“You will, of course, understand, Mrs. Harker, that when a man is so loved and honoured as our host is, everything regarding him is of interest in our little community. Dr. Seward is loved not only by his household and his friends, but even by his patients, who, being some of them hardly in mental equilibrium, are apt to distort causes and effects. Since I myself have been an inmate of a lunatic asylum, I cannot but notice that the sophistic tendencies of some of its inmates lean towards the errors of non causa and ignoratio elenchi .” I positively opened my eyes at this new development. Here was my own pet lunatic⁠—the most pronounced of his type that I had ever met with⁠—talking elemental philosophy, and with the manner of a polished gentleman. I wonder if it was Mrs.