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.

The consideration, that in our own language, no work existed on thesubject of Medical Jurisprudence, as it relates solely to Insanity,urged me to the present performance. Previously to this undertakingmanifold impediments were foreseen, and these difficulties haveaugmented in every page of its progress:—the apprehensions fromthis arduous attempt, have, however, been mitigated by the consolingreflection, that in a novel enterprize criticism would be tempered withcandour.

[ii]

The following sheets are addressed to the readers of differentpursuits, law and medicine:—from the latter, I have heretoforeexperienced much indulgence and encouragement, when the result of myprofessional labours has been submitted to their judgment:[i:A]—to theformer I am little known: and here feel it necessary, by a distinctavowal, to assert that I have in no manner presumed to encroach ontheir province. Although the title may seem to imply an incorporationof the two sciences, yet it is not to be considered as the combinationof definite proportions of legal and medical knowledge. It has beenmodestly conceived that the general phenomena of disordered intellect,and the criteria of insanity, would not be unacceptable to the[iii]advocate; who might thereby become enabled to adapt the facts innature to the scale of justice. Furnished with such information, hewill be instructed to institute appropriate enquiries for the discoveryof truth, and to ascertain what is the duty of the medical evidenceto supply:—so that he may not be pressed beyond his resources, northe depths of his intelligence be left unsounded. On the practitionerof my own profession I have ventured to impress the importance andmoral obligation of his evidence before the tribunal of justice, andto enforce, that the value of medical opinion becomes enhanced byperspicuity of conveyance, and derives authority from the exposureof its foundations. It has likewise been my object, to direct hisattention to those leading points which usually constitute the subjectsof his deposition, or are presented for his solution during the courseof legal examination.