"Mental state" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... and adjusted it to the facts before him. So it was he came to cherish those two fancies before alluded to that the ominous birthmark she had carried from infancy might fade and become obliterated, and that the age of complete maturity might be signalized by an entire change in her physical and mental state. He held these vague hopes as all of us nurse our only half-believed illusions. Not for the world would he have questioned his sagacious old medical friend as to the probability or possibility of their being true. We are very shy of asking questions of those who know enough to destroy with ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... there is has been made for his pleasure, or to minister to his use. To this belief that every thing is of a subordinate value compared with himself, he clings with tenacity even in his most advanced mental state. ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... and disordered activity. The value and importance of treatment directed to the mind had, indeed, been long recognized, but in practice it had been subordinated to treatment of the actual and assumed physical disorders to which the mental state of the patient was attributed, and, in the few hospitals where persons suffering from mental disorders were received, means for its application were almost or quite entirely lacking. The establishment of Bloomingdale Asylum for the purpose ...
— A Psychiatric Milestone - Bloomingdale Hospital Centenary, 1821-1921 • Various
... unusual. His behavior doesn't quite follow the pattern we usually expect from such cases as this. His extreme physical disability has drastically modified the course of his mental development, and, at the same time, made it difficult for us to make any analysis of his mental state." If only, he added to himself, she had followed the advice of her family physician, years ago. If she had only put the boy under the proper care, none of this would ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... situation created by the Queen's death was both perplexing and menacing.[2] Dona Juana, wife of the Archduke Philip, inherited the crown of Castile from her mother in default of male heirs, but her mental state excluded the possibility of her assuming the functions of government. Already during her mother's lifetime, the health of this unhappy princess, who has passed into history under the title of Juana the Mad, gave rise to serious anxiety. Deserted by the handsome and frivolous ...
— De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) - The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera • Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt
... had its genesis not merely in a contemplative mood, but in contemplation which was forced by the impetuous temper of the times to fail of ever reaching the dignity of thoughtfulness. It was the immature product of an immature mental state; and richly as sometimes it was endowed by every human faculty, by imagination, wit, taste, or even profound thought, it yet never reached the goal of thought, never solved a problem, and, in its highest examples, professed only to reveal, but not to guide, the reigning ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 6, No. 34, August, 1860 • Various
... nothing on any side but the three figures and the objects about them made beautiful by his imagination. Though he tried hard to dismiss them, his resistance was vain, and he set himself to bringing some order into his thoughts "so as to produce a kind of romance." We have a glimpse of his mental state in the odd detail, that he could not bear to write his romance on anything but the very finest paper with gilt edges; that the powder with which he dried the ink was of azure and sparkling silver; and that he tied up the quires with delicate blue riband.[264] The distance ...
— Rousseau - Volumes I. and II. • John Morley
... to a town about twenty miles off for the purpose of telling the good news to Netta, who chanced to be on a short visit to a friend there at the time. When Mrs Tipps reached the station, her ignorance of railway matters, and the confused mental state which was her normal condition, prevented her from observing that the train was an excursion one. She therefore took out a first-class ticket and also an insurance ticket for 500 pounds, for which latter she paid sixpence! Her ignorance and perturbation also prevented her from observing that ...
— The Iron Horse • R.M. Ballantyne
... only was spoken language disused, but also written, no records whatever having been kept during this period. The delight of the people in the newly found power of direct mind-to-mind vision, whereby pictures of the total mental state were communicated, instead of the imperfect descriptions of single thoughts which words at best could give, induced an invincible distaste for ...
— To Whom This May Come - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... there has arisen throughout the different social orders, modified by conditions and varying in intensity, a common agitation—a very complex mental state, best compared to the petulance of a spoiled child, ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... was misery in her eyes and in her laugh and in the very touch of her hand. Misery and insincerity, and that terrible mental state when weakness is roped up between the two and knows, for once in its life, that it has ...
— The Bishop of Cottontown - A Story of the Southern Cotton Mills • John Trotwood Moore
... penis had been removed. The woman stated that from the time she had thus satisfied herself, her mind was unceasingly engaged in reflecting and sympathizing on the forlorn condition of her brother. While in this mental state she gave birth to a son whose penis was entirely absent, but who was otherwise well and likely to live. The other portions of the genitals were perfect and well developed. The appearance of the nephew and the uncle was identical. A most peculiar case is stated by Clerc as occurring ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... his audience to choose between them, and not to choose as do the evildoers. The world, as it is, was made by the joint action of the two principles, and they also fixed the alternative fates of men, for the wicked, Hell—the worst life; and for the holy, Heaven—the best mental state. After the creation was accomplished, the two principles drew off from each other, the evil one making choice of evil and of evil works, and the bounteous spirit choosing righteousness, making his strong seat in heaven, and taking ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies
... not noticed the girl particularly when she offered the sandwiches; but in this moment he found her beautiful. Her face reminded him of a delicate unglazed porcelain cup, filled with blond wine. But there was something else; and in his befogged mental state the ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... is so favorable to inspiration, and that he often quoted in self-defence the words of Claude Tillier,—"Le temps le mieux employe est celui que l'on perd." Aware of his strong propensity to that particular mental state, he attempted all his life to restrict it within limits which would leave sufficient time for active pursuits. His love of sailing must have been closely connected with the inclination to a restful, peaceful, dreamy state, for although ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... thought haunted her: she fancied herself tending him, counting his linen, and looking after all the details of his household, which were too petty to occupy his thoughts. All these fancies gradually took shape, and led up to an act only to be explained by the mental state to which she had ...
