Blaxton in hear going to see Ser Willam her husband, wich is a presnor at Moretoke casel neare Coventry. My lady now is at London, waiting if she can get him relest, and for the present is put of with good words. Our dotter Mary is at hom with me, she is (I praise God) a relegos child, and servesable to me. Mr Hums hath tout her to rit. My lady had a great love and care of her. I found her all her close and paid Mr Broune for teching her on the verginalls. I shall have a care of all the rest as much as in me lais. I ret to my frend Busby according to your desire about Isache, but never had ansar from him. I very much desire if it ples God to settel you at Rome, that he may com to you. I do think he will be a gret comfort to you, and loves rising earlly to go to coul. When I tel him I have had letter from you, he axes if you have send for him. "No more, thene euer, "I praise God for all your contentedness to bare your crosses, for that is the way to make them eassie and lite to you, to consedeer from hom they com, and how gustly wee deserue them, and how nesserary they are for vs, and how they cannot be auoided in this lif. "I most kindly thanke you for your deare, loving, and most constand care of me, and I do ernestlye desire to aprove myself what you thinke me in your cherrittabl good thots of me. All your delit is wall Thousands of your Readers have had, if they are heare, and I shall pray and long to heare of your at all like us, a deep gratification-Keats's Eve of prospring in your besnes and good settelment agine; St Agnes' is beautiful-this we felt before,' and now my vnkle ret to me that the marchands had agroeed feel doubly, accompanied with your comment and to leon (lay on) every one so much for Isabella' is also a delightful poem interpretation. you to agment your stipend. I shall just now rit to my Lady Blax- -some of its lines are like solid bars of gold, once ton, and let her know you are wall. Mrs Man and read they are read again, and never forgotten. But Mrs Garnett, the Dauensons, and Dr Clarke are wall. the same may be said of much of Keats's poetry. My Lady Gercon, I think, is ded, for when I saw Of all our modern great poets he has been the least her, theare was no hops of lif. My Lady Huten read and appreciated. As far as my experience in was wall, and remembers her to you. Oure good poetry goes, and the enjoyment of it, he takes his frend, Mrs Hungton, and her husband, are both ded, place with the highest— -or why do passages from his and Mr John Kilinggoul. All the res of our neighpoems come into the mind in the divine company of bours and our neighbours are as yet wall. My deare Shakspeare's and Milton's? I never read him withrespetes and seruies to your good frend Mr Tindal. out thinking of Comus' and The Midsummer "Yours as much as euer in the Lord, Night's Dream.' What a chaste antique witchery there is in the Eve of St Agnes !'-what pathos in " 6 • Isabella ! '—and what a compass of mind and power 6 in Hyperion!'-to use his own words," Might SNOW-DROPS. A LOVELY Sisterhood of nuns ye seem, Sad am I for you, sweet ones! you must never A REMARK WHICH WE BELIEVE TO BE WELL-FOUNDED. If a man keeps always perfectly sober, with an even temper, and no display of wealth, he may pass unscathed almost everywhere.-Alexander's Sketches in Portugal. This Correspondent (whose sonnet affords genuine proof that he has a right relish of the poetry he speaks of, and whose Gipsey King' we should be glad to see) has gratified us with a letter containing the following passage :— · MUSIC. Musical Library. No. XI. Charles Knight. 6 sition it is. It is among the very best of inventions, original, true, and belongs, not to this or that style of music, so much as to our very nature. ON THE DEATH OF HIS WIFE IN BY LORD HAILES. [SIR David Dalrymple, Scotch lord of session, the excellent writer of the Annals of Scotland.' His friend Lord Woodhouselee says truly of the following lines, that it would not be easy to produce from the works of any modern Latin poet (he might have added, or ancient,) a more delicate, tender effusion, or an idyllion of greater classical purity. It is a pity that the editor of Blackwood," or of the Times,' or Mr Landor, or some other accomplished scholar, does not make a selection of these classical amenities, and give us them in a volume with notes and translations. Our friend Mr Webbe should do it. We are sure that men of genius, of all parties, would hail it with encouragement and delight.] Vidi, gemellos, et superbivi parens, At mox sub uno flebilis vidi parens Te, dulcis uxor! ut mihi sol occidit, Heu, solus, ac dubius feror! AN ATTEMPT TO TRANSLATE THE ABOVE. I saw them, twins, a parent proud, I saw them, through my tears, both dead. But when thou left'st me too, sweet wife! Now through a lone and silent life L. H. DESTRUCTION OF A SHIP AND ITS It is a well-authenticated fact, that an American whale ship, the Essex, was destroyed in the South Pacific Ocean by an enormous Sperm Whale. While the greater part of the crew were away in the boats killing whales, the few