Chapter XIV: The Decay of the Affective Life

_Law of Decay: its formula, and its general application in
psychology—Difficulties where the affective life is
concerned—Successive disappearance of the disinterested emotions
(the æsthetic and intellectual), of the altruistic (moral and
social), the ego-altruistic (religious feeling, ambition, etc.),
and lastly, the egoistic—Converse proof: cases of arrested
development—Theory of degeneration—Its relation to decay._

At the opening of this work I gave a general survey of the evolution of the affective life; at its close we have to undertake a task of an opposite nature: the survey of its decay. Does this take place at haphazard, varying from one man to another? or does it follow a regular and ascertainable course? Is it reducible to any formula which can be referred to a law?

The law of decay, in psychology, consists in a continuous retrogression, descending from the higher to the lower, from the complex to the simple, from the unstable to the stable, from the most to the least organised; in other words, those manifestations which are the latest in date of evolution are the first to disappear; while those which were the first to appear are the last to vanish. Evolution and decay follow opposite courses.

I have already shown that the slow and continuous disappearance of memory verifies this formula, and, as a converse proof, that, in the rare cases where this faculty is recovered, the restoration proceeds, step by step, in the opposite direction, up the path previously descended. The methodical process of decay is still better seen in motor psychology. I may perhaps be permitted, by way of elucidation and preparation, to recapitulate briefly what I have detailed at greater length elsewhere: motor retrogression in the well-known case of drunkenness. There is, first, a period of excitement, even of exuberant spirits, which is the very antithesis of reflection; that is to say that attention under its highest form, as the result of a motor convergence, can no longer exist. Next, a man can no longer control his tongue, he tells all his secrets; the will, under its higher, inhibitory form, has disappeared. After this, he becomes incapable of any continuous plan or action: the will, even under its lower or impulsive form, remains powerless. Then the most delicate voluntary movements, those of speech and of the hands, cease to be coordinated. One degree lower, he loses the semi-automatic movements, those of walking: he staggers and loses his balance. Still lower, the muscular tonicity is weakened, he falls from his seat under the table; then the reflex movements are abolished; and finally, if the condition is continued long enough, there is cessation of the automatic movements—those of respiration and of the heart. Here is a well-marked, easily determinable retrograde process, the psychological function of the movements being comparatively simple.

The object of this chapter is to prove that the disappearance of feelings, when it takes place gradually and continuously, in consequence of age or of some slowly evolved malady (general paralysis, senile dementia, etc.), conforms to the same law. But, by reason of the complexity of the affective life, the question presents some difficulties which we must first of all point out.

The first is this: May not affective retrogression be simply the consequence of an intellectual retrogression? or must we take it as primary, independent, and self-determined, not secondary and consequent upon the decay of intellect? Or else—and this view appears to me the most probable—do both cases occur? It is impossible to give a categorical answer; the two elements, the intellectual and the affective, being closely associated. Yet, as retrogression is irremediable and results from organic decay or waste, the presumption is rather in favour of a gradual extinction of the tendencies.

The second difficulty is at least equally important. We have admitted that in every normal person all the primary tendencies exist; but their coexistence does not imply their equality. Experience proves this. The individual character results from the preponderance of one or more tendencies: the æsthetic or the sexual, the moral or the religious; one man is constitutionally timid, and another choleric. It follows from this that all cases of retrogression are not strictly comparable with one another; for it is evident that the dominant tendency is better able than the rest to withstand shocks and assaults, and to resist destructive action. This, in my opinion, explains how it is that—as in a case mentioned below—the æsthetic sentiment, one of the most delicate and latest in formation, is of very late extinction in an artist. This apparent exception is, in fact, a confirmation of the law.

