BOOKS.

DR. CONOLLY ON HAMLET'S SANITY.*

Da. CONOLLY is an accomplished critic as well as an experienced physician of mental disease, but we doubt whether any of his criticisms are, on the whole, less sound than those which are sug- gested to him by his professional studies. The public have often noticed a tendency in the stUdents of insanity to declare men insane whom practical people, accustomed to judge rather by results than by any theory of mental causes, would call at most eccentric or devoid of self-restraint. Getting a glimpse into phenomena which they have known to be symptomatic of a thoroughly disturbed reason, they aro really influenced more by the associations suggested to them with such cases than by the appearances actually before them, supposing that what they see indicates the gents at least of all the evil they have formerly seen in connection with the same symptoms. And so they will often declare a man insane for the partial disclosure of those grotesque inward impulses, and the audibility of those discordant inward notes, of the vibration of which most men are conscious in their own natures, though they are sufficiently reasonable to suppress them. But when this somewhat matter-of-fact dia- gnosis is carried into the world of literature, especially the world of Shakespeare, the results are necessarily even less trustworthy than in real life. Dr. Conolly would evidently have had little scruple in signing a certificate to put Hamlet under restraint even before the appearance of his father's ghost, and regards that injudicious and selfish step on the part of the paternal spirit as in the highest degree exciting to his princely patient, and as finally determining the tendency to violent mania. He does not, however, allow any- thing, as it seems to us, for that general stimulus to the tone of thought and expression which dramatic poetry, especially in Shakespeare's hands, necessarily implies,—and if he were to analyze many other characters, on whose sanity uo doubt has ever been cast, as he does Hamlet's, we doubt whether many of them could keep quite clear of the imputations which an experienced physician of mental disease would know how to throw out. Certainly, if Hamlet has a fit of frenzy in Ophelia's grave, Laertes must on the same occasion be pronounced still more insane when, with less to excite and unnerve him, he is the first to jump into the grave, exclaiming,

"Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead, Till of this flat a mountain you have made To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head Of blue Olympus!"

—quite an unreasonable proceeding, and showing, we should think a very high irritability of the nervous centres. And there are at least, eight or ten of Shakespeare's other heroes and heroines

whom it would be almost as easy for Dr. Conolly to claim as patients as the Prince of Denmark. A "study of Romeo" on like principles might, we are sure, be made to prove Romeo un- sound of mind from the beginning, from the first very incoherent speech containing the remarks :—

"Why then, 0 brawling love ! oh loving hate! Oh anything of nothing first create !"

to the last fatal act, which a coroner's jury, instructed by Dr. Conolly, would have returned "temporary insanity," or, perhaps, more technically, "melancholia."

Not, of course, that we wish to deny that Hamlet is, in Shakes- peare's conception, far nearer to the boundary between sanity and insanity than most of the poet's heroes, but only that many of Dr. Conolly's tests of lunacy cannot fairly be applied to his case, unless they are also applied to that of other quite sane heroes. He does not allow for the permanent elevation of the level of poetical drama above the plane of common life, and brings, as we believe, many entirely untrustworthy proofs of Hamlet's inco- herence of mind. Nay, Dr. Conolly even calls in the pedantic old Polonins with his amplified dissertations as a serious witness to the true diagnosis of Hamlet's disease, in a passage which is one of the most unfortunate efforts of professional refinement in the essay :— "Polonius goes on, with undiminished self-complacency, dilating on • A Study of Hamlet. By John Conolly, M.D., D.C.L. Mozon.

his own supposed perspicacity; on the counsel he had previously given to his daughter to refuse to see the prince, or to admit his messengers, or to receive any tokens from him.

"Which done, she took the fruits of my advice; And he repulsed (a short tale to make) Fell into a sadness ; then into a fast : Thence to a watch; thence into a weakness; Thence to a lightness; and, by this declension, -

Into the madness wherein now he raves, And all we wail for.

"This garrulity details to us the order of the symptoms already partly indicated in the action of the play, and might have been copied from the clinical notes of a student of mental disorders. We recognize all the phenomena of an attack of mental disorder consequent on a sudden and sorrowful shock; first, the loss of all habitual interest in surround- ing things ; then indifference to food, incapacity for customary and natural sleep; and then a weaker stage of fitful tears and levity, the mirth so strangely mixed with extremest grief ;' and then subsidence into a Chronic state in which the faculties are generally deranged. These are occurrences often noticed in pathological experience, and even in the sequence mentioned. In addition to these symptoms we learn. from an observation of Polonins, occurring in the same scene, and which the Queen confirms, that Hamlet has acquired the habit of walking for hours, 'four hours together,' in one place, here in the lobby.'"

This seems to us about as wise as it would be to take one of Polonius's previous speeches in the same scene as an impoitaut scientific testimony to the true nature of madness in general :—

" Your noble son is mad: Mad call it ; for to define true madness What is't but to be nothing else but mad ?

