to the great mass of men, intellectual amusements, | to see the curtain rise, and some celebrated actress make suited to the capacity of those to be entertained, and her debut amid shouts of applause. Perchance the polnot requiring forced intellectual exertion, are more luted imaginations of some might have directed their attractive than any other. Our pleasures are height-eyes to the "third heaven," where the "nymphs of the ened, tenfold, by the feeling that they are merely inno- pavé" usually shine, expecting there to behold the usual cent; but, how much more by the consciousness, that attraction. our minds are expanded and our hearts improved, while the buoyant spirits, and the glowing blood give us new physical life. The history of theatres themselves sustains our position. If, then, proper and permanent sources of literary recreation were opened, they would diffuse a moralizing and refining influence. And such an influence has been exerted by Mr. Buckingham's lectures, though to a very small extent, because operating for so short a time. No doubt, multitudes in New York, listened to his discourses with chained attention, who, but for them, would have passed the time in utter listlessness, or in dragging the foul waters of dissipation, for unsatisfying and debasing pleasures. Mr. Buckingham has been well received in the United States; and, no doubt, his fortune is rapidly improving, despite the pressure of the times. But, while we rejoice to hear of his success, we cannot approve of all the means employed to testify respect for his character. As a sincere patriot and philanthropist—for such we esteem him he claims our admiration and praise; but, here he stands so prominently before the public, as a distinguished lecturer, that there is danger, lest testimonials, given to his worth and services in the cause of humanity, should, in the popular acceptation, be laid to the account of his popular eloquence. And while we, therefore, object to some of the public demonstrations of respect for him, which have been made, our objection to the manner of these demonstrations is still greater; especially to that of one, the credit of which rests with the good people of Philadelphia. But such thoughts were soon dissipated by a solemn sound, rising over the general buzz of conversation and merriment-the voice of prayer. A blessing was invoked upon the assembly, and the object for which it was convened-perhaps, too, upon the house in which they were met. This part of the scene reminds us of the prediction of one devoted to the pleasures of the turf:-that, before many years a prayer would be offered from the judges' stand, at every horse-race, on behalf-either of the men or the horses, we know not which. But we would not speak lightly of things that we hold so sacred. Let us pass on to the further development of this curious spectacle. Mr. Buckingham addressed the crowd in a speech more than two hours long. His audience, with riveted attention, drank in his words, and those who had formed a high idea of his eloquence were not disappointed. Several other speakers followed him, who, perhaps, might, with better taste, have reserved their remarks for another occasion. We have not been informed of the exact "order of exercises," but suppose that, at this juncture, the speeches being finished, refreshments were served up. It would appear that they were delicious and abundant; though, indeed, it is said, that a large proportion of the eatables prepared were devoured rather before their time, by some very officious persons-frequenters of the theatre, no doubt, their knowledge of its localities having apparently been so correct-who broke in from the back of the house. However, the loss was either immaterial, or very soon repaired. But the alarm occasioned thereby, making all feel how precarious was the tenure on which their rights depended, quickened the activity of the crowd, in emptying the loaded chargers. The popular appetite, too, had been sharpened by the piquant intellectual repast. We Americans are charged with swallowing our food in hungry haste. But those who eat with great rapidity, must be equally hurried in seizing on their victuals: the supply must equal the demand. Plates, on this memorable evening, it is said, were scarce; or else the impatience and anxiety of the multitude, wrought up, by the occurrence just mentioned, to a pitch of phrenzy, forbade even the decency of a moment's delay. A thousand hands delved, incontinent, into the curiously ornamented pyramids of icecream, and gallantly offered their tempting spoils to the admiring fair, who had already devoured them with their eyes. Perhaps, however, all did not eat, as fast as they emptied their dishes: we are sure that some were seen, pocketing every manner of good things, even to the ices. Before Mr. Buckingham left New York, he received an invitation to a great