The Man of Genius

It is well to observe here, what a different appearance madness assumes, according to the age in which it occurs. Had Bosisio lived in the Middle Ages, or in Spain or Mexico at a later period, the kind-hearted liberator of birds, the martyr for posterity, would have become a St. Ignatius or a Torquemada – the Positivist atheist an ultra-Catholic, commanded by a cruel Deity to immolate human victims; but Bosisio was an Italian, living in 1870.

This case affords an excellent explanation of the occurrence, in remote times, and among savage or slightly civilized nations, of numerous outbreaks of epidemic insanity; and shows that many historical events may have been the result of mania on the part of one or more persons. Cases in point are those of the Anabaptists, the Flagellants, the witch-mania, the Taeping revolution.

Mental aberration gives rise in some men to ideas which, though bizarre, are sometimes gigantic and rendered more efficacious by a singular force of conviction, so as to sweep along the feeble-minded multitude, who are all the more attracted by any singularity in dress, attitudes or abstinence (which such disease alone can suggest and render possible), that these phenomena are made inexplicable to them (and therefore worthy of veneration) by their ignorance and barbarism. The ignorant man always adores what he cannot understand.

Our poor sufferer from hallucinations wanted nothing but a favourable epoch to impress his ideas on the multitude – neither muscular strength, nor a certain vigour of thought, nor extraordinary endurance under privations, nor disinterestedness, nor conviction. At another epoch, Italy would have found her Mahomet in Bosisio.

Mattoids in Art.– At the competition opened at Rome for designs for a proposed monument to Victor Emmanuel – the subject being an international one – mattoids came forward in crowds. In fact, we find, in Dossi’s curious book, not less than 39 out of 296 (13 per cent.), a number which would be raised to 25 per cent. if we add 38 more, who, in addition to their eccentricity, gave tokens of being imbecile.

The most general characteristic of these productions is their stupidity. One of them proposes a square stone box without a roof (similar to the “magnaneries” or roofless stone buildings used in the South of France for silkworms), which he calls a “Right Quadrangular Tower” – destined to receive the late king’s remains, and protect them against the inundations of the Tiber. Tr – ’s monument – “destined to live for centuries” – consists of a column surrounded by obelisks, by four flights of steps, and four triangles, each surrounded by twelve small spires. Each of the latter is to support a bust, each of the columns a statue of some great Italian; with regard to six statues, the artist reserves the right of changing them at the death of our illustrious men – Sella, Mamiani, &c. This is a case for saying, “Perish the astrologer!” Another competitor – two, in fact – have projected rooms to serve as public lavatories at the base of their columns. There is a curious coincidence and emulation of hatred in nearly all; most of them make use of celebrated monuments, whose destruction is, of course, a sine quâ non to the erection of theirs.

But, if wanting in every sign of genius, these designs are not deficient in allegorical symbols of the most grotesque type, or in inscriptions. Some of them, indeed, are nothing but a mass of irrelevant inscriptions, relating to everything in the world, except the poor Re Galantuomo himself – but more particularly to the supposed genius of the artist.

Here we find that the main characteristic of such minds – vanity, heightened to the point of disease – makes each of them think his own production a masterpiece. Canfora declares that he is “neither engineer nor architect, but inspired by God alone.” A. B. does not send in his design to the Committee, because it is too grand; and another ends by saying, “How mighty is the thought of the artist!”

Nearly all are absolutely ignorant of the art in which they claim to excel. Thus Dossi found among the projectors, teachers of mathematics and of grammar, doctors in medicine and in law, military men, accountants, and others who themselves asserted that they had never before handled pencil or compasses. At the same time, their far from humble social position bears out what I consider to be one of the principal points: viz., that we have before us (as might be suspected) idiots, or persons actually insane, but men quite respectable outside their special artistic mania. Such should be M – , a member of the Russian Archæological Society, of the Hellenic Syllage, Architect-in-chief of Roumelia and the palaces of the Sultan, Knight and Commander of various Orders, &c., &c.

When we compare these stupid abortions with the pictures inspired by insanity (I am not now speaking of those painters who, like various poets and musicians, in losing their reason, lost artistically more than they gained – especially in right proportion and the harmony of colour), we shall often find the absurd and disproportionate; but also, at the same time, a true, even excessive originality, mingled with a savage beauty sui generis, which, up to a certain point, recalls the masterpieces of mediæval, and, still more, of Chinese and Japanese, art, so extraordinarily rich in symbols. We shall see, in short, that art suffers here, not from a defect, but from an excess of genius, which ends by crushing itself.

