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                        MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE,

                           AS IT RELATES TO

                               INSANITY,

                             ACCORDING TO

                          THE LAW OF ENGLAND.

                         BY JOHN HASLAM, M.D.

                   LATE OF PEMBROKE HALL, CAMBRIDGE.
       FORMERLY PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL MEDICAL, NATURAL HISTORY
                 AND CHEMICAL SOCIETIES OF EDINBURGH.

                                London:
           PRINTED FOR C. HUNTER, LAW BOOKSELLER, BELL YARD;
           J. HUNTER, ST. PAUL’S CHURCH YARD; AND TAYLOR AND
                         HESSEY, FLEET STREET.

                                 1817.




PREFACE.


The consideration, that in our own language, no work existed on the
subject of Medical Jurisprudence, as it relates solely to Insanity,
urged me to the present performance. Previously to this undertaking
manifold impediments were foreseen, and these difficulties have
augmented in every page of its progress:—the apprehensions from
this arduous attempt, have, however, been mitigated by the consoling
reflection, that in a novel enterprize criticism would be tempered with
candour.

The following sheets are addressed to the readers of different
pursuits, law and medicine:—from the latter, I have heretofore
experienced much indulgence and encouragement, when the result of my
professional labours has been submitted to their judgment:[i:A]—to the
former I am little known: and here feel it necessary, by a distinct
avowal, to assert that I have in no manner presumed to encroach on
their province. Although the title may seem to imply an incorporation
of the two sciences, yet it is not to be considered as the combination
of definite proportions of legal and medical knowledge. It has been
modestly conceived that the general phenomena of disordered intellect,
and the criteria of insanity, would not be unacceptable to the
advocate; who might thereby become enabled to adapt the facts in
nature to the scale of justice. Furnished with such information, he
will be instructed to institute appropriate enquiries for the discovery
of truth, and to ascertain what is the duty of the medical evidence
to supply:—so that he may not be pressed beyond his resources, nor
the depths of his intelligence be left unsounded. On the practitioner
of my own profession I have ventured to impress the importance and
moral obligation of his evidence before the tribunal of justice, and
to enforce, that the value of medical opinion becomes enhanced by
perspicuity of conveyance, and derives authority from the exposure
of its foundations.