people remaining on board saw an enormous whale come up close to the ship, and, when very near, he appeared to sink down for the purpose of avoiding the vessel, and in doing so, he struck his body against some part of the keel, which was broken off by the force of the blow, and floated to the surface; the whale was then observed to rise a short distance from the ship, and to come with, apparently, great fury towards it, striking one of the bows with his head, with amazing force, and completely "staving it in." The ship, of course, immediately filled and fell over on her side, in which dreadful position the poor fellows in the boats saw their only home, and distant from the nearest land many hundred miles; on returning to the wreck, they found the few who had been left on board, hastily con gregated in a remaining whale-boat, into which they capsized-they with difficulty obtained a seanty sup had scarcely time to take refuge before the vessel ply of provisions from the wreck, their only support on the long and dreary passage before them, to the coast of Peru, to which they endeavoured to make the best of their way. One boat was fortunately picked up by a vessel not far from the coast; in it were the only survivors of the unfortunate crew, three in number-the remainder having miserably perished under unheard-of suffering and privations. These three men were in a state of stupefaction, allowing their boat to drift about where the winds and waves listed. One of these survivors was the master: by kind and careful attention on the part of their deliverers, they were eventually rescued from the jaws of death, to relate the melancholy tale.-[From a very interesting and comprehensive little account, just published, of the Sperm, Whale, its Fishery, &c. Effingham Wilson, pp. 58.] possess one. But very frequently all his worldly they visit their wives. Thus a Kulina, having mar- A GENTLEMAN WITH A WIFE IN [FROM the second volume of the Hindoos' (just manner THERE exists in Bengal a particular tribe of Brahmins, who conduct their marriages in a different from that which prevails among other members of the same caste. The history of this tribe is as follows. Formerly, there existed in Bengal but one order of Brahmins, called Satsati, all of whom were equal in honour. There was, consequently, no powerful rivalry to stimulate to exertion, whether in virtue or learning, and the whole caste insensibly sank into sloth and ignorance. For some time this state of things continued undisturbed. But at length a prince arose, who, incensed at their indolence and incapacity, and wishing to offer up, by pious and skilful hands, a sacrifice, which he designed to solemnize for obtaining rain, invited from a neighbouring state five Brahmins of learning and virtue capable of conducting the ceremony in a becoming manner. Their performance satisfied the monarch, who, as a reward, gave them grants of land; and from these five men, nearly all the Brahmins, now in Bengal, are supposed to be descended. Nearly the same thing, however, happened to their posterity as had happened to the Satsatis: ignorance, the vice which most easily besets mankind, intent, for the most part, on vulgar acquisitions, again crept in, and a second reform became necessary. Ballâlsêna, therefore, King of Bengal, observing among the Brahmins a great lukewarmness in the performance of their religious duties, determined to divide them into three orders, distinguishing one as a peculiar order of merit, to intitle a man to enter which the following qualifications were required: to observe the duties of the caste, to be meek and learned, of good report, to possess a disposition to visit the holy places, to be devout, not to desire gifts from the impure, to delight in an ascetic life, and to be liberal and beneficent. Those in whom these nine qualities were found, he denominated Kulinas; those who possessed some, but were wanting in other qualities, were called Srotriyas; while those, in whom none o. these signs of superiority could be discovered, were termed Vansajas. The distinctions thus created, and which still continue to be observed with great tenacity, have given rise to the greatest enormities. A Kulina may lawfully give his son in marriage to the daughter of a Srotriya, or even to a Vansaja; but, in the second case, on condition that his family, if the practice be continued, shall sink to the level of a Vansaja. This danger, however, he generally confronts with great readiness for a certain consideration; and the Srotriyas and Vansajas, vehemently ambitious of forming connexions with the privileged class, consent to expend enormous sums of money to obtain Kulîna husbands for their daughters. For this reason, the male youth of this class are generally engaged as soon as born to women of the inferior tribes. But the contriver of the rules, by which these people regulate their conduct, neglected to provide for the daughters of Kulinas, who are forbidden to marry out of their class, and, unless very wealthy, can find no husbands in it. They therefore remain