Foucault — “In the serene world of mental illness, modern…”

Source: Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason — Michel Foucault

Book page: foucault-madness-civilization

From: Madness and Civilization — Quotes

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In the serene world of mental illness, modern man no longer communicates with the madman: on on hand, the man of reason delegates the physician to madness, thereby authorizing a relation only through the abstract universality of disease; on the other, the man of madness communicates with society only by the intermediary of an equally abstract reason which is order, physical and moral constraint, the anonymous pressure of the group, the requirements of conformity.