— Recollections of My Youth • Ernest Renan
... material, which stands opposite to perceiving consciousness. These Three Potencies are called Substance, Force, Darkness; or viewed rather for their moral colouring, Goodness, Passion, Inertness. Every material manifestation is a projection of substance into the empty space of darkness. Every mental state is either good, or passional, or inert. So, whether subjective or objective, latent or manifest, all things that present themselves to the perceiving consciousness are compounded of these three. This is a fundamental doctrine ...
— The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali • Charles Johnston
... a French soldier was struck in the head with a bullet and left on the field for dead, but subsequently showed sufficient life to cause him to be carried to the hospital, where he finally recovered his general health, but remained in a mental state very similar to that of Professor Goltz's dog. As he walked about the rooms and corridors of the soldiers' home in Paris he appeared to the stranger like an ordinary man, unless it were in his apathetic manner. When his comrades were called to the dinner-table ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XXVI., December, 1880. • Various
... is completely epileptic. A result of the congestion caused by the siege. France, on the whole, has lived for several years in an extraordinary mental state. The success of la Lanterne and Troppman have been very evident symptoms of it. That folly is the result of too great imbecility, and that imbecility comes from too much bluffing, for because of lying they had become idiotic. They had lost all notion ...
— The George Sand-Gustave Flaubert Letters • George Sand, Gustave Flaubert
... beauty is restful, peace-giving and peace-bringing, but so, also, are neatness and order. Orderliness helps to fit one for work. There is undoubtedly some connection between surroundings and one's mental state. In themselves disorder and confusion are irritating. The sight of a dirty child crying in the doorway of an untidy house suggests some connection between the wretchedness of the child and the squalor of the home. I often think of William ...
— A Girl's Student Days and After • Jeannette Marks
... imaginativeness. The fantastic or the boldly imaginative poet may be as sincere as the most realistic: he is true to his own sensibilities or inward vision, and in his wildest flights he never breaks loose from his criterion—the truth of his own mental state. Now, this disruption of language from genuine thought and feeling is what we are constantly detecting in Young; and his insincerity is the more likely to betray him into absurdity, because he habitually treats of abstractions, ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot
... which other minds are affected by thinking of it. As when we say of any one that he is generous. The word generosity expresses a certain state of mind, but being a term of praise, it also expresses that this state of mind excites in us another mental state, called approbation. The assertion made, therefore, is twofold, and of the following purport: Certain feelings form habitually a part of this person's sentient existence; and the idea of those feelings of his, excites the sentiment of ...
— A System Of Logic, Ratiocinative And Inductive • John Stuart Mill
... remarking to himself that the mental state of the renowned Chief Inspector seemed to affect the outline of his lower jaw, as if the lively sense of his high professional distinction had been located in that part of his anatomy, dismissed ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... contained in their analysis [392] of the processes of perception and thought. A sensation, Zeno taught, was the result of an external impulse, which when combined with an internal assent, produced a mental state that revealed at the same time itself and the external object producing it. The perception thus produced he compared to the grip which the hand took of a solid object; and real perceptions, those, that is, which were caused by a real external object, and ...
— A Short History of Greek Philosophy • John Marshall
... same in outward appearance as upon the previous day, but between this morning's mental state and that of yesterday there was a great gulf. The Italian's character was a strange if not wholly unique mixture of simplicity and worldly wisdom. All her experiences, her life as a model in various parts of the world, her hardships and successes, while ...
— The Pagans • Arlo Bates
... night, fearing attack of some evil giant or beast upon all the beauty that was slumbering within. They, who were aware of his peculiar weakness, returned thanks in their most gracious manner; and when they were alone with the Judge they hastened to explain the knight's mental state. The Judge was much amused by the accounts of his adventures and his attempts to revive knight errantry ...
— The Story of Don Quixote • Arvid Paulson, Clayton Edwards, and Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... no power of thought, I did not compare one mental state with another. So I was not conscious of any change or process going on in my brain when my teacher began to instruct me. I merely felt keen delight in obtaining more easily what I wanted by means of the finger motions she taught me. I thought only of objects, and only objects I wanted. It was the ...
— The World I Live In • Helen Keller
... a few of the letters I received from men who are probably in as bad a mental state as they seem to think Schrank is," said ...