unmarried. Polygamy, itself an evil, is frequently resorted to as a remedy to the inconvenience resulting from this arrangement. The Kulina Brahmin, solicited and courted on all sides, marries a number of wives, some from his own class, to gratify his friends, others from among the inferior classes, through considerations of interest, to enrich himself, or to provide for himself a home in various parts of the country, where he may be lodged and entertained without expense during his peregrinations from one place of pilgrimage to another. The women of his own class he commonly leaves at the houses of their friends; of the others he generally takes one to his own house, when he happens to ! of the ballad are not without merit, and the first is so beautiful, that it makes one impatient of the mediocrity of the rest. The picture it presents has the true ballad freshness and simplicity,—the truth told in simple words. "Regent," perhaps, is not so well; but the rest is as fresh as the "summer night :" FEUDAL AMUSEMENTS. Henry de Lancaster, commander of the English forces, invited the Knight of Liddesdale to combat with him in the lists at Berwick. In the first course the Knight of Liddesdale was wounded by the breaking of his own spear. This accident having interrupted the sport, Henry Lancaster requested Alexander Ramsay to bring twenty gentlemen with him to encounter an equal number of English. The request was complied with; and the sports continued for three days. Two of the English combatants were killed on the field; nor was the loss of their antagonists less considerable. The point of a spear pierced the brain of William de Ramsay. After having been shrieved he expired in his armour. John Hay, an eminent person among the Scots, received a mortal wound. At this juncture, Patrick Graham happened to arrive from abroad. An English knight challenged him. "Brother," said Graham, pleasantly, "prepare for death, and confess yourself, and then you shall sup in Paradise." And so it fell out, says Fordun. He appears not to have felt any horror at a scene, where brave men, without either national animosity, or personal cause of offence, lavished their lives in savage amusement.-Dalrymple's Annals of Scotland. TO CORRESPONDENTS. " We have to thank five of our Readers for supplying "The dews of summer night did fall; The moon, sweet regent of the sky, And many an oak that grew thereby." We recollected this stanza: we had been repeating it, like a tune, for a week past, till the communications of our friends came to hand; and then were obliged to comfort ourselves for the breaking of the spell, by thinking how kind and prompt they had been in sending us so many copies within three days after the appearance of our request. We received the amazing anagram of our friend T. T., and have not yet recovered of the perplexity into which it has thrown us as to whether our Readers would derive as amusing an astonishment from it as ourselves. The History of the Streets of London,' contained in the Supplements, will have a copious index to it when concluded. "I do not believe there is a man on earth, even among the worst of those whom the every-day, and particularly 'decorous world shuns as 'blackguards,' who has not in his heart of hearts some redeeming quality; and I do firmly believe that of all the publications which issue from the press throughout Great Britain, none is more calculated to cherish and draw out that kind of latent goodness than yours'; and this I consider one of its greatest claims to attention; yes, even a claim superior far to its literary merit, though I am sure I shall not be accused of underrating the latter." G. W. cannot do better than cultivate his taste for poetry, provided it be only the ornament of his leisure, and interfere with no duty of certainty. Even the greatest poets, when they begin life, have no right to reckon upon their genius alone; especially as it sometimes happens, that the greater the genius, the less likely is it to be so generally understood by its contemporaries, as to be of worldly advantage to its possessor. The great poet, therefore, must often work like other men for a subsistence, and be content (as he well may) with his enjoyment of his beautiful fancies and his prospect of fame. And the lesser must be glad that he too has a perception of the beauties of nature, wherewith to solace himself after his necessary tasks. LONDON JOURNAL. TO ASSIST THE INQUIRING, ANIMATE THE STRUGGLING, AND SYMPATHIZE WITH ALL. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 11, 1835. PROCLAMATION EXTRAORDINARY! THE QUEEN-BEE DEPOSED! NATURE, Regina. To Our Right Trusty and Well-Beloved Samuel Bagster, Junior, Dr Edward Bevan, Captain Thomas Brown, William and Samuel Curtis, Dr John Evans, Edward Jesse, William Kirby, John Claudius Loudon, James Rennie, William Spence, N. A. Vigors, and all and singular our bee-masters, entomologists, gardeners, naturalists, poets, and others whom it may concern, GREETING: WHEREAS, by our singular good ordination, from time immemorial, our beloved and industrious little households, called Bees, purveyors to us of honey and wax, and singers of us to sleep by the side of our flowery brooks, have been, and are, and shall continue to be, till we think fit to ordain otherwise, the issue, male and female, lawfully begotten, of one sole Mother and Matriarch, falsely called QUEEN, who ruleth, like other mothers of households, intirely in right of her motherhood, and solely because she is the parent of all and singular the males, females, drones, workers, fighters, victuallers, sentinels, and all other denominations of bee whatsoever, separate or inclusive, and not because she resembleth in any respect the human Sovereign known by the name of Queen AND WHEREAS the said human Sovereign could by no parity of right or reason, except in the sense yclept metaphorical, be styled Mother or Matriarch of the innumerable separate households, composing Kingdoms or Queendoms; but on the contrary would be justly and highly scandalised at the slightest intimation purporting that she was, in like and veritable manner, the actual mother and parent of all and singular her Majesty's foot-soldiers, horsemen, vestrymen, noblemen, bishops, members of parliament, corn-factors, hosiers, dyers, boot-makers, &c. &c. to the great confusion of terms and ideas, and detriment of her crown and dignity— AND WHEREAS, furthermore, the state or condition of Motherhood, or Matriarchship, hath its own rights, dignities, and sovereign powers, as We who are both Queen and Mother well know, and standeth in no need of honours otherwise derived_ AND WHEREAS, most especially and lastly, it is of importance to all classes and denominations of creatures, to the furtherance of truth, and the operations of right reason, and beneficence, that the terms and ideas herein above-mentioned should be kept distinct and well apprehended, each in its proper confine and limitation, to the due glory of Me its originator (for in Me art originateth), and to the comfort and security of all things- . THIS IS TO GIVE NOTICE, No. 50. of Mothers, and Queen of all Things, of the con- SUNDAY IN LONDON. that St Paul preaches a sermon. See now-here comes a little fellow whom they would suppress, clean as a pink, far happier than a prince, a sort of little angel himself, making allowance for the pug-nose; but innocence and happiness are in his face, and before him (not to speak it profanely) is the beatific vision of the piece of hot mutton, which he is carrying home from the baker's, and devouring with his eyes. He is an honest boy, for his mother has trusted him with carrying the meat and the baked potatoes; and it is the only bit of meat which he or she, or his father, can get to eat all the week round; and his little sisters are to have some of it, for they have all been good, and helped to earn it; and so here is a whole, good, hard-working, honest family, whom the religious eaters of hot meat every day would prevent from having their bit on Sundays, because why? Because it would do the poor souls any harm? No; but because it would do their rich dictators the harm of seeing their own pragmatical will and pleasure opposed, humours, the very result perhaps of their own stuffing and indigestion. A Sunday evening in London, with its musical than it appears. That from this present Wednesday the Eleventh of March, in the year One Thousand Eight Hundred and Thirty-five, and henceforward through all time to come, in all books, poems, treatises, references, discourses, casual mention, and all and every mention whatsoever, the said Mother or Matriarch of the Bee-household, yclept the Hive, do cease and discontinue to be styled and intitled Queen, and be denominated, and reverenced solely under the deno- When we speak of lovers on a Sunday evening, mination of Mother or Matriarch as aforesaid; we mean, of course, lovers who cannot well visit on upon pain of our singular displeasure as the Mother any other day in the week; and whose meetings, From the Steam-Press of C. & W. REYNELL, Little Pulteney-street.] PRICE THREE HALFPEnce. therefore, are rendered as intense as they can be by the infrequency. What signify the circumstances that may have hindered them? Let them be button-making, or bread-making, or a clerkship, or servitude, or any other chance or condition of life, what care we, provided the love be genuine, and the pleasure truly felt? Burns was a ploughman, Allan Ramsay a hair-dresser, Gay at one time a mercer, Richardson a printer, Dodsley a footman. Do we suppose that the authors of Sir Charles Grandison,' Black-Eyed Susan,' and the finest love-songs in the world, did not make as cordial and exquisite lovers as the best-bred gentlemen about town, and that their mistresses and they did not worship each other with a vivacity and a passion infinite? Our Sunday lover, then, is an apprentice or a clerk, and his mistress is a tradesman's daughter, and they meet only on Sundays and Sunday evenings, counting every minute till the time arrives, listening to every knock, trying to look calm when the other joins the family