Volume 1

Wharton and Stille's medical jurisprudence.

  • Wharton, Francis, 1820-1889.
Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Wharton and Stille's medical jurisprudence. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    mg to their lights, and assigns to them that well-known grade of modified guilt which belongs to those who do wrong, wilfully, indeed, and intentionally, but whose illegal acts are the consequents of such passion as destroys in them the capacity of accurate guilty knowledge or complete guilty design. Such is the shape into which the law of insanity is now gradually settling. That the change is one of natural and logical development, will at once be seen; but with regard to it, so far as concerns the question of time, and therefore, so far as concerns the present edition of this work, two circumstances are to be particularly noticed. The first is, that the develop¬ ment here spoken of, has, on the law side, evidenced itself distinctively in the last ten years. The second is, that, on the psychological and medical side, it has only been within the last ten or fifteen years that the opinions of experts and of scientists have presented themselves in such a body as to enable the full voice of science and experience in this relation to be heard. The results on both sides of the inquiry will be ex¬ hibited in the following pages. What has been just said is mainly designed for the purpose of explaining why the text of the former editions has been in a large measure thrown aside, and why, in its place, is presented what is substantially a new treatise. The author takes this method of expressing his acknowl¬ edgments to T. C. Coooan, Esq., and Nathan Franks, Esq., for aid rendered in examination of authorities.