That he is mad 'tis true' 'tis true, 'tie pity, And pity 'tis 'tis true ; afoolish figure, But farewell it, for I will use no art ; Mad let us grant him then, and now remains That we find out the cause of this effect, Or, rather say, the cause of this defect ; For this effect defective comes by cause. Thus it remains, and the remainder thus," &c.

Is it not perfectly evident, as much in Dr. Conolly's extract from Polonius's speech, as in this, that nothing whatever is in- tended except to paint the excessively reduplicated ex Iravagance of the courtier's affected wisdom ? Indeed, we confess grave doubti as to the asserted scientific character of Polonius's so-called "clinical notes." Does not the indifference to food often pre- cede the loss of habitual interest in outward things ? Need the "weakness" or the " lightness" occur at all ? Dr. Conolly would scarcely stand cross-examivation on these

matters. In Hamlet's ease, at all events, the "ugliness," as Dr. Conolly himself notes, is one of the earliest symptoms, occurring immediately after the interview with the ghost, when Hamlet lightly calls him "old Truepenny," "Mole," and treats him altogether as a jocular phenomenon. Indeed, if these "clinical notes" were really meant as a scientific descrip- tion of Hamlet's disease, we cannot think that Shakespeare would have embodied them in speeches so full of long-winded pedantry and addled experience. The true dramatic purpose, not only of the character of Polonius, but in the latter part of the play of Osrie, and, to aless degree, of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern throughout, is, by keeping up a constant flow of hollow phrase and courtier- like verbiage, of sounding brass and tinkling cymbals, to deepen the contrast with the accumulating tragedy of murder, guilt, and madness, which the original crime of the King produces. We are sure at least of this, that Shakespeare had no notion at all of using the exhausted receiver of Polonius's worldly wisdom as the organ of any true diagnosis of Hamlet's case.

Dr. Conolly's theory appears to be that, though Hamlet has some- times the craftiness of lunatics in throwing dust into the eyes of his friends by providing them with false explanations of his mental state, and though he can at times intentionally carica- ture his part from mischievous motives, yet that, on the whole, Shakespeare was trying to delineate a mind really unhinged, liable to recurring fits of proper mania, broken by intervals either of clear reason or of clouded calm. He holds that even the purposeless and ill-sustained assumption of insanity, so variable in tone, so often dropped altogether ; again, all his conduct to Opbelia, his first soliloquy after the ghost scene, and then his inappropriate laughter and jokes, his talk with Horatio after the play of Gonzago's murder has fairly demonstrated the King's guilt, his shocking excuse for not killing the King while a his prayers—that it might give him a chance of salvation, his wild interview with his mother and remorseless murder of Polonius, his craft in getting Roseucrantz and Guildenstern executed in England instead of himself, finally, his violence in Ophelia's grave, are all absolute proofs of a real, not of a feigned, insanity. And it is on this ground alone that he justifies Horatio's panegyric on him after death,—that all his more cruel acts are to be referred to a dii-

turbed reason, while the true Hamlet was high-hearted and noble.

There is one curious passage in this essay in which the phy- sician so overpowers the critic, that he virtually reproaches Shakespeare with making the ghost audible in the interview in the Queen's bedroom. Dr. ConoIly thinks it would be more appropriate to make it in that scene a real product of Hamlet's fevered brain, and neither to make it visible nor audible to any one but himself; and the reply with which the prince persuades Iris mother of his perfect sanity Dr. Conolly regards, or wishes to regard, as nothing but the cunning of insanity :—

" It is carious to observe that the arguments he adduces to disprove

his mother's supposition are precisely such as certain ingenious mad-

men delight to employ— HAM. "Ecstasy!

My pulse, as yours, doth temperately keep time, And makes as healthful music. It is not madness That I have uttered: bring me to the test, And I the matter will re-word ; which madness Would gambol from.

This obvious desire to get rid of the ghost and substitute a delusion, while retaining Hamlet's apology for his own reason as a further proof of his insanity, will show sufficiently that Dr. Conolly differs materially from Shakespeare as to the state of Hamlet's mind, and of course, so far, we can have no controversy with him ; as the only point capable of discussion is what Shakespeare intended us to understand, not what Dr. Conolly thinks he would have done better to substitute in its place after a little conversation with himself.

For the rest, we hold Dr. Conolly's view to be chiefly mistaken through not getting any true glimpse of Hamlet's motives for his feigned insanity, nor, indeed, of the character of his mind altogether. It is clear that Shakespeare means to delineate a mind always catching at intellectual excuses to avoid de- cisive action, starting back like an elastic spring from any final course, and seizing chiefly on those trains of reflection which tend to scare from a contemplated deed or to justify in- action. Ms mother's unfaithfulness has taken a morbid hold of his imagination at the very commencement of the play, opening a vein of deep distrust towards women, and deepening that general misanthropy, the excuses for which irresolution so often magnifies as its best apology for the "policy of absten- tion" from active life.