In conclusion, it is very evident that the insane artist is as superior to the mattoid in the practice of his art, as he is inferior to him in practical life; that, in short, in the region of art, the mattoid approaches nearest to the imbecile, and the lunatic to the man of genius.

CHAPTER IV.

Political and Religious Lunatics and Mattoids

Part played by the insane in the progressive movements of humanity – Examples – Probable causes – Religious epidemics of the Middle Ages – Francis of Assisi – Luther – Savonarola – Cola da Rienzi – San Juan de Dios – Campanella – Prosper Enfantin – Lazzaretti – Passanante – Guiteau – South Americans.

ALL this helps us to understand why the great progressive movements of nations, in politics and religion, have so often been brought about, or at least determined, by insane or half-insane persons. The reason is that in these alone is to be found, coupled with originality (which is the special characteristic of the genius and the lunatic, and still more of those who partake of the character of both), the exaltation capable of generating a sufficient amount of altruism to sacrifice their own interests, and their lives, for the sake of making known the new truths, and, often, of getting them accepted by a public to which innovations are always unwelcome, and which frequently takes a bloody revenge on the innovator.

“Such persons,” says Maudsley, “are apt to seize on and pursue the bypaths of thought, which have been overlooked by more stable intellects, and so, by throwing a side-light on things, to discover unthought-of relations. One observes this tendency of mind even in those of them who have no particular genius or talent; for they have a novel way of looking at things, do not run in the common groove of action, or follow the ordinary routine of thought and feeling, but discover in their remarks a certain originality and perhaps singularity, sometimes at a very early period of life.

“Notable, again, is the emancipated way in which some of them discuss, as if they were problems of mechanics, objects or events round which the associations of ideas and feelings have thrown a glamour of conventional sentiment. In regard to most beliefs, they are usually more or less heterodox or heretical, though not often constant, being apt to swing round suddenly from one point to a quite opposite point of the compass of belief… Inspired with strong faith in the opinions which they adopt, they exhibit much zeal and energy in the propagation of them.”[357 - Responsibility in Mental Disease, p. 47.] They are careless of every obstacle, and untroubled by the doubts which arise in the minds of calm and sceptical thinkers. Thus they are frequently social or religious reformers.

It should be understood that they do not create anything, but only give a direction to the latest movements prepared by time and circumstances, as also – thanks to their passion for novelty and originality – they are nearly always inspired by the latest discoveries or innovations, and use these as their starting-point in guessing at the future.

Thus Schopenhauer wrote at an epoch in which pessimism was beginning to be fashionable, together with mysticism, and only fused the whole into one philosophic system. Cæsar found the ground prepared for him by the Tribunes.

When, says Taine, a new civilization produces a new art, there are ten men of talent who express the idea of the public and group themselves round one man of genius who gives it actuality; thus De Castro, Moreto, Lopez de la Vega, round Calderon; Van Dyck, Jordaens, De Vos, and Snyders round Rubens.

Luther summed up in himself the ideas of many of his contemporaries and predecessors; it is sufficient to mention Savonarola.

The spherical shape of the earth had already been maintained by St. Thomas Aquinas, and by Dante, before the discoveries of Columbus, which are also antedated by those of the Canary Islands, Iceland, and Cape Verde.

If the new ideas are too divergent from prevalent popular opinion, or too self-evidently absurd, they die out with their author, if, indeed, they do not involve him in their fall.

Arnold of Brescia, Knutzen,[358 - Knutzen, of Schleswig, in 1674, preached that there was neither God nor devil, that priests and magistrates were useless and pernicious, that marriage was unnecessary, that man ended with death, and that every one ought to be guided by his own inner consciousness of right. For this reason he gave to his disciples the name of the Conscientarii, garnishing his discourses with grotesque quotations. He went about begging and preaching in strange garments. It is not known what became of him after 1674. His writings are Epistola amici ad amicum, Schediasma de lacrimis Christi, &c.] Campanella, tried to shake off the dominion of the clergy, and take away the temporal power of the Pope; they were persecuted and crushed.

“The insane person,” says Maudsley, “is in a minority of one in his opinion, and so, at first, is the reformer, the difference being that the reformer’s belief is an advance on the received system of thought, and so, in time, gets acceptance, while the belief of the former, being opposed to the common sense of mankind, gains no acceptance, but dies out with its possessor, or with the few foolish persons whom it has infected.”[359 - Responsibility, p. 53.]