temperance festival, to be given to him in the city of Brotherly Love. On dit, that a dinner was first contemplated; but, then, many wished to extend the honor to Mrs. Buckingham; and, besides, a number of ladies, whose husbands were foremost in the affair, desired to be presented to the accomplished lecturer. Accordingly, to suit all concerned, a grand temperance tea-party was resolved upon. Now, the difficulty arose where could a room suitable for the occasion be procured? After some consultation, it was, luckily suggested, that the Arch-street theatre, then unemployed, might be hired; and this expedient was adopted by the grave deliberators, some of whom, as we understand, were clergymen and inferior churchofficers. The twenty-second of February was honored by the festival. For some time previously, it was advertised in the newspapers, and tickets offered at a dollar each. Of course, multitudes furnished themselves for the occasion: some, perhaps, in anticipation of convivial pleasure; some who were anxious to see and hear Mr. Buckingham; some, who, though principled against theatres, were glad of an opportunity to see the inside of one, without sin; and most, because the price of admission was so moderate. The appointed evening came, and the way to the place of temperate feasting was thronged. In looking round, on this gaily dressed assemblage, filling the boxes, and crowding the To speak seriously, we have stated nothing in the covered area of the pit, one might, almost, have expected | above account, which we do not believe to be substan At length the crowd dispersed, at a good hour, and in decent order. The next morning's papers contained glowing descriptions of the "GRAND TEMPERANCE FESTIVAL;" and the Arch-street dealers in grog boasted, that for many a day their receipts had not equalled those of the previous night! tially correct. Nor do we think that the doings of an American mob cast any stigma upon the character of the American people. Even our mob would suffer nothing in the comparison with the mob of any other nation; but that is no reason, why its triumphs should be hailed with applause. If Mr. Buckingham should "write a book," descriptive of scenes in the United States, we are sure that he will feel much difficulty, in attempting to picture this temperance festival; what with his gentlemanly feelings toward those who would have done him honor, and his vivid sense of the ridiculous. DESULTORY THOUGHTS ON HUMAN CREDULITY AND VERSATILITY. By a Southron. heels, or resort to that other succedaneum for a scanty stature, the ladies' cushion. I have a sample before my eyes of that antique head-dress, in a colored print of the lovely Antoinette, which has been handed down from the last generation in the family of a patriot to whom Louis the sixteenth was always dear. Wigs too will come in with the first battered beau of the haut ton who seeks to cover his baldness or to hide his gray hairs; and old as I am, I expect to see the reestablishment of long queues with powder and pomatum, and all the disgusting consequences which attended them. But the return of old times is not confined to the fashion of our coats. Our habits and manners have changed not less than our dresses. And some chance may yet bring them back again in all their freshness. Take for instance, the vulgar habit of profane swearing. When I was a boy, every gentleman swore ;-and what is worse, in every company. Even the ear of the fair sex became familiar with this gross violation of decorum. But as Bob Acres says, "Damns have had their day." What gentleman would now blurt forth his It is curious to observe how the opinions and the vulgar oaths before a lady, or wound the sacred ear of a follies which have been exploded in one generation are divine by "taking the name of the Lord in vain?" and often revived in another, and embraced with as much yet a war, with all its other mischievous consequences, confidence and ardor as if they never had been rejected may bring back into polished life this disgusting pracor exposed. It is not quite fifty years, I think, since tice. "The soldier, bearded like the pard and full of the imposture of Mesmer received the stamp of repro- strange oaths," is ever so great a favorite with the fair, bation from the philosophers of France, assisted by the that his vollies will be forgiven and his bluntness forsagacity of Franklin. In this day of light and intelli-gotten, in the richness of his epaulets and the gallant trim gence, it is again revived under new auspices and with of his regimentals. The same destructive besom may more exorbitant pretensions, and meets with the coun-sweep away our temperance societies, and the can and tenance of men of science, and the most unbounded the tankard of the camp may again introduce that credulity of thousands who flock to witness its wonders. There seems indeed to be a cycle in