Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1870-03-23
Moral Heritage and Criminal Epidem-

! ties, and the influence of imitation on
the frequency of crime, are treated in an
, able and interesting manner. The fol-
! lowing abstract of some of DIR. Elam's
positions and statements we find in the
New York Tribune:
External form and color, organic pc
, culiarities and inherent moral and intel
. lectual qualities may or may not be in
heTited, bUt an acquired aud hdbitUdl
rice rarely fails 10 leave traces upon the
offspring, either in its own form or in
one closely allied. Bethius mentions
the case Of young girl who inherited
from her father propensity for eating
human flesh. Both her parents died be-
fore she was wear old, and she was well
brought up, but she gave way to the
disgusting habit after time. The trans
mission of moral qualities is not of such
a nature as to obliterate mans freedom.
Prupensities and tendencies to particular
forms of virtue and vice are hereditary
not the acts themselves. All the pas
sions are distinctly heritable. Heredi-
tary intemperance is so common that
almost every reader can probably recall
instances within his own personal knowl-
edge. Mr.. B., of Yorkshire, and his
wife were scarcely ever sober. The wife
died of delirium tremens the husband
died of the shock of seeing his only
tOXication by the police; the eldest son,
San inveterate drunkard, committed sui
eide; only one of large family of child
/ rem escaped the taint, all the others
I coming to an Untimely end. NJ. hIorel,
an eminent authority on this subject,
says: 81 have never seen the patient
cured of his propensity whose tenden-
cies to drink were derived from the
hereditary predispOsition given to hin
0 l.. IL. .
bling, libertinage, and a tendency to
crimes against life and property, are
transmitted from generation to genera
ton. An example is cited OF a family,
in France, one of whom was sentenced
to the galleys for life assassination. Five
remained-three brothers, n sister, and
her husband; they were all ultimately
convicted as professional robbers. In
quiry showed that the father and grand
father had both been hanged an uncle
and aunt had been long in the gaIleys;
a nephew had been similarly condemn
ed and all the rest of the family followed
the same destiny. There is no form of
heritage more remarkable than tenden-
cy to suicide, uRaccompanied by other
marks of alteration of mind. DIR. Win
slow speaks of family in which all the
members as they arrived at a certain age
exhibited desire to destroy themselves.
DIR. Gall speaks of seven children of one
man, who all enjoyed a competency and
good health, vet all committed suicide in
the course of 80 or 40 years "Sitting
one day with an acquaintance" SAYS DR..
Elam, 'I noticed some depression in his
spirits. After a prolonged silence, he
broke out into the following attempt at
conversation: My grandfather hung
himself-my uncle took pOisOn-my
father shot himself-I shall cut my
thrOatr The facts were correct; but
constant surveillance prevented the Sc
quel in his own history" Insanity is
universally recognized as hereditary,
and more than half the cases that occur
are occaSioned or favored by transmitted
taint. Like other diseases and peculiari-
ties, it often skips a generation, but
often. too, it descends in a more. or less
aggravated form, without any such in
terruptiOn. Its various forms are inter-
changeable with strictly physical disor-
ders, so that hysteria, chorea, consump-
tion, in one generation, may become /
-imbecility, mania, epilepsy, &C., in the
next; and, rice CerSd, insanity in. the I
parent may be represented in the Off 1
spring by deafdumbness, epilepsy, hys- F..
terra, or the vague and underlined weak I
nesSeS or perversiOns of judgment /
capacity or will, which We call mental 1
ltltsOttndHeSs. There is consequently a I
debatable ground of mental condition |
which is not insanity in the eve of the /
law or the physician. yet is not perfect /
mental sOundness. Persons who inherit |
nature prone to temptation, and at the |
same time an inert will and judgment,
are not, when they commit crime, equally |
responsible with offenders who have
been more kindly treated bv nature.
Any great disturbance of the surface
of society by exceptional social, COM
mercial, or political changes, such as
revolution, war, financial panic, or fever
of speculation is almost certain to be
followed by a rapid termination of the
seeds of evil sown deep in the corrupt
moral nature of man. France. during
the disturbed year 1880, was overspread
by an epidemic of incendiarism. Be
tween 1888 and I635-an era of important
political changes-seyen foremost public
characters were assassinated, namely,
William of Orange, Henry Duke Of
Guise, Henry III. and Henry ". of
France, the Duke of Buckingham, Gus
tavus Adolpbus, and Wallenstein. In
Denmark, about the middle of the last
century, there was an epidemic of mu.-
der, the victims being generally child
ren. The criminals were actuated only
by the insane notion that by public re-
pentance and conversion on the way to
the scltfold they could make sure of
heaven, and the epidemic lasted until :
for capital punishment was substituted
a sentence of branding on the forehead,
for life, and an annual
a man named Wix, in Lon
don, shot his master with pistol he had
purchased from a pawnbroker, One
Graham soon afterwards went to the l
same shop and bought a pistol with !
which he shot a stranger named Blewitt
hn lnr-1l al fha - 81
that Immediately after each assassina-
ton he had received a great many appli- /
cations for pistols, but had resolved
never to sell another. Infanticide has a
strong tendencyt become epidemic. In
One of the departments of France, about
he close of the last century, girl killed g.,
ler illegitimate child; there had been =
no crime of the same nature in that To- 7
,ality for very many years, but within !
he next twelve months there were .
eleven other cases very similar in details. :,
Suicide is still more frequently initiated. :
At one time-for no imaginable cause .
here was an epidemic of drowning a
lmOng the women of Lyons. 1t was :
,hecked at last by an order that the bod =
es of all who thus destroyed themselves =
hould be publicly exposed in the mar .
let place. DR.. Forbes Winslow men .
ions, in his Anatomy Of Suicide that +
1 Mansfield, in particular year, in the :,
month of June, suicide prevailed to an =
farming degree, from cause wholly y
lndiscoverable. The same thing hap =
lened at ROuen. in 1906, at Stuttgardt in -
SII. and in the Valois in 1913. At Var q q;
allies in the single year 1873 no fewer "
han l, 300 persons destroyed themselves. .,
n February, 1914, $50 men of the For g
ign Legion were encamped in the PROV T 7
nee of Oran, when enc of the soldiers =
lutilated himself by a blow upon his -
'rist with the lock of his gun. In the 4
curse of twenty days thirteen others
)llowed his example. No plausible
lotive could be discovered in a single
lstance. The commander, in alarm, Z,
lOved his camp a few leagues to place te
coupled by battalion of Chasseurs of n,
'incennes, and was astOunded TO learn =;
nat eight of the Chasseurs had mutilated -
lemselves in the same way nearly at N
ne same time. The officers were con- a.
dent that no communication had taken "a,
lace between the two camps. The 7,
lost remarkable instances of epidemic II
-ime occur, however, in connection with ar
OisoninE. In the 18th century a society n
young wives was discovered in Rome, N
hose object was TO poison their hus- ~
lnds. They met nightly at the house N,
an old woman called La Spara, to ar N,
Inge the details of their crimes. La Il
para and four others were hanged %
lirty were whipped through the streets, a,
I'd a great number were banished. ay
lOrtly afterward nine others were J,s
,nged, and many more, including IN
lung and beautiful girls, were scourged =.
rOupb the Roman streets Tho -