Of late years there has arisen in India, owing to the efforts of Keshub Chunder Sen, a new religion which deifies modern rationalism and scepticism; but here, also, the madness of Keshub evidently outran the march of the times; for the triumph of a similar religion is not probable, even among us, with our much greater progress in knowledge. Thus, too, Buddhism, finding the ground contested by the caste system in India, took no firm hold there, while it extended itself in China and Tibet. Keshub was induced to take up this line of action by a form of madness analogous to that which we shall also see in B – of Modena. In fact, this strange rationalist believes in revelation, and in 1879 he declaimed, “I am the inspired prophet,” &c.[360 - Revue des Deux Mondes, 1880.]

The same thing may be said of politics. Historical revolutions are never lasting, unless the way has been prepared for them by a long series of events. But the crisis is often precipitated – sometimes many years before its time – by the unbalanced geniuses who outrun the course of events, foresee the development of intermediate facts which escape the common eye, and rush, without a thought of themselves, on the opposition of their contemporaries, acting like those insects which, in flying from one flower to another, transport the pollen which would otherwise have required violent winds, or a long space of time to render it available for fertilization.

Now, if we add the immovable, fanatical conviction of the madman to the calculating sagacity of genius, we shall have a force capable, in any age, of acting as a lever on the torpid masses, struck dumb before this phenomenon, which appears strange and rare even to calm thinkers and spectators at a distance. Add further, the influence which madness, in itself, already has over barbarous peoples at early periods, and we may well call the force an irresistible one.

The importance of the madman among savages, and the semi-barbarous peoples of ancient times, is rather historical than pathological. He is feared and adored by the masses, and often rules them. In India, some madmen are held in high esteem, and consulted by the Brahmins – a custom of which many sects bear traces. In ancient India the eight kinds of demonomania bore the names of the eight principal Indian divinities; the Yakshia-graha have deep intelligence; the Deva-graha are strong, intelligent, and esteemed and consulted by the Brahmins; the Gandharva-graha serve as choristers to the gods. But, in order to know what a point the veneration of the insane may reach, and how little modern India has changed in this respect, it is quite sufficient to observe that there exist at present in that country 43 sects which show particular zeal towards their divinity, sometimes by drinking urine, sometimes by walking on the points of sharp stones, sometimes by remaining motionless for years exposed to the rays of the sun, or by representing to their own imagination the corporeal image of the god, and offering up to him, also in imagination, prayers, flowers, or food.[361 - Dubois, People of India, p. 360.]

The existence of endemic insanity among the ancient Hebrews (and, by parity of reasoning, among their congeners, the Phœnicians, Carthaginians, &c. – the same words being used for prophet, madman, and wicked man) is proved by history and language. The Bible relates that David, fearing that he would be killed, feigned madness,[362 - 1 Samuel xxi. 14, 15.] and that Achish said, “Have I need of madmen that ye have brought this fellow to play the madman in my presence?” This passage is evidence of their abundance, and also of their inviolability, which was certainly owing to the belief, still common among the Arabs, which causes the word nabi (prophet) to be constantly used in the Bible in the sense of madman, and vice versa. Saul, even before his coronation, was suddenly seized with the prophetic spirit, so much to the surprise of the bystanders that the event was made the occasion of a proverb – “Is Saul also among the prophets?” One day, after he had become king, the spirit of an evil deity weighed upon him, and he prophesied (here raged) in the house, and attempted to transfix David with a lance.[363 - Ibid., xix. 9, 10, 23.] In Jeremiah xxix. 26, we read “The Lord hath made thee priest, … for every man that is mad and maketh himself a prophet, that thou shouldst put him in prison and in the stocks.” In 1 Kings xviii. we see the prophets of the groves, and of Baal crying out like madmen, and cutting their flesh. In the First Book of Samuel we find Saul as a prophet rushing naked through the fields.[364 - Ibid., xix. 24.] Elsewhere we see prophets publicly approaching places of ill-fame, cutting their hands, eating filth, &c. The Medjdub of the Arab, and the Persian Davana are the modern analogues.[365 - Berbrugger, Exploration Scientifique de l’Algérie, 1855.]