human affairs, like the cycles which govern the movements of the heavenly bodies in their sublime and wonderful revolutions. Our habits and our manners, our follies and our propensities all have their day, and are laid aside for others which in their turn prevail for a season, after which the former return upon us and are received with renewed eagerness and favor. Thus they follow each other in a perpetual round, and verify, to a great extent at least, the wisdom of the adage, that there is "nothing new under the sun." The truth of these remarks will be questioned by none; yet it is probable there are some who have not duly considered to what a variety of subjects they may be extended. All observe it in the fashions. The dresses of our fair ladies, which a few years ago were so narrow that they could scarcely step, and so thin that they shivered with cold, have at length got back to the ample dimensions of former days and the comfortable habiliments of their grandmothers. The large and inconvenient sleeve is giving way; and the bosom, once too temptingly displayed, has been kindly hidden from our view, and the less attractive back and shoulders are now exhibited in its stead. Short waists, flowing robes and the graceful drapery of the Grecian costume have yielded to long waists, short skirts and heavy plaits, while the old fashioned bishops are re-sentiment, and of the perpetual fluctuation of everyvived in the admired tournures of our lovely daughters. It is true we have not yet returned to high-heel shoes and cushions for the ladies, or to periwigs and powder for our sex. But the former may reasonably be expected, if the young Victoria, ambitious of queenlike majesty and impatient of her want of height, should add to her censurable excess which prevailed at our banquets in by-gone days. I remember "when I was young and debonair," I was at an entertainment in this city, which was served in the second story of the house, whence there was no escaping by a window. The landlord most hospitably locked the door and put the key in his pocket, and the glass was circulated so briskly that there were left but few to bury the dead. These excesses are now indeed no more; but I fear they are but suspended for a season, in spite of all the efforts and all the influence of temperance societies. These arrogate to themselves that change in manners which is chiefly the result of the perpetually varying current of human affairs. In its eternal windings it trenches upon our customs in succession, wearing away first one and then another, and giving rise to new ones which flourish in their turn for a season, until they too are swept off by the same resistless tide. Conceding the beneficial influence of temperance societies, particularly among the laboring classes, we are unwilling to believe that they have been the sole occasion of the happy changes we have witnessed. What society is there against swearing? what combination against fox hunting? what against balls at public houses? what against barbecues? Yet all these are obviously in the wane, from the silent but effectual operation of public thing that is human. Our customs and opinions succeed Turn next to the protestant ;-are his skirts clear? I am too much of a protestant to be an impartial judge that I can venture to approach. Take the church of the Baron Emanuel Swedenbourg, an enthusiastic and visionary man, whose heated fancy led him to believe that he had ascended to the fifth heaven, and there had seen all the glories of the godhead, and mingled with angels and archangels around the sapphire throne of the great Jehovah. Yet this religious madman had his devoted followers, who believed his visions, dwelt upon his rhapsodies, and doubted not his revelations. I once had the pleasure of meeting with one of his sect, a remarkably intelligent lady of the New Jerusalem church, with whom I entered into an interesting conversation about her great apostle. I asked her if his followers really believed he had ascended to the fifth heaven. "Assuredly, sir," said she. “And upon what grounds do they believe it?” said I. "Upon the same," said she, "on which you believe that St. Paul had done so before him. Both of them were pure and virtuous, and pious and inspired men, and neither would have asserted that which was untrue!!" Thus it is that credulity affords a ready answer to every difficulty; so that we almost cease to wonder at the declaration of the ancient father, who, in the fulness of his faith exclaim. touch upon them, let us advert for a moment to the sub- herself would blush, if she were not too credulous to ject of human credulity, which, though in a state of perceive her delusions. perpetual change, seems indelibly ingrained in the character of our race. Philosophers have never agreed upon the character-in such a matter, but there are some of its churches istic by which man is