— The Attempted Assassination of ex-President Theodore Roosevelt • Oliver Remey
... contents on the deck. To enter, he was obliged to leap over the body of the dying man. The action was grotesque, callous, almost inhuman; it jarred the girl's agonized transports back into a species of spiritual calm, a mental state akin to the fatalism often exhibited by Asiatics when death is imminent and not to be denied. The apparent madness of the captain was now more distressing to her than the certain loss of the ship or the invisible missiles that clanged into white patches on the iron plates, cut sudden holes and ...
— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy
... has now enumerated four categories which are not the self. The fifth and last is Vinnana, frequently rendered by consciousness. But this word is unsuitable in so far as it suggests in English some unified and continuous mental state. Vinnana sometimes corresponds to thought and sometimes is hardly distinguished from perception, for it means awareness[413] of what is pleasant or painful, sweet or sour and so on. But the Pitakas continually insist[414] that it is not a unity and that its varieties come into ...
— Hinduism and Buddhism, Vol I. (of 3) - An Historical Sketch • Charles Eliot
... valueless. Religions, arts, laws, historic events, all have but one standard of appraisement, to wit, the degree to which they produce permanently beneficial mental states in the individuals influenced by them. All must agree to this, though they may differ widely as to what such a mental state may be; whether one of pleasurable activity, or that of the Buddhist hermit who sinks into a trance by staring at his navel, or that of the Trappist monk whose occupations are the meditation of death and ...
— An Ethnologist's View of History • Daniel G. Brinton
... that his own cousin had composed, and which Mr. Green marked with wavy ink lines, so that Arthur would be sure to see them. Mr. Green thought that his cousin's lachrymal symposium on the uncertainty of all things human should be very comforting to Arthur in his present mental state. Little parcels, too, came mysteriously through the mail to Arthur. One day it was a pair of socks, from an anonymous contributor; another time there came a pair of woollen mittens, red and blue, done in that intricate pattern which ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... fruits of goodness, not having reached its Science. Belief is virtually blindness, when it admits Truth without understanding it. Blind belief cannot say with the apostle, "I know whom I have believed." There is danger in this mental state called belief; for if Truth is admitted, but not understood, it may be lost, and error may enter through this same channel of ignorant belief. The faith-cure has devout followers, whose Christian practice is far ...
— Retrospection and Introspection • Mary Baker Eddy
... myself, and my duty is to increase the sum of my happiness. But the mental state we call happiness is relative to the presence or absence of this state in others. Even amongst the lower animals, misery and distress in one of the flock militate against the happiness of the others. In a highly developed man true happiness is impossible in the presence of pain and misery ...
— The Fertility of the Unfit • William Allan Chapple
... movement that you make, and you are making thousands of them every hour, is a distinct example of mind activity causing bodily action. In fact, the very will to make any bodily movement is itself nothing more nor less than a mental state. ...
— Psychology and Achievement • Warren Hilton
... Into her own mental state—possibly at this time the least enviable of the two—we get some glimpses in the Lettres d'un Voyageur of the autumn 1834, and winter 1834-35. Here, again, we should be content with gathering a general impression, ...
— Famous Women: George Sand • Bertha Thomas
... Mrs. Davis, a fine, motherly soul of fifty, stout and sympathetic, who lived four doors from Jennie, and who understood quite well how she was feeling. She had co-operated with the nurse and doctor from the start to keep Jennie's mental state as ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser
... mental state was pitiable. Tragedy had pursued him, almost from his life's beginning, he reflected, as he furtively awaited opportunity for the revenge which he had planned. The fierce feud of the mountains had robbed him ...
— In Old Kentucky • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... is made still more clear by the fact that obedience does not consist so much in the outward act as in the mental state of the person obeying; so that he is most under the dominion of another who with his whole heart determines to obey another's commands; and consequently the firmest dominion belongs to the sovereign who has most influence over ...
— A Theologico-Political Treatise [Part IV] • Benedict de Spinoza
... the open-door system, that it became necessary to engage the attention of patients who were inclined to escape, and also of the much larger number who might wander away without any such definite purpose, so as to keep them under control and supervision. It did not require much study of the mental state of the patients, nor indeed much attention of any kind on the part of their attendants, to insure their safe custody, when the conditions of their life were either to be locked within their wards, to be confined within the high walls of airing-courts, or to be ...
— Chapters in the History of the Insane in the British Isles • Daniel Hack Tuke
... deep breath. "It's about Her Majesty's mental state," he said. "I understand that a lot of it is complicated, and I probably wouldn't understand it. But can you give me as much as you think ...
— Occasion for Disaster • Gordon Randall Garrett
... in the fit mental state to receive the impression. Because you chanced to own the mirror ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Her mental state was peculiar, and her thoughts revolved about the journey from Oxford Street homeward. A thousand times she mentally repeated the journey, speaking the same words over and over again, ...
— Dope • Sax Rohmer |