party; for they seldom see one another alone even then. But now they are at least in the same room, and happiness is with them. They see and hear each other; they see the little manœuvres to get a nearer seat; at length they sit close together. The parents are not displeased, and let things take their course. This is, perhaps, the happiest time of courtship-when lovers feel secure of one another's affections, and only have just sufficient doubt of other security to make everything seem dependent on themselves and the result of their own will and choice. By degrees, as the family divide in their talk, they are suffered to talk exclusively together. Every word is precious; every question the most indifferent has a meaning: it is sufficient for one to say, "I like this," or "I like that," and the other thinks it a charming observation-a proof of fine sense, or feeling, or taste, or, above all, of love; for the eyes, or the quivering lips, or the panting bosom, speak with it, and the whole intercourse, whether speaking or silent, is one of intense acquiescence and delight. A gentleman comes up and gallantly addresses some smiling remark to the lady; the lover, if he is not quite sure of her mind, begins to be jealous. The gentleman moves off, and a remark at his expense prostrates the lover's soul with gratitude. The lady leaves the room to put a child to bed, or speak to a sister, or look after the supper, and darkness falls upon the place. She returns, and her footsteps, her face, her frock, her sweet countenance, is thrice blessed, and brings happiness back again. She resumes her chair, with a soft “thank ye," as he elaborately, and for no need whatsoever, puts it in its best position for being resumed; and never, he thinks, did soul, breath, and bosom, go so sweetly together as in the utterance of that simple phrase. For her part, she has, secretly, hardly any bounds to her gratitude; and it is lucky that they are both excellent good people, otherwise the very virtues of one or other of them might be their destruction. (Ah! they will think of this in aftertimes, and not look with severe countenances on the victims of the less honourable.) At length they sit looking over some pictures together, or a book, which they are as far from reading as if they did not They turn over the leaves, however, with a see. tion; on various political and social institutions; on the condition of woman; nay, even on the very ob. ject and end of the intire apparatus of society. These opposite and jarring opinions have their origin in the gross ignorance that prevails of that human nature, which all this apparatus is constructed for the purpose of influencing. The great majority of men know absolutely nothing, even of the frame-work of their bodies; could ignorance be more than ignor ant, one might say they are in a state of still greater darkness relative to the operations of their minds; while, as to women, there is scarcely one who would not think there is a degree of impropriety in their so much as thinking of such subjects; and yet many of these persons are really anxious for their own improvement, and sincerely desirous to promote the welfare of their fellow-beings. charming hypocrisy, and even carry their eyes along the lines; their cheeks touch-his hand meets: hers by favour of the table-cloth or the handkerchief; its pressure is returned; you might hear their hearts beat, if you could listen. Oh! welcomes, war; welcome, sorrow; welcome, folly, mistake, perverseness, disease, death, disappointment, all the ills of life, and the astonishments of man's soul! Those moments, nay, the recollec. tions of them, are worth the whole payment. Our children will love, as we have loved, and so cannot be wholly miserable. To love, even if not beloved, is to have the sweetest of faiths, and riches fineless, which nothing can take from us but our own unworthiness. And once to have loved truly, is to know how to love everything which unlovingness has not had a hand in altering-all beauties of nature and of mind, all truth of heart, all trees, flowers, skies, hopes, and good beliefs, all dear decays of person, fading towards a two-fold grave, all trusts in heaven, all faiths in the capabilities of loving man. Love is a perpetual proof that something good and earnest and eternal is meant us, such a bribe and foretaste of bliss being given us to keep us in the lists of time and progression: and when the world has realised what love urges it to obtain, perhaps death will cease; and all the souls which love has created, crowd back at its summons to inhabit their perfected world. Truly, we have finished our Sunday evening with a rapt and organ-like note. Let the reader fancy he has heard an organ indeed. Its voice is not unapt for the production of such thoughts, in those who can rightly listen to its consummate majesty and warbling modulations. " [Something yet remains to be said of Sunday in the Suburbs.'] The scope of the work is well expressed in the tions can be properly developed and directed: hence PHILOSOPHY OF HEALTH."