to be distinguished from all other animals in the creation. Plato defined him to be a twolegged animal without feathers. But Diogenes turned this definition into deserved ridicule. Some say that man alone is a rational animal; but the dog and the beaver, and the ant and the bee, stand forth as the champions of the inferior races, and challenge for them also the attributes of reason. Once it was said that man was a cooking animal; but the ouran-outang denies our exclusive title to that appellation. For my own part, I incline to look upon him as a credulous animal, though I thereby hazard the exclusion of the skeptics from the pale of humanity—a consequence at which many of my readers would not be disposed to repine. The truth is, however numerous the individual exceptions may be, there is no trait of the human character more universal than this. In all time and in all countries, superstition and credulity have lorded it over the mind. To say nothing of ghosts and hobgoblins, of demonology and witchcraft, of the foul fiend that haunts the moor, or the flying Dutchman that makes the seaman's blood run cold, we may go back to classical days for our illustrations. What a lasting monument of human folly is to be seen in the heathen mythology, where superstitioned, "Credo quia impossibile est.” is busy in the apotheosis of the winds and of the floods, and where every affection of the soul is invested with an imaginary form, and placed by devoted polytheism in the temple of the gods? Look at their oracles, now uttering the maxims of the sage and delivering the predictions of a penetrating sagacity, and now practising the cheats of a juggler, or answering questions about the future, in riddles that serve but to perplex, or to lead to destruction the misguided inquirer. And yet they were crowded by the credulous; and the monarch and the slave were found together at the shrine. Turn away from the land of literature and the arts, from the land of Socrates and Solon, to the country of the demigods of Italy, the country of Brutus and of Tully. Over that wonderful land the same superstitions reigned, and the same ready credulity in the monstrous creations of heathen mythology. What then shall we expect when we pass into Asiatic climes, to the country of Zoroaster and Confucius, to the land of Brama or Mahomet? Over all of them credulity sits brooding, and the darkness of ignorance covers them as with a pall. Is it better with christianity; with the christian who justly derides the mythology of the heathen and the false of an incident which occurred in the old court of chancery before There is an amusing reminiscence handed down by tradition, prophets of the musselman and the hindoo? Ask the the venerable chancellor Wythe. One morning on taking his sects of each other. Ask of the protestant the history seat, he complained with some warmth of the masses of trash of credulity in popish countries. Straitway he recounts which the counsel introduced into the records; and in proof of a long catalogue of her superstitions. He points at it, read the deposition of an aged lady in support of the credit of once to her priests,-here giving absolution;-there and that when he was a youth he was one of the greatest liars praying a soul out of purgatory;-here curing a disease she ever knew. That she felt sorry for him, and as a cure adby the influence of their prayers, and there adminis-vised him to swallow the heart of a rattlesnake; that he did so, tering extreme unction to the departing zealot. He and ever since, he had been as truthful a man as any other in the points to the tombs of the fathers crowded with pros-prescription of a bolus or a charm for the cure of a moral infirtrate pilgrims, and brings you the toe of St. Peter, or a veritable fragment of the cross, or the liquifying blood of the holy St. Januarius. Who but blushes for humanity at such an exhibition of its follies? Credulity When we turn to the ordinary occurrences of life, while superstition and credulity meet us at every step, they are yet perpetually changing, like a Proteus. In one age, we have a monarch touching a patient for the king's evil, or a noble lady soothing the pain of her champion's wound by anointing the spear with which it was inflicted. In another, we have one impostor performing wonders with Perkins's points, and another practising the ridiculous mummeries of animal magnetism. Charms* and conjuration are the every-day remedies of the vulgar, and quack medicines and infallible prescriptions fill the columns of our journals and the stomachs of the sick. We cannot lay a fence or kill a hog without looking at the age of the moon, whose influences, extending beyond the tides, are fancied to rule over the ravings of the lunatic and the fluids of our frames. It is wonderful, too, to see this ready credulity exhibited by the most intelligent. Johnson believed in