rived. This idea resulted from the recurrence of lucid intervals, which is more or less true in the first stages of all cases of insanity. By this we mean, that attacks of insanity, until they become confirmed and incurable, are, to some extent intermittent, and subject to alternate paroxysms and relaxations, at intervals of irregular duration and frequency, or these intervals may be of periodical occurrence.

7. The term lucid interval has acquired a kind of technical import in legal language, and is nqt, in that,sense, applicable to this intermittent character of the disease. We shall have occasion hereafter to define this with more precision, when it will be more convenient to point out the specific distinction, between a ⚫ mere intermission of the disease, and a temporary restoration to entire sanity, which is what is understood by a lucid interval. 8. The term lunatic, in its more extended import, includes all persons of unsound mind who are not idiots, or imbeciles.

9. Monomaniacs are those persons, who are insane upon some one or more subjects, and apparently altogether sane upon others. The capacity of such persons to execute a will, where the subject of their infirmity was not involved, has been very generally admitted.

10. Persons may be affected with delirium from inflammation or stimulus, and while this state continues to such a degree as to overwhelm the reason and judgment, it produces a total incapacity to execute a will or do any binding act in the way of contract. In regard to responsibility for crime it is otherwise, when produced by stimulus; as this is considered a voluntary madness, it has not been regarded as any excuse for crime, unless, or until it produce positive insanity, which is sometimes

the case.

11. Senile dementia is that peculiar decay of the mental faculties, which occurs in extreme old age, and in many cases much earlier, whereby the person is reduced to second childhood, and becomes sometimes wholly incompetent to enter into any binding contract, or even to execute a will. It is the recurrence of second childhood by mere decay.

SECTION VIII.

IDIOTS AND IMBECILES.

1. Imbeciles are wholly deficient in observation, comparison, and judgment. n. 2. The capacity requisite to execute a will defined and illustrated.

2. Imbecility of mind is commonly congenital, or occurs in advanced age, but is sometimes the result of sudden shock, or calamity.

3. It may be produced by accidental causes. Its characteristics.

n. 3. Some illustrations of the subject.

§ 9. 1. FROM what has been before said, it is obvious the only inquiry here is in regard to the mode of determining, who are to be reckoned absolute idiots in the law. As we said, we cannot define an idiot except by comparison. One test of exemption from this class is capacity for improvement, or acquisition. But this is admitted to be fallacious, unless we confine it to mental improvement, or the strengthening of the powers of comparison and judgment. For idiots often have something of memory and imitation, whereby they are able, to a very limited extent, to increase their knowledge of facts. But they are wholly deficient both in the perceptive and reflective faculties. They possess neither observation nor judgment. And the little memory they have is wholly passive. They have no ability to recall, at will, past transactions, and no forecast. And all these powers, in a greater or less degree, enter into the act of an understanding disposition of property, to take effect after one's ⚫ death. And without the possession of these faculties, it is confessedly impossible for one to execute a valid will.

1 Ante, § 8.

2 Converse v. Converse, 21 Vt. 168. The extent of capacity requisite to take one out of the category of imbeciles is here thus defined: "It is not easy to lay down any precise rule as to what exact amount of mental capacity is sufficient to enable one to dispose of property by will. Less mind is ordinarily

2. By far the most numerous portion of this class of persons have been so from birth, or become so in extreme old age. But absolute dementia, where there is an entire destruction of the mental faculties, is by no means an uncommon consequence of insanity, whether in the form of mania or monomania, and not unfrequently results from some severe and sudden moral shock.3

requisite to make a will, than a contract of sale, understandingly, for the reason that, in contracts of sale, there are usually two parties, and some degree of antagonism between their interests and efforts; so that here mind is opposed to mind, and consequently it is somewhat more difficult to see clearly the just bearing of all the relations presented, than under the common circumstances of making a will, where one is left free to act upon his own perceptions merely. But this is not always the case in making a will. One may be beset by an army of harpies, in the shape of hungry expectants for property, altogether more perplexing than the ordinary circumstances attending a disposition of property by sale.