The ideal case for illustrating our subject would be this: An average man, all of whose tendencies are nearly equipollent, is struck down by a disease involving slow retrogression, so that the order in which the feelings are weakened and extinguished can be noted; then the decadence stops short, and is followed by a restoration of the affective life, which can be followed, step by step, in its gradual ascent, so as to ascertain whether it is or is not the repetition, in reversed order, of the period of dissolution. The search for such a case, however, would be no less than the pursuit of a chimera. The only practical method would be to collect a great number of observations on different patients, and thus draw up a schematic table of decay, analogous to Galton’s composite photographs—formed by the accumulation of resemblances and the elimination of individual differences. This is what I shall try to do, as far as the extreme scarcity of material and the difficulties of an unexplored subject will permit. I shall first examine dissolution properly so called; then, by way of converse proof, the arrest of development.

I.

As the decay of the feelings progresses from the higher to the lower, from complex adaptation to simple adaptation, gradually narrowing the area of the affective life, we may, in this decadence, distinguish four phases, marked by the successive disappearance of (1) the disinterested emotions, (2) the altruistic emotions, (3) the ego-altruistic emotions, and (4) the purely egoistic emotions.

(1.) I class under the first head the æsthetic emotions and the higher forms of intellectual emotions, which aim at no practical or utilitarian end, but are luxuries, not necessaries of life. Æsthetic and scientific cravings are so slightly marked, and so far from imperative in the majority of men, that it is impossible to demonstrate with certainty that they are the first to disappear; but it may be indirectly inferred.

It cannot be denied that those who have a passion for art or science, and for whom these are necessary conditions of life, are extremely rare compared with those who are moved or possessed by love, the desire for riches, or ambition. In the mass of men the æsthetic and intellectual feelings remain in a rudimentary condition, or attain only a slight, at most a medium development, and it cannot be said with certainty when they become extinct, seeing they have never really existed. Compared with the higher forms, they resemble a case of arrested development, _i.e._, of retrogression; and this arrest of development is the rule, as it must be for all tendencies beyond the bounds of the mere necessities of life.

To this negative proof I may add other positive proofs.

Age and diseases whose effect is retrogressive diminish, if they do not annihilate, zeal, enthusiasm, the impulse towards creation, discovery, or the simple enjoyment of art, and the curiosity which is always on the alert. I omit some very rare exceptions, each of which would require individual examination. In the majority of men weakened vitality at once destroys all taste for the superfluous.

We must also note the decided hostility to all innovations—new forms of art, new discoveries, new ways of stating or treating scientific questions—which comes on with old age. The fact is so well known as to make proof unnecessary. As a general thing, in art especially, every generation rejects that which follows it. The usual explanation of this “misoneism” is that there is a fixed cerebral constitution, organised intellectual habits. Yes—but if the proposed new scientific or artistic ideal caused a true, deep, intense emotion, it would break down and sweep away the barriers of habit. There would be a shock, a turning upside down, a conversion. Cases of a rupture with the artistic or scientific past sometimes occur, but rarely, as they presuppose the possibility of a violent shock and the revival of an imperious passion, but turned in another direction. This repulsion for novelty is rather of emotional than of intellectual origin; it is a sign of the weakening of the affective life, and of a tendency towards diminished effort, repose, inertia.

(2.) The altruistic feelings (social and moral emotions) having a practical value, and being reckoned among the conditions of human existence, it is much easier to fix the moment of their partial or total decay. Now, the preceding groups apart, they are the first to disappear. They may have been altered or extinct for a long period, while the ego-altruistic, and still more the egoistic tendencies, are still intact. We have seen, again and again, how quickly persons become unsociable and ungovernable through dementia, general paralysis, melancholia, epilepsy, hysteria, shock, and injuries to the head.

