his degree of controlling nerve power. The idiot, imbecile, maniac, and morally insane are not responsible at all, and the criminal's responsibility must be judged by the greater or lesser degree of his moral faculties, the degree of his criminal neurosis, and there are some of the criminal class of society whose neurosis is so exaggerated, so incurable, that they are not a bit more responsible than are the morally insane; the habitual drunkard, for example. And here I consider the best time to define for you the difference between moral insanity and what is understood, or what I call a criminal neurosis, or, if you will, moral depravity. I would define moral insanity to be where a man has had a sound moral organization and sufficient nerve control to guide his moral acts, and where by reason of disease or some accidental circumstances, either from reflex action, from functional derangement, or lesion of the parts, or disease of the vascular system, &c., his mental faculties become altogether changed, and he loses power over his moral acts from the loss of nerve control. This man's will may be to do right, but he has no nerve controlling power to resist his impulse; and sometimes, to prevent himself committing a crime, he will commit suicide, choosing, as he conceives, of two evils the least. This is what I call moral insanity, and in such a case the intellect may be unclouded, and the miserable unfortunate know well that he is no longer a moral, but an immoral man; and he is a most miserable man, always accusing himself, although he knows he cannot help himself. Yet, by our inhuman and unscientific laws, such men are hanged, that is, judicially murdered; and the righteous man whose moral faculties are sound, and whose moral faculties are like an iceberg, says: "Serves him right; moral insanity, indeed! hang all such rascals; these doctors and scientists, by and by, will do away with all responsibility."

I will now define what I mean by a criminal neurosis. I have said that every man has it more or less, but some have so much

of it that they are hardly responsible for their acts. These are they that are begotten, conceived, born and brought up in crime, generally the offspring of depraved and debauched parents. They differ from the morally insane, inasmuch as they never had a sound, moral organization; their moral organization from their birth has been deformed; they never knew good; evil to them is good. They are as incapable of reasoning as a wild horse; they cannot recognize the rights of society; they are Ishmaelites their hand is against every man. If they have controlling nerve power, they don't know how to use it, or if they do, they use it for their own vile ends. These men never regret an evil deed, because they see no evil in their act. They are a law unto themselves. They are only in a very slight degree removed from the lowest brute, either intellectually or morally. And these men we punish by hanging and whipping, &c. We treat them also as responsible beings, and still crime goes on, and the criminals still live in our midst. Then the righteous say: "Well, if he had listened to the voice of God, if he had listened to the teachings of religion, if he had controlled his evil desires, his evil passions, &c., he would have been a different man." Of course he would, but he didn't; he had no desire to do so. He acted exactly in accordance with his nature; he acted in obedience to his criminal neurosis, in obedience to his abnormal moral faculties; and for all the example it is to another of his sort, we might just as well hang a dog as hang such a criminal.

Gentlemen, you know, and I know, and all the world knows, that the only remedy that has been ever tried for the prevention of crime has been punishment, and this punishment has been meted out to all as if all were equally responsible for their acts. This, to say the least, was unscientific, and consequently unjust, and punishment, gentlemen, has been proved a failure for the prevention of crime, or for the cure of the criminal class of society. Crime continues, and the criminal classes continue. There is no man recognizes more than I do, as I have already said, the right of society to enact laws for its own preservation. Moreover, I fully recognize the right of society to inflict pun

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ishment, even capital punishment, for crime if it thinks well so to do; but I deny the right of society to treat all criminals as if all were equally responsible, or as if all were to some degree responsible. If punishment has to continue, and I suppose it will, for the present at all events, I would have men punished, not according to the enormity of their crimes, but in accordance with the moral responsibility with which they have been endowed; and where I found an irreclaimable, an incurable criminal, I would treat him as I would an incurable maniac, and lock him up for life, not for punishment, but for the protection of society, and to put a stop to the procreation of such animals.

What next would I have? I would have the Legislature recognize the fact that poverty was the great objective cause of crime, and that if we must of necessity have different grades of society, if we must of necessity have poor, we must not of necessity have a pauper class, from which class, as a rule, springs the criminal classes. I would have the Legislature bend their whole energy to do away with pauperism, and thereby diminish crime and the criminal classes. But you will ask, how is the law to draw the distinction between the men of different mental organizations? How is a judge, before he passes sentence, to know a man's mental callibre or a man's moral faculties? Let the law once be made and the medical profession will soon provide men capable of doing that work. But we need not trouble ourselves too much about the question of criminals at present. There is not much prospect of the Legislatures of the present day troubling themselves about the matter. Such questions as these are rarely taken up by men of strong party proclivities. Besides we would have a strong power against us, the theologians and lawyers. You will naturally ask why, then, am I writing so much upon the subject? I answer, some men lay only the foundation; other men build thereon. I hope that in time these other men will appear and build upon the foundation that I have been trying to lay. But if I have no hope to get legislation upon the criminal class of society, I have strong hope of having legislation upon the question of insanity, if for no other reason than to put a stop to our judges making themselves ridiculous before

the whole world, in their different definitions of what causes irresponsibility in the insane. Could there be anything more absurd than to find a Judge in the Province of New Brunswick making a statement the very contrary of that made a few months before by the Lord Chief Justice of England, "the Judge instructed the jury that unless there was an entire lack of knowledge to distinguish between right and wrong, they could not but find the prisoner guilty," the Lord Chief Justice of England said: "I coincide most cordially in the proposed alteration of the law, having been always strongly of opinion that, as the pathology of insanity abundantly establishes, there are forms of mental disease in which, though the patient is quite aware he is about to do wrong, the will becomes overpowered by the force of irresistible impulse." Here, gentlemen, is a difference, but is the Provincial Judge to be found fault with? I certainly think not; the fault lies with the Dominion Government for never having defined where responsibility terminated. I will now, for your information, and in support of my views, given before this Society three years ago, and for the information of our Legislature, quote the highest authority in England, both legal and medical. In The Journal of Mental Science (edited by Drs. Mandsley and Clouston) for April, 1878, page 22, is the following from the pen of David Nicolson, M. D., Deputy Superintendent State Criminal Lunatic Asylum, Broadmoor, England, "a bill introduced into the House of Commons in 1874, by Mr. Russell Gurney, with the view of amending the Law of Homacide led to the appointment of a committee, before which most important and hopeful evidence was given. The following evidence. of Lord Justice Blackburn speaks for itself, and virtually displaces the legal dictum of right and wrong," "We cannot fail to see that there are cases where the person is not clearly responsible, and yet knows right from wrong. I can give you an instance. It was in the case of that woman of whom I was speaking, who was tried for wounding a girl with intent to murder. The facts were these: The woman had more than once been insane, the insanity being