ghosts: Those who burnt witches for the love of God, were among the first men of their day and generation: and in these our times, we are Dr. another witness. She said, "She had known him from a boy, settlement." I am not sure that this is the only instance of the mity. This opinion is, I imagine, as old as Hippocrates: Lord Bacon obviously espouses it, though he denied that the influence of the moon satisfactorily accounted for the tides. not without examples of a ready belief of whatever is | tension with unsuspecting credulity, and scientific men miraculous. Here we have the two first men of their are to be found engaged in eager investigations into the day, disputing for the hundredth time whether cheat is mysteries of the art, with less zeal for the exposure of a distinct plant, or springs from an injured grain of impostors, than for the establishment of so valuable wheat. The old chief justice maintained the latter, and a discovery on the surest foundations. Human foreof that opinion most certainly was Lord Bacon.* There sight cannot anticipate, indeed, the mighty wonders it we have a venerable old man, whose gray locks strag- is yet to work, and the countless blessings it is to gle scantily over his scalp, sitting with his elbow rested shower upon our race. It will accomplish with so on a table, with a glass tumbler before him. He holds much facility what now costs both labor and time; for it between his finger and his thumb, a simple thread, to shames the telegraph in its operations, and leaves even which is appended a small key, so held as to be within steam itself at a countless distance in the rear. Cogthe mouth of the glass. What is he about? He is nate with the lightning, the magnetic influence can exhibiting his key clock!!† He verily believes that from 'put a girdle round the earth in forty minutes." Of some secret cause, some influence emanating from his what use, then, are the wonders of the telegraph or the hand, or some wonderful correspondence between the yet greater wonders of our express mails, when a sleeping glass and the key, this simple apparatus will strike the girl, under the manipulations of a magnetizer, can see hour of the day with unerring accuracy. No argument what is going on in the extremities of the "empire," can overthrow his convictions, and yet he is among the and give you the news of the very moment in the most most venerable and respectable of men, and fills his distant corners of the earth? For we have no reason elevated station with dignity and ability. I have heard to doubt, that if this new Pythian priestess can, in the he derived the hint from Lord Bacon's works. After a infancy of the art, discern in her visions what is going diligent search through the Instauratio Magna, the on in Philadelphia, while she is sleeping quietly in Sylva Sylvarum, and the Novum Organum, which New-York, her visual ray will soon be so improved as form together that wonderful omnium gatherum of wis- to enable her to discern what is passing in the remotest dom and of notions, I at length met with the passage kingdoms of the world. Such wonderful results lead which gave rise to this curious conceit. [see vol. 2, p. 64.] to the suspicion that this most valuable discovery must No man, indeed, was ever more full of such conceits have been well known to the ancients, and was the true than was the great stickler for the theory of the antag-secret of the oracle at Delphi and the vaticinations of onizing principles of radical heat and radical moisture, the cave of Trophonius. Be this as it may, the magBut let us not jeer this greatest of philosophers, whose netic lady bids fair to render altogether superfluous the noble genius gleamed through the darkness of the age espionage of courts, and the use of spies in the camp in which he lived. It shed its bright rays over every of an enemy. What movement of an army could be inscience, and laid the foundations of that analytical scrutable to a secretary who had been duly magnetised, philosophy, which in our times has led to such wonder- or to a general who had had the benefit of the passes of ful results. Let us rather reproach ourselves for still the operator; when a girl fast asleep, can see through a clinging to the nonsense and the impudence of charla- millstone at a glance, and discern without difficulty the tanism, in spite of the wise lessons we have imbibed interior of a dwelling a hundred miles removed? And from his philosophy. Let us lift up our eyes in amaze- then what an acquisition to science! that an ignorant ment at the countenance given by the intelligent among female, who, when awake, hardly knows that there ourselves to the grossest of impostures. In this boasted is such a thing as what Mrs. Ramsbottom calls the era we have had Redheffer's perpetual motion as a fair "abominable* region," and who cannot tell the liver set-off against the elixir