But their retrogression takes place by gradations to be determined by observation alone.[254]

Case 1. "F—— entered the asylum December 20, 1889, suffering from
general paralysis, which took the form of dementia. He was an
intelligent, well-educated man, capable of filling a brilliant
position in society. Being a gifted musician, he became well known
as a violoncellist and his playing was long an attraction at the
most frequented concerts. What especially struck one in this
patient on his admission was his utter indifference to all about
him—doctors, nurses, and patients alike. When shown an aged
dementia patient who was dying he was neither touched nor
disturbed, but simply remarked, ‘There’s one of ’em going to
croak’ (‘_En voilà un qui va claquer_’). To suggestions that he
should leave the asylum and mingle again in society, he never
returned any other answer than ‘I like my own comfort too well—I
wish people would leave me in peace.’ The more general altruistic
feelings, therefore, would seem at this date to have vanished; but
family affection, especially filial love, is still intact. F——
incessantly speaks of his father, wants to write to him, to see
him. On being shown his picture he burst into tears. The personal
feelings are still intact, the love of liberty, and the instinct
of self-preservation in all its forms.

"Jan. 15, 1891 (a year and a half later). F—— is now in the
_gâteux_ ward. The feelings already ruined or destroyed have not
reappeared. Retrogression has gone on almost uninterruptedly. F——
no longer speaks of his father, and if spoken to about him he
replies with indifference. One day, all his family being assembled
at the foot of his bed, he recognised each of his relations and
spoke to them by name, but showed no emotion whatever; the moment
of separation left him as indifferent as their arrival had found
him.

"Even the egoistic feelings are now impaired; he no longer demands
freedom of movement. Eating is the only thing that interests him;
he devours ravenously, and, after his meals, picks up the crumbs
which have fallen on the bed-clothes. The nutritive instinct is
the last surviving.

"Yet, in this patient, the artistic feeling long remains
unimpaired, for the reason indicated above, viz., that it is the
direct expression of his temperament, and an essential part of his
_ego_: because he is an artist.

"Two months after his admission into the asylum, though devoid of
social tendencies and generous feeling, he was still able to
co-ordinate his movements and play his old tunes on the
violoncello. One day, in the garden, he was found gazing
ecstatically at the blue sky, flecked with small white clouds; he
was saying, ‘How beautiful it is! how beautiful it is!’ Nothing
else, by-the-bye, could be got from him that day. Chance having
brought the famous violinist X—— as a visitor to the asylum about
a month before F.’s death, he was asked to play to the latter. The
patient had been, for some time, in the last stage of insanity and
was past understanding anything, yet he understood this, and when
he heard the familiar airs of old times played on the violin his
eye became clear, and for a minute the mind seemed to have found
itself again under the influence of art."

Case 2. “Ph. R——, aged 70, suffering from senile dementia, was up
to this age an intelligent, peaceable, respectable citizen. At the
last elections he presented himself as a candidate for the
Chamber, and, in spite of the protests of his family, placed
himself at the head of an Anarchist group, and drew up a programme
which we will not inflict on the reader. He claimed to have
received 700 votes. However that may be, it became necessary to
place him in seclusion. His political and social tendencies
perished in the first catastrophe, but his domestic feelings still
remained intact. He spoke of his family with a touching
simplicity. A letter written to his brother-in-law (too long for
reproduction here, but very sensible) furnishes throughout
irrefragable proofs of this. Gradually these feelings became
weaker, the disease progressed rapidly, he became dirty in his
habits, and the only function now remaining is the generative
instinct in its simplest form, as masturbation.”

Footnote 254:

I owe these observations to the kindness of Dr. Dumas, who
collected them with a view to a special study of the decay of
feeling.

