I questioned him more fully than I have ever done. I wanted to completely understand the facts of his hallucination. The way that I did this was, I now see, a little bit cruel. I seemed to want to keep him to the point of his madness. Usually I avoid doing this with the patients the way I would avoid the mouth of hell.

(Note to myself. Are there any circumstances when I would not avoid the pit of hell? Hell has its price!) If there is anything behind my wish to investigate this patient, it will be valuable afterwards to record it accurately. So I had better begin doing so. Therefore . . .

The patient is R. M, Renfield, age 59. He has a sanguine temperament, and great physical strength. It is unusually easy to upset him, and he has periods of gloom. These end with him having some idea I cannot understand. Possibly his sanguine temperament and his disturbed mind together make him a dangerous man. If he is unselfish then he is probably dangerous. With a selfish man, caution protects both himself and others. When a person thinks of himself, he is not prepared to give or risk more than he will gain. When duty, a cause or something else comes first, then such a man will take risks, and only an accident or a series of accidents can balance this.

Vocabulary:

Hallucination: Seeing something that is not really there
Circumstance: A situation, the way things happen
Sanguine temperament: A lively, slightly undependable character
Gloom: Being miserable and unhappy
Possibly: It might happen but it is not likely
Probably: It might not happen, but it is likely
Cause: An idea, such as freedom, which people are prepared to fight for