“Medjdubim,” says Berbrugger, “is the name given to these individuals who, under the influence of special circumstances fall into a state which exactly recalls that of the Convulsionnaires of St. Medard. They are numerous in Algeria, where they are better known under the names of Aïssawah or Ammarim.” Mula Ahmed, in the narrative of his journey (translated by Berbrugger) speaks of “Sidi Abdullah, the Medjdub, who brought the best influence to bear on the Hammis, his thievish and vicious fellow-citizens. He would remain for three or five days like a log, without eating, drinking, or praying. He could do without sleep for forty days at the end of which, he was seized with violent convulsions” (p. 278). Further on, he speaks of one Sidi Abd-el-Kadr, who wandered from place to place, forgetful of himself and his family – an indifference probably due to his sainthood. Drummond Hay shows us how far respect for the insane is carried in Morocco, and among the neighbouring nomadic tribes: “The Moor tells us that God has retained their reason in heaven, whilst their body is upon earth; and that when madmen or idiots speak, their reason is, for the time, permitted to return to them, and that their words should be treasured up as those of inspired persons.”[366 - Western Barbary, p. 60.]

The author himself and an English consul were in danger of being killed by one of these novel saints, who, naked, and often armed, insist on acting out the strangest caprices which enter their heads; and those who oppose them do so at their peril.

In Barbary, says Pananti,[367 - Travels, p. 133.] the caravans are in the habit of consulting the mad santons (Vasli), to whom nothing is forbidden. One of them strangled every person who came to the mosque; another at the public baths violated a newly married bride, and her companions congratulated the fortunate husband on the occurrence.

The Ottomans[368 - Beck, Allegemeine Schilderung des Othom. Reiches., p. 177.] extend to the insane the veneration which they have for dervishes, and believe that they stand in a special relation to the Deity. Even the ministers of religion receive them into their own houses with great respect. They are called Eulya, Ullah Deli– “divine ones,” “sons of God” – or, more accurately, “madmen of God.” And the various sects of Dervishes present phenomena analogous to those of madness. Every monastery[369 - Ibid., p. 529.] has its own species of prayer or dance – or rather its own peculiar kind of convulsion. Some move their bodies from side to side, others backwards and forwards, and gradually quicken the motion as they go on with their prayer. These movements are called Mukabdi (heightening of the divine glory), or Ovres Tewhid (praise of the unity of God). The Kufais are distinguished above all other orders by exaggerated sanctity. They sleep little, lying, when they do, with their feet in water, and fast for weeks together. They begin the chant of Allah, advancing the left foot and executing a rotatory movement with the right, while holding each other by the forearm. Then they march forward, raising their voices more and more, quickening the motion of the dance, and throwing their arms over each other’s shoulders, till, worn out and perspiring, with glazing eyes and pale faces, they fall into the sacred convulsion (haluk). In this state of religious mania (says our author) they submit to the ordeal of hot iron, and, when the fire has burnt out, cut their flesh with swords and knives.

In Batacki, when a man is possessed by an evil spirit, he is greatly respected; what he says is looked on as the utterance of an oracle, and immediately obeyed.[370 - Ida Pfeiffer, Voyage, vols. v., vi.]

In Madagascar, the insane are objects of veneration. In 1863 many people were seized with tremors, and impelled to strike those who came near them. They were also subject to hallucinations and saw the dead queen coming out of her grave. The king ordered these persons to be respected, and for a space of at least two months, soldiers were seen beating their officers, and officials their superiors.

In China the only well-defined traits of insanity are to be found in the only Chinese sect which was ever conspicuous, in that sceptical nation, for religious fanaticism. The followers of Tao[371 - Medhurst, State and Prospects, London, 1838, p. 75.] believe in demoniacal possession, and endeavour to gather the future from the utterances of madmen, thinking that the possessed person declares in words the thought of the spirit.

In Oceania, at Tahiti, a species of prophet was called Eu-toa—i. e., possessed of the divine spirit. The chief of the island said that he was a bad man (toato-eno). Omai, the interpreter, said that these prophets were a kind of madmen, some of whom, in their attacks, were not conscious of what they were doing, nor could they afterwards remember what they had done.[372 - Cook, Voyages, vol. ii. p. 19.]

With regard to America, Schoolcraft, in that enormous medley entitled Historical and Statistical Information of the Indian Tribes[373 - Vol. iv. p. 49.] (1854), says that the regard for madmen is a characteristic trait of the Indian tribes of the north, and especially of Oregon, who are considered the most savage. Among these latter, he mentions a woman who showed every symptom of insanity – sang in a grotesque manner, gave away to others all the trifles she possessed, and cut her flesh when they refused to accept them. The Indians treated her with great respect.

