"That is the
chief fatal disease recognised by our physicians."
"And what is its nature?"
"Ah, that neither I nor any other physician can tell you. Life 'goes
out,' like a lamp when the materials supplying the electric current
are exhausted; and yet here all the waste of which physic can take
cognisance is fully repaired, and the circuit is not broken."
"What are the symptoms, then?"
"They are all reducible to one--exhaustion of the will, the prime
element of personality. The patient ceases to _care_. It is too much
trouble to work; then too much trouble to read; then too much trouble
to exert even those all but mechanical powers of thought which are
necessary to any kind of social intercourse--to give an order, to
answer a question, to recognise a name or a face: then even the
passions die out, till the patient cannot be provoked to rate a stupid
amba or a negligent wife; finally, there is not energy to dress or
undress, to rise up or sit down. Then the patient is allowed to die:
if kept alive perforce, he would finally lack the energy to eat or
even to breathe.
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