Thus the peculiarity of Hamlet's mind is the tendency of all its impulses, if not immediately carried out into action, to turn into speculative food for his discursive imagination—a process by which they lose all their force as impulses, and by which the effort to embody thorn in action becomes even repulsive. There is a certain inherent dislike in the intellectual imagination to translate thought into action—a mood which in its lightest form Wordsworth has expressed for us in the beautiful poem on Yarrow unvisited :—

" Be Yarrow's stream unseen, unknown, It must, or we shall rue it ; We have a vision of our own, Ah! why Should we undo it f" And the same mood has been still more curiously illustrated by the late Mr. Clough, in his Roman poem, "Amours de Voyage," where he delineates through many pages the revolt of his hero's mind against the practical step of marrying a woman he loves when it comes to the point. It is wholly an intellectual and imaginative, not in any sense a moral repulsion, against committing the in- tellect to a given course, in favour of keeping the largest reserve of freedom. Goethe constantly delineates in himself the same excessive reluctance to take the last and critical step in any course he had resolved on. He had almost to cheat himself into doing it,—to do it with his eyes shut,—in order to do it at all. If he opened them, he hesitated, and thought hedging preferable. It seems to us that this is Shakespeare's great idea in Hamlet. Impulses, if not immediately acted upon, turn to specu- lative thought, and open a chasm between himself and his purpose. When be first hears of his father's murder he is all impatience to avenge it ; but before the ghost has well disap- peared he is noting that "a man may smile and smile and be a villain, at least in Denmark." In short; he is trying to imagine his uncle's state of mind, as he had previously imagined his mother's with morbid accuracy. The ghost's revelation instead of spurring him to action is opening up a long vista of exciting images, and it is in this state of mind that the idea of feigned madness has something very fascinating for him. It will give him an excuse for loosing the control which social convention demands over Iris thoughts, it will open opportunities for obser- vation, release him from the necessity of hypocritical respect to his uncle and mother, above all, look to himself like a step towards his revenge 'without demanding any real practical effort. Nay; more, it will release him honourably from all virtual engagements to Ophelia, which he is no longer either able or willing to fulfil, —not able, for he is dedicated to a great act of revenge,—not willing, for his faith is shaken in all women by Iris mother's con- duct, and though he still feels tenderly for °Olefin, his trust is weakened, and the thought of any practical tie like marriage is becoming more and more distasteful to him. In fact, the un- hinging of his mind is a kind of unhealthiness far removed from mania—an increasing morbidness about definite actions, a stimu- lated vision of all tire objections that can possibly be urged against a given step, a more and more complete surrender to the- habit of imagining what he will do rather than doing it. To this species of intellect, under the special excitement of finding his near- est relations guilty of the most terrible crime, a plausible excuse for affecting fitful madness would be a great temptation, anti Hamlet's. first use out is to disentangle lihnself, so far as he can, from his en- gagements with Oplielia, and set her free, while he secur,s a mask from behind which he may, as he says to himself, watch his- opportunity, and in reality excuse his own delays.

But Dr. Conolly thinks this interpretation would prove him alto- gether too coarse and cruel to Ophelia and his mother, too blood- thirsty to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, too unnatural even, towards the King himself. We do not think so. Hamlet is not meant to be aniiable, is meant to have that peculiar hardne-s and insensibility to the mere pain of others which often marks minds. habituated to stare all sorts of emotions and events unblushingly in the face. He says of himself to Ophelia, and far from untruly,— for Hamlet is incapable of mere modest self-depreciation,--" I caul& accuse me of such things that it were better my mother bad not borne me. I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more

offences at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, itnagina- tions to give them shape, or time to act them in." And he is hard. He stares the bloom off all the most delicate sentiments. He justifies his substitution of Roseuerantr_ and Guildenstern for himself with the most haughty coolness.. When Horatio remarks that they have gone to their death, he replies, with perfect sang-froid, that they had no business to meddle :— " Why, man, they did make love to this employment,

They are not near my conscience: their defect Does by their own insinuation grow : 'Tis dangerous when the baser nature comes Between the pass and fell incensed points Of mighty opposites;"

which is clearly no dreamy excuse, but the cold imperious. temper of a prince born to the purple. And his treatment of both his mother and Ophelia is in the same spirit, not devoid of affection, but quite careless of giving pain,—perhaps rather enjoying it.

On the whole, though we have derived both pleasure and in-- struction from Dr. Conolly's essay, we are fully convinced that any attempt to show Hamlet's reason to be shaken is utterly hopeless. His mind Iris highly morbid, it is true,— but the mor- bidness arises from the thronging thoughts which deter him from action, which draw him into the solitude of his own discursive and hitter imaginations, and cause "tine native hue of resolution" to be " sicklied o'er with the pule cast of thought." Dr. Conolly may regard Hamlet as insane if Ire pleases, but the insanity is not mania, not one of reason, rather of a great disproportion between his discursive intellect and his will.