^ ONE of our fair Readers, not aware that we had de signed a special attention to this new work by Dr Southwood Sinith, has kindly forwarded it to us, with the following letter and notice; the former of which we publish in accordance with the love we bear to all genuine qualities, especially in a womanly. shape, and to the readiness which they evince for waiving their self-love in behalf of more general considerations. We are also willing to let the world see what a compliment she pays us, in likening our public spirit to that of the author. The book (as might be supposed from a lady's thus writing about it) is unexceptionable in every conventional respect, as well as admirable in the rest. . I am, Sir, with many thanks for the pleasure I so often receive in reading the LONDON JOURNAL, Respectfully yours, FAILOSOPHY is the science of principles, and principles are, or ought to be, the basis of institutions, and the guide of reforms whenever institutions be come inadequate or corrupt.. A mind accustomed to the investigation of principles, and to the application of them to practical purposes, is sometimes painfully impressed by the narrowness and inadequacy of proposed measures of reform in which their advocates seem disposed › finally and contentedly to rest; and still more painfully affected by the opposite and jarring opinions, that prevail, for example, on educa In this state of things, in this condition of darkness on the one hand, and of opposite and conflicting opinicn on the other, the work before us seems to come like the " still small voice" that followed the whirlwind and the storm, when the prophet was seeking for God. It calls us back to Nature, and tells us about Humanity. It is truly an exposition. It presents no theories; it advances no doctrines; it opens to us facts; it details phenomena, and invites us to come and see, and seeing, to use our understandings and form our conclusions. It is true philosophy. If completed as it is begun (for there is but one volume yet published), it must be an extensive work; but, when completed, the date of its publication will form an epoch in human existence. Sooner or later it must influence human minds, and its author must rank among the foremost of the benefactors of humanity. How much such a work is needed, they best know, whose knowledge of human nature is most profound; but to write it required a rare union of qualities the anatomist, the physiologist, the physician, the intellectual and the moral philosopher combined. Of Dr Southwood Smith's qualification for the great task he has undertaken, a judgment may be formed from that part of it which he has accomplished. The volume before us is evidently the result of long and careful investigation. The arrangement of the matter is such, that subject after subject is introduced gradually and naturally, though extremely condensed; the descriptive part is full' and complete; the style is remarkable for clearness and simplicity; it seems as if no useless word had been permitted to remain; yet the beauty and variety of the ideas conveyed by it give it the character of the highest kind of eloquence. Considered as a popular work, it will be found perfectly intelligible to all who study it, and from it the child might be instructed how it is made. "In the expository portion of the work," Dr Smith continues in the introduction, "I' have not been anxious to abstain from the employment of technical terms, when a decidedly useful purpose was to be obtained by the introduction off It is extremely difficult to make extracts from a work like this. The volume contains a general view of life, as existing in the vegetable and in the animal; the distinctive characters of the vegetable or organic, and the animal or sentient life, and the combination of the two lives in the animal; the definition of structure and function; the progress of structure and its increasing complexity, as the scale ascends from the vegetable to the animal, and from the lowest animal up to man; with a beautifully philosophical view of the cause of this increasing complexity, which is given "not arbitrarily, but from absolute necessity,” and because "the number, the superiority, the relation, the range, and the energy of the functions performed by the higher being, require it. An account of the progressive advancement of life and of death fol lows. These subjects occupy the two first chapters. The third is devoted to an exposition of the conclusions deducible from the facts which have been detailed; they are important, grand, and cheering. That the end of organization and of life is the promotion of happiness; that pleasure is the direct, the ordinary, and the gratuitous result of the action of all the organs, and that the higher the organized structure the greater is the enjoyment to which it is subservient; that pleasure flows from the exercise of every faculty, and the higher the faculty the greater. the pleasure. That pain, though occasionally the result, is always the accidental, never the ordinary result, and that it is self-destructive, while