Causes of Insanity Included Religious Excitement

Discovering the reasons for insanity proved difficult for early alienists. For many years, these mental health experts attributed the origins of insanity to what modern medicine would call laughable causes: excessive novel-reading, masturbation, smoking, religion and so on. Eventually, a few medical men began to question these sorts of factors as true causes of mental issues.

Dr. John Gray, superintendent of the State Lunatic Asylum in Utica, New York, wrote in 1885 that, “Religion, strange to say, is sometimes set down as a cause of insanity . . . . To some it means that a person is insane on the subject of religion; to others that the insanity was caused by religion.”

Dr. John Gray

Gray recognized that the idea of “Religious Insanity” actually meant that religion caused insanity to many people. His belief, though, was that: “What people talk about when they become insane, has rarely anything to do with the real cause of the disease.” Gray gave a couple of examples concerning his theory, one being the case of a severely overworked minister who finally broke down and began raving that he was Zerubbabel and had been appointed by God to preach “to the spirits in prison” and that he had descended into hell to preach the gospel of salvation and redemption.

“This was not Religious Insanity,” said Gray, “but insanity from exhaustion, religion having nothing to do with it except to give tone and character to his delusions.” Gray found that many people who appeared insane due to exhaustion or broken health could often recover when given rest and proper medical treatment.

State Lunatic Asylum, Utica, New York, courtesy National Library of Medicine

His point of view was a refreshing counterpoint to others in his field who would have labeled a patient like this insane and perhaps never expected a recovery.