From the Mouth of Madness

Lunatics, madmen, psychopaths, deranged, unstable, coo-coo for cocoa puffs, there are dozens more of such labels. Every insanity is unique, but they are all alike in one perfect aspect. No insane person believes the lie of consensual reality.

Dr. S. Hayden Cane

Insanity:
(Law) Such a mental condition, as, either from the existence of delusions, or from incapacity to distinguish between right and wrong, with regard to any matter under action, does away with individual responsibility.

Insanity
The word provokes quick mental images, the mental patient locked in the padded cell, wearing the archaic straightjacket, or the filth crusted psychopath looking for the next victim to destroy. While there are certainly individuals who fit this bill, they are perhaps the most isolated but highly visible cases. There are many more people who are quietly insane, going about their daily business with no one the wiser. These are the great majority of the disturbed masses.

The mind is a delicate thing, a few pounds of dense protein rich matter, capable of incredible feats of intellect. The brain has a solid track record, it has worked for a very long time, but it is inevitable that there are a few that go bad. These ‘broken’ brains are the most common cause of insanity. I don’t intend for this to be a lecture of basic insanity, those of you who have made it this far should have completed these studies already. I won’t be going over manias, dementias, delusions, multiple personalities, or OCDs. This is a lecture of abnormal insanity.

Literature is rich with descriptions of things that should not be, and wonders that defy description. Lovecraft wrote of things so dark and blasphemous that to see them was to be rendered insane or catatonic. If these claims are true, then no sane person has ever seen the horrors that might exist, and those who might have are now insane. Those poor people are now medicated and living in cells like prisoners. If there was such a thing as a Cthulu, it would take the world completely by surprise. The only warnings would be dismissed as the ramblings of the mad. Perhaps, in a perverse way, we want to be destroyed without warning. The ancients once revered the insane as touched by the gods.

Dr. S. Hayden Cane

From the Mouths of Madness
Madness, like ice cream, comes in a variety of flavors. There is manic-depressive fudge ripple, and OCD bubblegum crunch, and vanilla catatonia. Then there are the good flavors, Lunacy, Amentia, Depravitas, Morbidia, and Horrere.

Lunacy
Does it surprise you to know that the fae are real? Should it then not surprise you that they most vehemently hate us, and everything we have accomplished? The moon touched, the fae-strucj, the poor lunatics, they exist mostly within their mind. The poor wretches don’t have much of a mind let, as most of their essence, their creative intellect was stolen away. Like small children, they wander through the world unable to speak, but with eyes that half see into the wonders and horrors of the quiet dreaming places, they laugh and cry with equal ease.

Amentia
In the myths and legends, half of the heroes were cursed by the gods, some were simply turned into pillars of salt, spiders, or just blasted into ash and dust for their insolence. Others were left insane, broken in their own minds. These rare individuals have done something or would have done something of great offence to the divine. As such, they have been struck and made into animals.

Depravitas

Morbidia

Horrere

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