the tendency of pleasure is to its own increase and perpe- tuity. The fourth chapter illustrates the bearing of these facts on the duration of human life, and shows both from physiology and from statistics that its term is capable of being lengthened; that it has. already been lengthened considerably; that longevity, is a good, since it is only the best portion of human life which can be lengthened, namely, the period of maturity, all the others, infancy, childhood, adoles cence, decay, being fixed within narrow limits, while that of maturity varies greatly at present according to different circumstances, and there is no reason why, at any fixed period, it should end. The remaining three chapters give a general view of the structure of the intire body, and a particular description of one of its functions—the circulation. This part of the work is written with great care and precision, and by the aid of a large number of diagrams the subjects are made so clear, that no one who studies them with attention can fail to understand them, nor, understanding, to be deeply impressed by the detail of mechanism so exquisiite, of contrivances so wonderful, of means adapted to ends in a mode far surpassing human skill, of a mysterious power at work which human skill cannot approachthe principle of life generating power instead of merely collecting it, and carrying on operations of which the results only can be appreciated, the mode in which they are accomplished being beyond the power of human intelligence to perceive. From this part of the work it is impossible to make extracts; it is a treatise complete in itself, which requires to be read in connexion and with care. It is from the third chapter, in which the conclusions to be deduced from the general view of human existence are laid: down, that they can best be taken, and, even from them, no adequate idea can be formed of the work. Portions read separately may seem like theory; read in connexion they come with the force of demonstra❤ tion; but the attempt must be made. We have been taught, step by step, that the vege table, or organic life, builds up, and exists for the purpose of building up, the animal life. "What then is the object of the animal life? That object, whatever it be, must be the ultimate end of organization, and! of all the actions of which it is the seat and the in strument.. "Two functions, sensation and voluntary motion; the impression communicated to the sentient nerves ing which is ranked by everyone among the most at the very confines of life; it is interwoven with the actions that build up and that support the very frame- are combined in the animal life. Of these two "Is sensation, then, the ultimate object of organiza- ject, because it is invariably attended with an ulti- "Is the production of pain the ultimate object of organization? That cannot be, for the production of pain is the indirect, not the direct, the extraordinary, not the ordinary, result of the actions of life. It follows that pleasure must be the ultimate object, for there is no other of which it is possible to conceive. The end of organic existence is animal existence; the end of animal existence is sentient existence; the end of sentient existence is pleasurable existence; the end of life, therefore, is enjoyment. Life commences with the organic processes; to the organic are superadded the animal; the animal processes terminate in sensation; sensation ends in enjoyment: it follows that enjoyment is the final end. For this every organ is constructed; to this every action of every organ is subservient; in this every action ultimately terminates."-P. 73. The proof is made out from every one of the faculties, beginning with the lowest, the first springs of organization and of life, and going on to the moral faculty, the crown and the glory of man. It is difficult to know where to choose; the exposition of each is so beautiful; but omitting the pleasures to be derived from the use of the senses, the pleasure of the eye in seeing, the ear in hearing, the pleasure arising from the use of the intellectual faculties, and the still higher pleasures arising from the use of the moral faculties, we shall extract, as being less obvious less likely to occur to minds in general, the passage illustrative of the mode in which pleasure is attached to the exercise of the organic organs; that which shows the heightening of the pleasures of sense by the addition of the intellectual faculties; and that which relates to the harmonious junction of the selfish and sympathetic parts of man's nature. "But if the communication of sensibility to processes in their own nature incapable of exciting feeling, for the purpose of converting them into sources of pleasurable consciousness, indicate an express provision for the production of enjoyment, that provision is no less exemplified in the point at which this superadded sensibility is made to cease. "Some of the consequences of a direct communica tion of consciousness to an organic process have been already adverted to. Had the eye, besides