In the following cases intellectual retrogression seems to precede and determine the affective evolution:—

Case 3. "D——, a general paralytic, on his admission into the asylum,
is fond of talking of the 3000 francs he has invested; he is
much occupied with the dividends and coupons now due which he
ought to have received. On inquiries being made all this was
found to be accurate. He had, therefore, a tolerably clear idea
of property, since this idea was suggested by the image of
certain papers representing the values involved. At a later
period, when spoken to about his 3000 francs, he had forgotten
everything and did not understand. When reminded of what he had
himself said, and that he possessed the values guaranteed by the
receipts, he understood no more than before. But D—— carries
money about with him, and knows very well how much he has at the
time. ‘For ten centimes,’ he says, ‘I can have a cup of coffee
every day, and I have three francs.’ The sight of a white,
shining metal is sufficient to awaken in him the idea of
possession represented by the pleasure to be bought with it."
Three months later he no longer understands even this third
degree of possession: possession with him means having something
to eat; the piece of bread which he is holding in his hand and
greedily devouring is the only thing he cannot be induced to
give up.

Case 4. "M——, formerly employed in the _octroi_; paralytic
dementia. During the first few days after his admission he gave
himself up to political divagations, spoke much of universal
suffrage, and especially of liberty. When asked for a definition
of this word he gave the following explanation: ‘Liberty is the
right to do what one wishes.’ A short time after this he ceased
to make speeches and seemed to collapse. He was no longer
capable of giving his definition, or of understanding it; when
pressed with questions he said at last, ‘Liberty is being able
to walk about in the yard.’ The abstract idea is replaced by a
concrete idea indicating an assemblage of movements. Later
still, a few days before his death, he answered the same
question with, ‘Being free is when any one is in bed; I shall be
free when I am in bed.’ The idea of liberty, therefore, was at
last confused in his mind with that of a vague state of
comfort."

These observations show how the group of altruistic sentiments dissolves piecemeal, and the affective sphere narrows itself more and more. The first to disappear are the vaguest and weakest of all the forms of benevolence—those embracing the whole human race; then the family emotions, which are more stable, more restricted, more frequently repeated; finally, there is absolute indifference to every one.[255]

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Footnote 255:

“When the mind undergoes degeneration, the moral feeling is the
first to show it, as it is the last to be restored when the
disorder passes away; the latest and highest gain of mental
evolution, it is the first to witness by its impairment to mental
dissolution.... In undoing a mental organisation, nature begins by
unravelling the finest, most delicate, most intricately woven, and
last completed threads of her marvellously complex network. Were
the moral sense as old and firmly fixed an instinct as the
instinct to walk upright, or the more deeply planted instinct of
propagation,—as many people in the presumed interests of morality
have tried to persuade themselves and others that it is,—it would
not be the first to suffer in this way when mental degeneration
begins; its categorical imperative would not take instant flight
at the first assault, but would assert its authority at a later
period of the decline; but, being the last acquired and the least
fixed, it is most likely to vary, not only ... in the pathological
way of degeneracy, but also ... in physiological ways, according
to the diversities of conditions in which it is placed.”
(Maudsley, _Body and Will_, p. 266.)

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(3.) The ego-altruistic emotions (to employ H. Spencer’s terminology) form a group whose limits are vague, floating, and indecisive. It is even uncertain whether it exists as a distinct group or simply corresponds to a particular “moment” in the evolution of complex emotions. Without arguing this point, or attaching any importance to it, I employ this formula, because it is a convenient one in following step by step the retrogression from pure altruism to pure egoism.

Sexual love is a fairly good representative of the group. Need we say that, appearing later than the other instincts, it disappears before them, thus being in strict conformity with the law of retrogression. It does not belong to childhood, but neither does it to old age. We must eliminate the survivals and _simulacra_, which are only a factitious product of imagination; we are dealing with the tendency under its normal and complete form, with _all_ its physiological and psychological conditions.

