The Merchant of Venice : a short study in borderland melancholy / by J. Foster Palmer.

  • Palmer, James Foster.
Date:
[1912]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Merchant of Venice : a short study in borderland melancholy / by J. Foster Palmer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    foreboding.* In the early .stage.s there are u.sually, a.s in this case, no delusions. These come on later, as the morbid ideas assume a more flefinite shape. ()n all subjects unconnected with these particulai ideas the patient is able to com’erse (juite rationally; and, finally, we have hei*e clearly indicated, what is so prominent a s3nnptom in these cases, a tendency to suicide : a tendenc}^ in this case, kept in abeyance b\' a high development of the reasoning and moral faculties. Hallu- cinations are In' no means a constant, nor even, perhaps, a frequent concomitant of melancholia. That they do occur there can be no doubt. Indeed, it is inconceivable that “ the rise of subject conscious- ness ” characteristic of the di.sease should always stop short of vi.sual projection. The hallucination, too, in this case, coincides with a further phase in the progress of the disease. It has now assumed a more di.stinct form. It is b\' no means uncommon for a melancholic patient, after a long period of struggling, to adopt a certain resolution, often of a horrible, and even miarderous, character. He feels that he has a “ burden on his soul that a certain duty has to be performed, and that he will get no peace of mind till he has performed it. The mere acceptance and adoption of this resolution often gives great relief to the previous s3unptoms. He is no longer in the former hara.ssing state of perplexity and uncertainty, and the overwhelming- feeling of gloom and oppression gives place to a whole-hearted desire to carrv out the supposed dut^^ All the faculties of the mind are now concentrated on the object in view, instead of being dissipated in the vain and purposeless attempt to solve vague doubts and difficulties. This condition is called bj^ Hoff’bauer the “ Incitement of an obligatory resolution.”! It is at this point, after the apparition of his father, that the re.solution assumes a definite form. It is in the speech which follows the di.sappearance of the gho.st, commencing with “ O all yoii • Quaiii’s Dictionary of Medicine. Art. Insanit3'. By G. F. Blandford, M.D. It maj- be mentioned liere that it was not till after Shakespeare’s time that tlie word melancholia was used to express a definite mental afFeetion. Shakespeare, it will be observed, does not use the word melanelioly even quite in this sense. When he does use it (as in Act II, .Sc. 2, 630), it has a more undefined meaning, and refers to a general bodily' and mental debility, and a susceptibility to impressions from without. In Love’s Labour’s Lost (Act I, Sc. 2, 1-5) it is employed by the cuphuist Armado simply as .sv'nonymous with “sadness.” In Twelfth Nvjht and (as an adjective) in The Merchant of Venice, it has another meaning, one more in accordance with its derivation (fJ.e\uv —filuck bile), and the mental sj'mptoms that were supposed to arise cnit of thi.s Iwdily condition. Antonio, apparently, is suffering from a mild attack of melancholia (for it is more than mere depression, and he seems unable to account for it), of which he is cured by the shock of his subsc(]ucnt danger, but Gratiano was not aware of this, and even accuses him of assuming a gravity and surliness of manner in order to increase his reputation for wisdom (Merchant of Venice, Act 1, Sc. 1, 101). + Die Psychologic in ihren Hauptauwendungen auf die Rechtspflege. Voi. XX.—No. 7. D