of life and the philosopher's from the spleen, should all at once be initiated in her stone of former times. We have also the Quarterly sleep, into the mysteries of nosology and pathology Review, gravely publishing a narrative of the wonder- and physiology, and all the secrets of the materia ful performances of an Egyptian magician, through medica; and without seeing or touching a patient, whose incantations an untutored boy can call up the should be able to judge of his disease, and prescribe spectres of the dead, as the witch of Endor brought the proper remedy for its cure! Verily this is a woninto the presence of the trembling Saul, the awe-inspi- derful science, and entitles its professors to an eminent ring image of the departed prophet. And we are exaltation. It is true that it is somewhat partial in its gravely told by the accomplished editor how far above influences, and uncertain in its operations. It requires suspicion is the source from which this wonderful story FAITH and WEAK NERVES† to ensure the success of an is derived; as though he yielded credence himself, to experiment; and it is said that in the recent exhibitions the miracles of this magician of the land of necro- in a certain city, even the intimation by a visiter, in an mancy. Again; at this moment, animal magnetism, audible voice, of a design to apply a red-hot poker to though exploded fifty years ago, as an impudent impos- the nose of the sleeping patient, had a very marvellous ture, is revived both in Europe and America, with reno-effect upon the profoundness of his slumbers. Whether vated zeal, and received with obvious favor by many of this was occasioned by the disturbing influence that iron the illuminati. Exhibition rooms are crowded with gaping spectators, who swallow every monstrous pre He says, vol. 1, p. 469, speaking of the diseases of grain, "Another disease is the patting forth wild oats (obviously our cheat) into which corn oftentimes doth degenerate." + This incident is taken from real life. "Abdominal." "Men are to be admonished," says Lord Bacon, "that they do not give place and credit to those operations, because they succeed many times; for the cause of the success is oft to be truly ascribed unto the force of affection and imagination upon the body agent; and therefore these things work best on weak minds and spirits; as those of women, sick persons, superstitious and fearful persons, children and young creatures." VOL. IV.-37 opinion "that the anointing of the weapon that maketh the wound will heal the wound itself."* Such a mass of absurdities cannot fail to excite our laughter in these days of light and scrutiny. Yet are we sure that the hobbies of modern practitioners will not be equally derided when we shall be in our graves? The liver and the nerves, the mucous membrane, and the spinal marrow, the heart and the brain, all of which have had the ascendant in their turns, may very possibly soon give way to some new theory, which the enthusiasts in pathological anatomy may elaborate from their minute investigations. Already have the visions of glory which filled the dreams of Lavater been dis must naturally have over the magnetic current, or by the natural repulsion of the tip of the nose for the white heat of a poker, I must leave to others to determine. I can only say that I learn no attempt was made at a repetition of the scientific experiment in a town where there was so little faith and such iron nerves, accompanied by an obvious disposition to make the actual cautery the test of truth. The experimenter and his familiar, it is said, precipitately took leave, and departed to pursue their investigations on some more propitious theatre. Much regret was felt at this premature retreat, as an opportunity would have been afforded by a few day's delay, of greatly advancing the cause of benevolence, as well as of science, by subjecting to the mag-pelled by the greater glories of phrenology and the sucnetic influence some unfortunate children who have been blind from their birth, and on whom the blessing of sight could doubtless have been conferred, for the time being at least, by this great catholicon of the 19th century. cessful theories of Gall and Spurzeim. Those who can laugh at lord Bacon and his fanciful notions, will yet gravely descant upon the developments of the brain as indicated by the skull, and pronounce ex cathedra that the subject of examination is according to the principles Let us pass from animal magnetism to medicine. of their art, a saint or a Scapin, a philosopher or a fool. Fifty years ago a dose of calomel was shunned as a Nay more: not only do we learn from the ingenious poison, and tartar emetic was looked upon with an German the position of every passion and every talent almost holy abhorrence. Since that time they have in the map of the human brain, but we are now promised been dignified as