The religious sentiment in its medium forms, neither too coarse nor too subtle, belongs also to this category, plunging its roots deeply into the individual, but in order to rise beyond him. Of its two constituent elements, love tends towards the dispossession of the individual; the other, fear, towards strict egoism; with retrogression, the latter becomes exclusive. The believer, especially in the melancholic state, at first complains of being wanting in pity, fervour, love of God; he no longer finds consolation in prayer. Thus, as decadence increases, or simply in consequence of age and the approach of death, the egoistic anxiety about personal salvation becomes imperious. This was the time of life when the kings, princes, and lords of the Middle Ages multiplied pious foundations—monasteries, churches, and hospitals; and the same thing still takes place, in our own day, in religions which admit of the efficacy of works in purchasing salvation, and of prayers for the dead. The religious feeling thus comes back to fear, its primary form in evolution. We might also note the frequent survival of observances and rites when the _true_ feeling has disappeared, _i.e._, the solidity of the organic and automatic element. In a retrograding religion, dogma dissolves before outward acts of worship, which, as we have seen, is the inversion of the evolutionary process.

Ambition is the type of the higher form of egoism; but as it must take into account the nature of other men and employ them in carrying out its designs, it is a modified form of egoism. We know how tenacious and durable is this passion in its numerous forms—the pursuit of power, honour, renown, riches; in it we have a foretaste of the stability of egoism after the ruin of all other tendencies. It disappears when the stage is reached when man sincerely declares himself disgusted with everything, and speaks like the author of Ecclesiastes. The greatest of the Cordovan Caliphs, Abderrhaman III., who noted down the principal events of this life, wrote: “I have reigned fifty years in peace and in war, loved by my people, feared by my enemies, respected by my allies, seeing my friendship sought for by the greatest kings on earth. Nothing have I lacked that the heart of man could desire—neither glory, nor power, nor pleasures. Yet, having counted the days in this long life in which I enjoyed unalloyed happiness, I found that there were fourteen.” But this contempt for human interests comes late, and springs rather from weakness than from wisdom. Men renounce the world, not so much because they have weighed it and estimated it at its true value, as because they no longer have the courage to conquer or keep it. Except in the case of philosophers, the disappearance of all ambition is the first symptom of the decadence of the egoistic tendencies: it indicates weariness, exhaustion, and a want of faith in one’s self.

(4.) The last group, that of the strictly egoistic feelings, the most general and most firmly organised of all, is the last to disappear. The threefold group formed by the offensive instinct (anger), the defensive instincts (fear), and the nutritive cravings, persists in men and animals up to the farthest limit of consciousness. We know that anger makes its appearance later than fear; does it vanish earlier? I have no data to enable me to reply to this question. What is certain is that the affective states associated with nutrition last to the end, and that all remaining activity is concentrated in them, as shown by the cases above quoted. The fact, moreover, is so well known that there is no need to dwell on it.

II.

We have just seen how the process of decay, beginning at the top of the building, gradually destroys all its storeys, one after another, as it descends to the foundations. It would be interesting to ascertain whether the work of restoration would follow, as it ought, the inverse order; but, when decay has fully accomplished its task, all is over, without hope of recovery. We only meet with partial and fragmentary cases of restoration. In the absence of this converse proof we may proceed from below upwards, not to retrace the normal evolution of the affective life, which has already been done, but to consider the cases in which this evolution remains in a rudimentary state, or becomes abortive at various stages of its ascending progress, _i.e._, in idiots, imbeciles, feeble-minded persons, human beings of incomplete development.

In the lowest stage, that of the complete idiot, all instincts are wanting, even that of nutrition. In infancy idiots only learn to take the breast with difficulty. At a more advanced age, there are some who feel neither hunger nor thirst; the sight of food fails to awaken them from their torpor, and without the help of others they would perish of inanition. Ordinary cases, on a higher level than this, show unbounded voracity. Idiots may be capable of feeling nothing but the nutritive cravings, and giving no signs of pleasure or pain except inarticulate growls, shrill cries, or strident laughter.

The complete idiot shows no sign of fear; he cannot fear, because he feels and comprehends nothing. Those less devoid of sensibility dread punishment, especially blows.

With regard to anger, there are the apathetic and insensible, and, above them, in imbeciles, fits of bestial rage, with convulsions, suffocations, violent impulses, and destructive cravings.

