degree is introduced; the power of control is not enough; there must be a sufficient amount of it, or the reverse, to establish the responsibility or irresponsibility of the party. It will thus appear, that any attempt by fixed rules, either legal or medical, to distinguish between those mental conditions which should be accountable and those which should not, must either fail in its application, or be productive of evil. To borrow a simile: let us examine a map of an inland country, and we shall see rivers without source or mouth, and roads that seem to lead to nothing. A person who knows anything of geography, understands at once, on looking at such a map, that the sources and mouths of the rivers, and the towns which the roads lead to, are somewhere beyond the boundaries of the district, though he

may not know where they lie. But one who was ill informed might be inclined presumptuously to find fault with the map, which showed him only a part of the rivers and roads. And it is the same with anything else of which we see only a part, unless we recollect that it is but a part, and make allowance accordingly for our imperfect view of it.

When we say, therefore, that the irresponsibility or otherwise of each case must be determined by the circumstances which attend it, we decide upon that which comes within our district of observation; were the sphere of human vision less limited than it is, obstacles to the employment of fixed rules might vanish, but at present, from the very nature of the

case, our wisest of men are prepared to admit them insuperable. "If from circumstances, then, it can be inferred that the criminal possessed this sufficient power of control, he should be made responsible and rendered liable to punishment; if, however, he was led to the perpetration of the act by an uncontrollable impulse, whether accompanied by deliberation or not, then he is entitled to an acquittal as an irresponsible agent;" for, as Dr. Pagan well observes, the very loss of the control over his actions which insanity infers, is that which renders the acts which are committed during its continuance undeserving of punishment. We think, then, that this should be the test for irresponsibilitynot whether the individual be conscious of right and wrong-not whether he have a knowledge of the consequences of his act-but whether he can properly control his actions!—a test to be applied not only in homicidal cases, but whenever or wherever the plea of irresponsibility is raised on the ground of insanity. At the same time we are by no means blind to the difficulty there must be occasionally in deciding in the individual case, whether the impulse was or was not irresistible, and admit to the fullest extent the nicety of discrimination that is required at the hands of those who have to record the verdict; in like manner as the shadings of manslaughter may be seen to blend almost insensibly in the darker and more revolting features of murder, and vice versâ, even so do the modifications

in the power of control pass in almost imperceptible gradation, from the class of responsible to that of irresponsible action. Urge this difficulty, then, as an objection, and we would bid you indicate whether the same will not equally apply to every other test that has yet been proposed; whilst it has this advantage over them all, viz.-that it is correct in principle, which is more than can be said of that which depends on the "consciousness of right and wrong," or the "knowledge of the resulting consequences." For though it is evident that there are some who can distinguish right from wrong, and also some who are aware of the consequences of their acts, who, nevertheless, still ought not to be held responsible for them; yet, on the other hand, there are none who possess "sufficient power of control" to govern their actions, that ought not to be deemed accountable beings: this power of control presupposes a condition of sanity so decided, as alone, in the absence of the clear evidence supplied by delusion, which is found in cases of intellectual insanity, or combined with it when present, to appear to be the best means of discerning between the mental unsoundness which should be held amenable to, and that which should be exempt from, punishment. But how are we to estimate this controlling power, and the amount of it that the individual possesses? Let me ask, how do we estimate or decide upon the amount of malice or revengeful feeling that is required to establish the distinction,

in the case of the criminal homicide, between murder on the one side or manslaughter on the other? There is great analogy between the two cases: in the latter instance, our juries are constantly deciding to which class the individual case shall belong, not upon the dictum of any fixed infallible rule, but from a careful and deliberate weighing and scrutiny of the particular circumstances and considerations which come before them in connexion with the case. Upon this selfsame principle must we rely in our attempt to estimate the power of control; giving to each feature its due prominence, to each extenuating circumstance its appropriate weight, and to facts their correct relation to truth.

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CHAPTER VI.

RECAPITULATION-PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS

CONCLUSION.

A CONCISE recapitulation of the arguments of this essay appears likely, though at the risk of being thought tedious, to be the best precursor to such practical suggestions as have been forced upon the attention of the writer, by their consideration. At the starting-point, law was viewed as an institution originating in necessity for the preservation of the safety and comfort of the human family; that, like all other fabrics of earthly growth, it neither is nor can be expected to be free from imperfection or flaw; that, in some instances, its faulty regulations press injuriously and unjustly upon certain classes of society, and that when a means of adjusting these more equitably is demonstrated, it becomes our bounden duty to avail ourselves thereof. A subject of importance, intricacy, and doubt, is that which embraces the relation which should be maintained by the legislature towards those of unsound mind committing crime. The legislature rightly