Page:American Journal of Psychology Volume 21.djvu/562

550 "When we reach for an object we move the hand to the right or left as may be necessary, but in turning the hand to the right the opposite muscles are used from those used in turning to the left. But in all such movements the conscious process, the desired activity remains the same." Bleuler holds, too, "gewisse Kenntniss der Ausgangsstellung ist also zur Ausführung der meisten bewussten Bewegungen unentbehrlich."

Berkley reports "A case of General Cutaneous and Sensory Anæsthesia" (Brain, Vol. 23, pp. 111-138), in which, besides total blindness and partial deafness, there was almost total loss of the two forms of sensibility called by Head Protopathic and Epicritic but with only partial loss of "deep" or muscular sensibility, i.e., there was total loss of "thermic, pain, olfactory, gustatory, equilibrium, pressure and weight sensations," and almost total loss of the visual but only partial loss of the muscular sense. "With auditory perceptions a progressive dulling could be noted." In fact "none of the special senses or cutaneous sensations remained wholly uninvolved." Considering the degree and extent of anaesthesia, this case presents two striking considerations: (1) "The musculature, while responding to the will, did so in such a feeble manner that the patient was incapacitated from helping herself to any extent. Thus the dynamometer, when taken in the hand and squeezed, was so feebly compressed that the indicator showed no movement of the dial, though the woman exerted every effort in the trial." This in spite of the fact that both nerves and muscles responded promptly to the galvanic and faradic currents, and in spite of the fact that the autopsy revealed no emaciation. (2) The second fact to be noticed in this case is that "throughout the long course of the illness there was never the slightest departure from normal mentality on the part of the patient." It is therefore clear, that so far as this case is concerned a general loss of sensibility affects voluntary movement more seriously than it does the ideational processes.

Spiller reports a case of anæsthesia in which a loss of muscular sensation resulted in inability to control the member unless it was kept in the field of vision. The "sensations of touch, pain and temperature are diminished in the left, but not to the same degree as are the sense of position and stereognostic perception." ("Separate Sensory Centres in the Parietal Lobe for the Limbs," Journ. of Nerv. and Mental Diseases, Vol. 33, pp. 117-121.) The defects of movement accompanying these sensory disturbances are described by Spiller as follows: "The movements of the left upper limb are awkward, although the limb can be moved freely at all