"But it may be safe no doubt to affirm, that, in making any contract understandingly, one must have something more than mere passive memory remaining. He must undoubtedly retain sufficient active memory, to collect in his mind, without prompting, particulars or elements of the business to be transacted, and to hold them in his mind a sufficient length of time to perceive, at least, their more obvious relations to each other, and be able to form some rational judgment in relation to them. The elements of such a judgment should be, the number of his children, their deserts, with reference to conduct and capacity, as well as need, and what he had before done for them, relatively to each other, and the amount and condition of his property, with some other things, perhaps. The capability of men in health to form correct judg ment in such matters, is no doubt very unequal, and, when there is no inherent incongruity in the will itself, and no just ground to suspect improper influence, juries are, and perhaps should be, very liberal in sustaining testamentary dispositions. But there must undoubtedly be some limit. When one is confessedly in a condition to be constantly liable to commit the most ludicrous mistakes, in regard to the most simple and familiar subjects, he ought not to, and cannot, make a will."

* In a little book, written by an undistinguished and almost unknown country clergyman, by the name of Grant Powers, upon the Effect of the Imagination upon the Nervous System, we have a most wonderful array of facts and argument upon the subject, showing conclusively that the loss of consciousness, and

As we have before shown, the most common characteristics of this entire class of persons, whether the malady is congenital or accidental, is entire incapacity for business, and absolute permanency in condition.

3. It is probably more common for sorrow and bereavement, and business calamities, to destroy life, than to break down the mind merely. But there are multitudes of cases where persons are rendered permanently insane, and finally imbecile, by disappointment, bereavement, religious despair, and other severe shocks upon the nervous system.. One marked peculiarity of this species of mental derangement is, that the person evinces often a sudden revulsion of feeling, going at a single bound from almost hopeless despair to the most ecstatic joy, from imaginary distress to equally unreal happiness. And those who have devoted their lives to the care and the cure of insane persons, assure us, that cases of great exaltation of joy are more likely to end in incurable imbecility, than those of unnatural depres

sion.

of reason, and even of life itself, is not an unfrequent consequence of mere surprise, or delusion. And the instances are many of them near at hand. A gentleman in Francestown, New Hampshire, fell dead, upon hearing it announced that he was elected town clerk. Another in Warren, New Hampshire, fell dead, upon being told by the sheriff that he had a writ for him. And the instances are almost innumerable, where children, by fright, or grief, or sudden joy, have been rendered permanently idiotic. And there are sufficiently numerous reports of persons in more advanced life having suffered in the same way, to assure us that such occurrences are by no means uncommon.

Ante, § 8, n. 3.

SECTION IX.

1. This is indicated by sudden and unaccountable change of character.
2. By delusion, and incapacity to estimate the true relations of things.

n. 2. Extended analysis and illustration of the subject.

3. Intellectual perversion and false judgment often occur.

4. Unaccountable moral obliquity not an unusual concomitant.
5. These different characteristics often occur in the same person.

§10. 1. THE symptoms of insanity are quite incapable of description or classification.1 It is sometimes very obvious, and at others exhibits itself in modes and forms so subtle, as to almost elude the observation of the most wary and experienced. One of its most marked evidences is, where the individual comes suddenly to exhibit a marked change in his habits and tastes, prefering what he before avoided or disliked, and where there is no assignable cause for the change, unless it be one affecting mental capacity.

2. The belief in the existence of mere illusions, or hallucinations, creatures purely of the imagination, such as no sane man would believe in, are unequivocal evidences of insanity. But where the party has correct perceptions, he will generally be found able to make an understanding disposition of property by will, unless from imbecility he is incapable of estimating the just relations of things, or perhaps of recollecting fully the elements of a will.2

1 Taylor, Med. Jur. 629. One may, and often does, suffer very marked changes in character, in the course of years, and this is no ground of imputing aberration of mind. So, too, there are instances of very sudden transformations short of insanity. But such changes are regarded by medical writers as one of the most satisfactory evidences of insanity. Wharton & Stillé, §§ 106, 192, 195, 202.

* Taylor, Med. Jur. 629. This most reliable writer says: "The main character of insanity, in a legal view, is said to be the existence of delusion : i. e., that a