the Samson and Goliah of the ma- by the naturalist Geoffroy St. Hilaire, a series of meteria medica, and are exhibited without scruple, by the moirs on the functions and situation of the soul itself. He ignorant as well as the initiated. The former has been states that he has no hesitation in treating on this subindulged in to an excess against which all are now ject;-that he feels strong in his own powers, and means ready to exclaim. I was once much amused at a prac-first of all to examine the nature of the spiritus corporeus tical joke upon its extravagant use. In passing through of St. Augustin!! In truth there seems no measure or a village, 1 saw a flour barrel standing at an apothe- limit to the whimsies of the human mind, nor any rea cary's door, with the word "Calomel" in very large cap-sonable hope that with all the advantage of the wisdom itals marked upon its side. In amaze, I drew up my of other times we shall ever be any wiser than those sulky, and asked an explanation. It turned out to who have gone before us. be a piece of humor of the young apothecary, in ridicule of the preposterous extent to which the doses of this medicine were carried among the customers of his master. A humorous gentleman of the same place declared that in a severe illness he had taken so many pills,-not all calomel, it is true,—that when he sneezed they flew all over the room. But this passion has passed away, and we are getting back to what our forefathers thought to be a wholesome horror of mercury, and a wise confidence in nature, as the only true doctor. The science of medicine is, perhaps, above all others most remarkable for its oscillations. The medicaments in vogue at various times, are quite amusing. Lord Bacon's works are full of those of his day, many of which he very confidently recommends. Among others, he advises "a trial of two kinds of bracelets, for comforting the heart and spirits, one to be made of the trochisk (or cake) of vipers, and the other of snakes; for, since they do great good inwards, especially for pestilent agues, it is like they will be effectual outwards." He tells us too, that "the moss which groweth upon the skull of a dead man, unburied, will staunch blood potently;" a quality which it has in common with the "blood-stone," and "the stone taken out of the toad's head," which is "very efficient, as the toad loveth shade and coolness;" and what is very wonderful, he gives in detail an account of the "English ambassador's lady at Paris, helping him away with" (i. e. curing) "a hundred warts within five weeks, by rubbing them once with a bit of bacon skin, which she afterwards nailed up to a post in the sun." Nevertheless, he seems somewhat skeptical about the "constantly received and avouched" It were well, indeed, if in more important concerns the versatility of the human character was not as conspicuous as in the lighter matters which we have been passing in review. But unhappily it is otherwise, Graveora manent. The oscillations in religion and the I have in my possession a folio volume translated from the French, and purporting to have been written by the physician of the King of France, about 170 years ago. It is a treatise on pharmacy, materia medica and the practice of medicine, and exhibits of course the most approved state of the science at that day. Truly it is a curiosity. The recipes resemble Lord Bacon's. The filings of a dead man's skull are the prescribed remedy for epilepsy and madness, and distilled vipers, the specific for the bite of every species of rabid or venomous animal; provided, always, the patient has not been bitten above the teeth, for in that case the poison is inevitably fatal. Hartshorn is also a great panacea with this grave doctor. He tells us it is extracted from the horn of the elk, the swiftest of all animals, whom the hunters can never take unless they find him sick; and even then they must be very adroit, for if the animal discovers them, he puts his hind foot to his left ear, which cures him in an instant, and he flies beyond the reach of his pursuers!! Such was the profound ignorance and ridiculous credulity of this grave medecle of sagacity and wisdom. In what light his successors of the cin, who was doubtless looked up to in his own times as a mira. present day will be regarded by their successors a hundred years hence, time must develope. But if we may conjecture, from the diversities already prevailing among the Sangrados and Brunonians, the Broussaists and the Old School, the Thompries and practice of them all, will be remembered only as subsonians and Homoœpathists, we should prophesy, that the theojects for ridicule in some Literary Messenger of the day, while some new system will, in its turn, be the hobby of the profession, and prevail until it has immolated its hecatomb, as others have done before it. Eclectic Journal of Medicine, vol. I. 395. |