The Patagonians[374 - D’Orbigny, L’Homme Américain, ii. p. 92.] have women-doctors and magicians who prophesy amid convulsive attacks. Men may also be elected to the priesthood, but they must then dress as women, and cannot be admitted unless they have, from their childhood, shown special qualifications. What these are is shown by the fact that epileptics are appointed as a matter of course, as possessing the divine spirit.

In Peru, besides the priests, there were prophets who uttered their improvisations amid terrible contortions and convulsions. They were venerated by the people, but despised by the higher classes.[375 - Müller, Geschichte der Urreligion, Basle, 1853.]

All revolutions in Algeria and in the Soudan[376 - Revue Scientifique, 1887.] are due to lunatics or neurotics who make, of their own neurosis and the religious societies to which they attach themselves, instruments for invigorating religious fanaticism and getting themselves accepted as inspired messengers of God. Such were the Mahdi, Omar, and a madman who headed the great revolt of the Taepings in China.[377 - See my Tre Tribuni, 1887.]

Phenomena which present such complete uniformity must arise from like causes. These seem to me to be reducible to the following:

1. The mass of the people, accustomed to the few sensations habitual to them, cannot experience new ones without wonder, or strange ones without adoration. Adoration is, I should say, the necessary effect of the reflex movement produced in them by the overwhelming shock of the new impression. The Peruvians applied the word Huacha (divine) to the sacred victim, the temple, a high tower, a great mountain, a ferocious animal, a man with seven fingers, a shining stone, &c. In the same way the Semitic El (divine) is synonymous with great, light, new, and is applied to a strong man, as well as to a tree, a mountain, or an animal. After all, it is quite natural that men should be struck by the phenomenon of one of their fellow-creatures completely changing his voice and gestures, and associating together the strangest ideas – when we ourselves, with all the advantages of science, are often puzzled to understand the reasons for his actions.

2. Some of these madmen possess (as we have seen, and shall see again, in the Middle Ages and among the Indians) extraordinary muscular strength. The people venerate strength.

3. They often show an extraordinary insensibility to cold, to fire, to wounds (as among the Arab Santons, and among our own lunatics), and to hunger.

4. Some, affected either by theomania or ambitious mania, having first declared themselves inspired by the gods, or chiefs and leaders of the nation, &c., drew after them the current of popular opinion, already disposed in their favour.

5. The following is the principal reason. Many of these madmen must have shown a force of intellect, or at any rate of will, very much superior to those of the masses whom they swayed by their extravagances. If the passions redouble the force of the intellect, certain forms of madness (which are nothing but a morbid exaltation of the passions) may be said to increase it a hundred-fold. Their conviction of the truth of their own hallucinations, the fluent and vigorous eloquence with which they give utterance to them – and which is precisely the effect of their real conviction – and the contrast between their obscure or ignoble past, and their present position of power or splendour, give to this form of insanity, in the mind of the people, a natural preponderance over sane but quiet habits of mind. Lazzaretti, Briand, Loyola, Molinos, Joan of Arc, the Anabaptists, &c., are proofs of this assertion. And it is a fact that, in epidemics of prophecy – such as those which prevailed in the Cevennes, and, recently, at Stockholm – ignorant persons, servant-maids, and even children, excited by enthusiasm, are fired to deliver discourses which are often full of spirit and eloquence.

A maid-servant said, “Can you put a piece of wood in the fire without thinking of hell? – the more wood, the greater the flames.” Another prophetess, a cook, cried out, “God pronounces curses on this wine of wrath (i. e., brandy), and the sinners who drink of it shall be punished according to their sin, and torrents of this wine of wrath shall flow in hell to burn them.” A child of four said, “May God in heaven call sinners to repentance! Go to Golgotha – there are the festal robes!”[378 - Ideler, Versuch einer Theorie des Wahnsinnes, p. 236 (1842).]

6. Mania, among barbarous people, often takes the epidemic form, as among the savage negroes of Juidah, among the Abipones and among the Abyssinians in those affections analogous to the tarantula which are called tigretier. Thus, in Greece, an instance is recorded of an epidemic madness among the people of Abdera, who had been deeply moved by the recital of a tragedy; and those Thyades who appeared at Athens and Rome – worshippers of Bacchus, thirsting for luxury and blood, and seized with sacred fury – were affected by erotico-religious insanity. But this is more especially seen in the Middle Ages, when mental epidemics were continually succeeding one another.