A very curious instance of those sudden and total losses
of memory which raise such perplexing and appalling problems as to the nature of the personality of man is reported this week from Brighton. Whilst sitting on the sea-front a woman felt something break in her head. She thereupon became unable to tell her name, address, or anything connected with her past life. She is at present in the Brighton Workhouse, her continual cry being, "Oh, shall I get my memory again P" Her clothing does not contain a single mark or initial whereby she might be identified. She is a respectably dressed woman, apparently fairly well-to-do. The following is her description : —Age about fifty-six, dressed neatly in black, appears to be a nurse or companion, well educated, wears a wedding-ring." We hold, and it seems to us are bound to hold, that the notion of a life beyond the grave which will not be endowed with memory of this life is tantamount to annihilation. But if the state of this poor woman is permanent, then she has already suffered a sort of annihilation, though of course death may revive her lost faculty. Still, if she goes on living, she will in effect be another person, and how are these two personalities to be linked and reconciled ? In truth, the whole thing is ore of the most soul-shaking of mysteries.
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