Argument+2

What makes us sane as oppose to those whom we have labeled as unstable. Why should they be punished for not constricting their true self? While we act and adapt to norms we have established to be sane.
 * Sanity**

Edgar Huntly brings up the question of true sanity: what is the basis by which we label some one insane or sane. Initially, we see that Edgar himself sets insanity in the realms outside his civilized society. "The whole appears to be some freak of insanity" is his opinion upon his reflections of his violent ations towards the panther in the cave. His psychological adventures also constitute what most would call crazy our out of the 'normal'. Then of course we have the conclusion of the novel where according to Sarsefield, "Clithero is a madman whose liberty is dangerous and, who requires to be fettered and imprisoned as the most atrocious criminal".The basis of this judgement comes from Sarsefield's perception that murder is an action that always has malignant intentions with no justification. Yet death is sometimes the only state by which many can find relief from pains that seem uncontrolable or at least that is how initially both Clithero and Edgar see it. "He desired to confer on her the highest and the only benefit of which he believed her capable.....These positions were sufficiently just to my own view, but I was not called upon to reduce them to practice.". However Edgar later admits his 'fault' and Clithero's 'insanity'; whom ultimately kills himself on the trip to the assylum. Clithero is never ignorant as to the knowledge of his actions, and remains constant as to what he did. Whereas Edgar seems to change his mind once he is on contact with Sarsefield, the 'civilized' man. It seems that Clithero acted in accordance to a instinct, whether out of hatred or compassion. Edgar acted in accordance to how others have influenced him, even after having discovered, "My rambles were productive or incessant novelty, though they always terminated in the prospect of limits that could not be overleaped".

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Bibliography
 * Brown, B. Charles. __Edgar Huntly: Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker.__ Penguin Classics, 1799.