Passion and criminality in France : a legal and literary study / by Louis Proal ; translated from the French by A. R. Allinsom [!].

  • Proal, Louis, 1843-
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Passion and criminality in France : a legal and literary study / by Louis Proal ; translated from the French by A. R. Allinsom [!]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    rich, feels for Othello, a man of years, poor and a foreigner, and black as soot into the bargain. He cannot fathom the motives that have led her to quit the paternal roof to follow after this man to all appearance so ill fitted for the part of a seducer ; he asks him if he has not thrown a spell over the girl by means of love potions and arts magic. Even when it is not a disease, love is a passion that is by its very nature exclusive and absorbing. M. Maillet holds that Ambition presents a yet more exclusive character; but I do not agree with him. No doubt Ambition is absorbing, but not to the same extent as Love. The thoughts of my sin so absorb me, said David, that my eye can see naught else. ^ The man who is deeply smitten with love can think of one thing only : Aimer est tout son but, aimer est tout son bien. ^ Doniinated by this one fixed idea, intelligent men grow stupid. They have only a single thought left, that of their passion ; to this they make everything else sub- servient, indifferent alike to fortune and the pleasures of society, of pride and of ambition : Son arc, ses javelots, son char, tout l'importune. ^ All they care for is solitude, that they may ponder undisturbed over the object of their passion ; they think only of the individual they are enamoured of, they seek out every opportunity of meeting and seeing her. Girls who are pursued by these ardent lovers declare they 1 Masillon's analysis of this state of mind evinced much penetration when he said, speaking of Love : It is distinctive of this passion to fill the whole heart to overflowing. . . . The lover can think of nothing but his love ; it possesses and intoxicates him to the exclusion of everything else. Every object recalls its fatal images, and rouses its unholy desires ; society, solitude, presence, absence, objects the most indifferent, occupations the most serious, the holy sanctuary itself, the blessed altars of God, the awful mysteries of Religion, all recall its memory. (Sermon on the Prodigal Son.) ^ To love is all his aim, to love is all his bliss. Corneille, Andromède, Act i. Sc. 4. ^ ' Her bow, her darts, her car, all stir his heart.