Those who pass the purely egoistic stage and do not remain totally indifferent to those about them, show a vague and transient affection for the person who takes care of them. Others, less destitute, “seem amiable and affectionate, and we may compare these patients to the dog who fawns on those who caress him” (Schüle). The highest step attained by them, and that rarely, is a certain sense of injustice. Itard observed this in his famous “savage of the Aveyron,” whom he had purposely punished without cause.[256] In short, the social and moral tendencies are rudimentary or non-existent.

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Footnote 256:

Itard, _Mémoire sur le sauvage de l’Aveyron_, éd. Bourneville, pp.
xlviii. _sqq._

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With regard to the sex-instinct, it is either entirely absent or there are various perversions and unrestrained erethism.

Lastly, there are some who can rise to a rudimentary manifestation of the superfluous or disinterested feelings. The idiot, as a rule, does not play; he is self-centred, isolated, and has no surplus vitality to expend. That activity which seems to live on itself and costs no effort, but is a source of pleasure without fatigue, is almost, if not quite, unknown to him. Even when invited and induced to play, he does so with little enthusiasm. We find, however, a rudiment of artistic tendency in those who have some taste for drawing or music. We may note, in passing, that the musical faculty being, as we know, one of the first to appear, ought also to be one of the last to disappear.[257] But all this is very poor and reduces itself to mere imitation, and even this natural and simple tendency is wanting among the lower grades of the feeble-minded.

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Footnote 257:

Ireland (_Journal of Mental Science_, July 1894) has published
some observations which tend to favour the idea of this slow
retrogression in dementia. He gives the case of a patient, sinking
into dementia, who not only retained her musical ability, but
could even pick up new tunes; and mentions cases where the
patient, seated before a piano, could play old melodies though
incapable of anything else. A girl, aged fourteen, became demented
through brain fever and had ceased to speak, save a few words, but
was still fond of music and would play fragments of tunes. Two
lady patients, though incoherent in speech, played with great
accuracy on the piano—one by ear only, the other from musical
notes, although she was quite unable to read a book, etc. (Perhaps
in this last case there was “word-blindness” applying to words
_only_.)

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Such, briefly, is the balance-sheet of the affective life in these disinherited ones. It is generally admitted that, in this abortive development, there are two main periods: the first lasting from birth till about the third or fourth year, when, if arrest of development takes place, the psychic state remains almost _nil_; the second, from the fourth year onwards, allows of a less scanty, but a discordant and perverted psychology. In both cases, the evolution, however incomplete, reproduces in all its stages the contrary order to that of decay.

It will be necessary, in concluding this study of decay, to say a few words about a doctrine, much used and abused in these days, and often alluded to in the course of this work, which stands in direct relation to the pathology of the feelings, and, in short, permits us to return some sort of answer to the question put at the beginning of this chapter: the Theory of Degeneration.

When we review the abnormal or morbid forms of the affective life: destructive impulses, phobias, incurable melancholy, sexual perversions, failure of the moral sense, insanity of doubt, etc., and seek their causes, we at once find some which are proximate or immediate. Among the most frequent are physical maladies, injuries to the head, sudden shocks, as in railway accidents; sorrow, whatever its origin, whether love, ambition, ruin, separation; intellectual overwork, and excesses of all sorts. A little reflection, however, shows us that the alleged causes are not the _whole_ cause—that, in fact, they are often, rather, accidental and occasional. One man bears courageously or even cheerfully a loss under which his neighbour succumbs. Many are able to give themselves up with impunity to excesses of pleasure or work, physical or mental. Of the passengers in the same train, at the time of an accident, the greater number will suffer nothing worse than fright, while one perhaps may on this account become insane, or permanently subject to phobias. To explain this difference of results under identical conditions, we must seek a supplementary cause in the constitution of the individual himself. When he offers only a slight resistance, and succumbs to the least shock, we say that he is a degenerate.