transmitting rays of light to the optic nerve, been rendered sensible of the incursive passage of each ray through its substance, the impressions excited by luminous bodies, which is indispensable to vision, the ultimate object of the instrument, if not wholly lost, must necessarily have become obscure, in direct proportion to the acuteness of this sensibility. The hand of the musician could scarcely have created its varied and rapid movements upon his instrument, had his mind been occupied at one and the same instant with the process of muscular contraction in the finger, and the idea of music in the brain. Had the communication of such a two-fold consciousness been possible, in no respect would it have been beneficial, in many it would have been highly pernicious; and the least of evils resulting from it would have been, that the inferior would have interrupted the superior faculty, and the means deteriorated the end. But in some cases the evil would have been of a much more serious nature. Had we been rendered sensible of the flow of the vital current through the engine that propels it; were the distensions of the delicate valves that direct the current ever present to our view; by some inward feeling were we reminded, minute by minute, of the progress of the aliment through the digestive apparatus; and were the mysterious operations of the organic nerves palpable to sight, the terror of the maniac, who conceived that his body was composed of unannealed A little explanation is necessary before extracting ness of the organic process. Of that we still remain What is the consciousness excited? Not a conscious-glass, would be the ordinary feeling of life. Every [This notice to be concluded next week.] THE WEEK. TASSO BERKELEY. MARCH 11, 1544. At Sorrento, in the Bay of Naples, salem Delivered.' A grave, majestic, and true, pock,→→ clear, solemn voice, and a deliberate utterance. BIRTH-DAYS. 12, 1684. In the neighbourhood of Kilkenny, in Ireland, son of an English gentleman, who was collector of Belfast, George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne, an illustrious metaphysician and philanthropist, who put the world upon canvassing that extraordinary Platonical puzzle of the nonexistence of matter; substance, he said, being nothing but an idea existing in the mind, and upheld there by the constant exercise of the will of God a very pious and sublime proposition, and unsusceptible of disproof by the human faculties though, on the other hand, the amount of those faculties appears to render all final conclusions on such subjects impossible. One of his most ingenious and perplexing arguments, next to that of reducing every sensation to a perception of the intellect, without which certainly its existence would be the same as non-existence, was, that Nature never took two means of doing anything when she could do it by one; and that, therefore, it would have been superfluous in her to create both the perception and the thing perceived. The perception, the said, was the thing perceived. And if you asked him how things always remained in the places in which you left them, or were missed and found elsewhere by others, &c. &c., the tranchant reply was ready, that the Divine Being so willed it; an argument which has more in it than appears at first sight; because, reason about the question as we may, the first cause, or mystery, remains as mysterious as ever; and God might evidently will it to be what Berkeley says, as well as something more accordant with ordinary opinion. On the other hand, it would seem, that God, at present, wills the ordinary opinion to be what it is: and with the most unaffected reverence for Berkeley (who was one of his divinest earthly creations, and hada right to "dwell apart" in his notions), we are of that class of thinkers (if we may lay claim to the appellation at all) who take the common sense of these matters for proofs of them; and believe in the distinction between matter and spirit, as God has itnpressed it in the common mind.Berkeley was one of the most amiable and disinterested of men, giving up time, money, and favour for the good of his fellowcreatures, and taking an early part in that diffusion of knowledge, which the junction of Christianity with modern philosophy has at length made a characteristic of civilization. Those of his eminent friends, the wits and philosophers of the day (for the was beloved by all parties) who ventured to banter his metaphysics, reverenced him all the while, and almost adored him. Pope said he had "every virtue under heaven;" and Atterbury declared, that till he had seen Berkeley, he did not think so much understanding, so much knowledge, so much endurance, and so much humility, had been the portion of any but angels." When he began life, he wrote in the “Guardian,' and is said to have had "a guinea and a dinner" from Steele for every paper he contributed; a vulgar mistake, surely, meaning that whenever his young friend tbrought his paper, he was asked to stay dinner as a matter of course, or of reciprocal pleasure; for Stee'e |