The conception of degenerescence as a fundamental cause is due, as every one knows, to Morel, and has flourished famously since his day. Unfortunately, it has been called in to account for occurrences so numerous and so dissimilar that, in the end, it has brought down on itself the suspicions of some writers, who have recently stigmatised it as a “metaphysical,” _i.e._, vague and transcendental explanation. In fact, different writers seem to understand by this word totally different things. The original propounder of the doctrine had a clear if not a correct notion of degenerescence. “The clearest idea,” says Morel, “which we can form of human degenerescence is by representing it to ourselves as a morbid deviation from a primitive type. This deviation, however simple we may suppose it at its origin, nevertheless contains such elements of transmissibility that he who carries its germ in himself becomes more and more incapable of performing his functions as a member of the human race, and progress, already impaired in his person, is threatened in those of his descendants.... Degenerescence and morbid deviation from the normal type of humanity are therefore, in my idea, one and the same thing.” This is quite clear. Morel, as a Christian, believed in a typical man, perfect as he came from the hands of the Creator: such a belief simplifies many things. This position has been given up. At present, we understand by degenerescence, a morbid predisposition, having its peculiar signs, its physical and psychical “stigmata.”

The physical stigmata, which have been enumerated at great length by specialist writers, consist in anomalies of the skeleton, the muscular and the digestive system, of the respiratory, circulatory, and genito-urinary apparatus, of the skin, the special sense-organs, of speech, and especially of the central and peripheral nervous system. The detailed lists contain about sixty items.

The psychic stigmata are more vaguely defined. The principal are: irritability, showing itself in a marked disproportion between action and reaction; instability of character, absence of unity, of consent, incessant changes, eccentric conduct, painful haunting by fixed ideas, irresistible impulses, or extraordinary apathy.

It has been objected to this doctrine that, of a thousand individuals taken at random, there is perhaps not a single one who does not show one or more of the stigmata, so that the whole human race would be included in the alleged class of degenerates. No stigma, it has been said, is specific by itself; neither is any group of symptoms, at least in a clear and indisputable form; so that one can come to no conclusion from them.

This and other difficulties have supplied matter for many discussions, into which this is not the place to enter. Degenerescence, whatever its value as an explanation, and the abuse to which it has been subjected, is not a mere word; it expresses a reality: it sums up in itself a number of characters. This is sufficient for us, and allows us to eliminate one hypothesis: that the decay of the feelings is necessarily dependent on intellectual decay.

To say truth, the question stated above: Is the retrogression of the feelings a primary, and that of ideas a secondary fact? or the contrary? is, under this form, somewhat factitious. It is only by analytical artifice that we separate thought and feeling, which, by their nature, are closely connected. The law of retrogression is generally valid in biology, and probably also in psychology; it does not act on isolated points, it gradually surrounds and saps the whole building, no matter on what side it begins. It is clear that all weakening of the intellect, such as that produced by old age and disease (difficulty in understanding general ideas, loss of certain groups of recollections, etc.), involves the disappearance of the corresponding affective states: one of the observations already quoted (Case B.) is an instance in point. But we must not thence conclude that the retrogression of the affective life _is_, _by right_, always subordinated to that of knowledge. Most cases of degenerescence prove the contrary; it is essentially an organic decadence, a state of physiological poverty, showing itself first of all by alterations in the range of the emotions, tendencies, actions, and movements. The intellect, for its part, is better able to stand the shock, and sometimes remains uninjured. More than this, the adherents of this doctrine have shown that the degenerate are sometimes endowed with brilliant intellectual faculties; while some have even maintained that degenerescence is a necessary condition of high mental originality (“genius a neurosis,” etc).

Apart from all exaggeration, the mass of facts permits us to make the induction that decadence is primarily (not exclusively) that of the affective tendencies and manifestations, since it is on them that degenerescence (taking the word in its least vague sense) first and principally acts.