mine in my own estimation, by the assurance of a sympathy at once the most flattering and valuable that I have ever been conscious of, in the person of a Lady who posseses In nobil sangue vita humil e quieta, Ed in aspetto pensoso anima lieta. I ken not what has roused a sense of the sublime and beautiful in my mind, after many years of dry mathematicks and the study of mechanical philosophy, except it be your presence which affords such a charming picture of both, much less can I account for the revival of a disposition to versify; unless it be that your accents affording at once a lively consciousness of the harmonies of Nature and the Graces and a vivid perception of the intimate union of music and poetry, has awakened the dormant Sisters from their Parnassian slumbers. I do not affect to remember that the fabled doves of Apulia ever covered me when achild with the leaves of bay tree, or that I slept in the springtime of life in the groves of Academus or in the alcove of Zeno, nor have I ever willingly laid down by the murmurs of Pierian fountains. But I have lounged on your sofa, through many a snug winter's evening, with Flora still smiling by my side, and Urania towering above me; the former an emblem which reminded us that the prettiest blosoms spring from and return to the dust; the latter whose electric tresses sparkling with celestial fire, seemed to be glaiks of the Empyreal regions, pointing to a new state of existence hereafter, and an alliance of the mind with a higher order of phenomena. Your voice was often like the music of Helicon, whose cadences inspired the lay of the poet and tuned the lute of the minstrel. When you began to reason on ethics, Hope appearedto have opened some secret sluise from the Hippocrene into the Jordan. Your philosophy always exhibited the triumph of the moral over the physical part of our nature. I have been exalted by almost every impressive scene of Nature. I have travelled through the flowery plain, crossed the rugged mountain pass, been tossed on the billows of the stormy Ocean and seen Amphitrite shake hands with Jove in a waterspout: I have ascended above the clouds in a balloon and disputed with Dedalus, Phryxus and Phaëton the high way of the air, and have penetrated with telescopes into the wonders of other worlds in the physical heavens. But no sensations produced by these merely, natural scenes are at all comparable to the poetic elevation of sentiment which your philosophical conversations have sometimes produced in my mind, when passing through every variety of physical enquiry, we have ended in a regular metaphysical argument and proved. How charming is divine Philosophy Not harsh nor crabbid as dull fools suppose But musical as is Apollo's lute And a perpetual flow of nectar sweets. The dear dogs snoring by the fire and Puss purring on the canopy have cheered the bright ingle, and formed a pretty discord to our harmony our harmony, broke the thread of our logic, and given place to useful and relieving interludes. With these recollections of some of the happiest moments of my life passed in your society I have the honour to remain Madame. Bruges, Dec. 8, 1845. Your most obedient humble Servant, T. FORSTER. PROLEGOMENA IN PHILOSOPHIAM MUSARUM. Organization, as well as habits of friendly intercourse with several distinguished poets of the day, gave me, in early life, a strong disposition to write verses. Our very education in England has for nearly half of Our poetical reading and the a tendency to foster this propensity scholastic studies are made up of construction of hexameter and pentameter lines. But although a large proportionate devellopement of ideality, comparison and some other faculties tended to impart a versifying turn of mind, yet I hardly think I should ever have wasted time in printing such hasty effusions of my imagination as are to be found, in these sheets; had it not been for the following considerations. Poetry exhibits the real character of the writer in the least suspicious colours. Serious treatises are written with premeditation and too often are the fruits of hyprocrisy. But verses, particularly short odes, songs and romances, are penned with carelessness, and are, as it were, the offhand productions of momentary impressions impressions, penned penned with sincerity and in haste, and which may therefore be regarded as the genuine portraits of the writer's mind. I was always pleased with tracding the lineaments of other men's characters in their poetic effusions, and discovering therein many little tournures of thought, which, were it not for their poetry, would have escaped for ever unnoticed. Phrenology, too, seemed to demand the perusal of such productions in order to complete our researches into the causes and varieties of the characters of different individuals. And in the zeal with which in 1815 I pursued this science, I sought, in the poetical works of our most renowned authours, the means of bringing to a successful issue the enquiries in which Dr Spurzheim, Dr Leach and myself were then engaged, as disciples of the celebrated Dr Gall, and which MM. Broussais, Vimont, Combe and others have since brought nearer to perfection. The historian writes cautiously, for fear of offending his party or endangering his reputation, and histories are full of falsehoods ; — the mathematician is confined to positive rules and cannot wander; the schools have established, for him, axioms destined for ever to form the basis of his logic; the metaphysician gropes along in a sort of suspicious twilight and tries; in order to satisfy himself with some favourite system of the universe, to build up an hypothical fabric on the basis of doubtful postulata. The attentive observer of nature; and the patient investigator of science have higher claims on our respect; from the utility of their enquiries: yet their works afford to the phrenologist much fewer materials for comparing the character of the mind with the organization of the brain than do those of the poet. With him the imagination let loose upon all the objects of nature, takes its flights according to the bias of his individual genius; and fearless of criticism, because only engaged in the operations of fancy, he proves the truth of what the antient as well as modern bards have said of those who are engaged in such works: and shews that though to say that: The lunatic the lover and the poet May be perhaps going a little too far; yet pictoribus atque poëtis Quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas. With these views I sought for proof of phrenology in the works of successive writers; and thinking that as poetry exhibited the actual state of the composers feelings, I might trace even in my own nonsense, penned at different periods, those changes of sentiment and of views which, we are told, accompany different times of life! The result however turned out otherwise a : careful examination of the banbles of my imagination at differend epochs of existence only proved to me how much I had always been the selfsame being; and confirmed the opinion, which phrenology teaches us to entertain, of the predominance of cerebral configuration over all other causes of character; which shines constantly in essence, throught all the varieties in species produced by diversified education and the influence of external impressions. Let us turn however to educated poets, men whose moderated ideality has had a large share of learning to work upon, and whose position and circumstances have contributed to modify their productions. We shall see in every case, how much cerebral developements have had to do with their general character, while early impressions and the events of the times have suggested the particular subjects of their verses. The antient busts of Homer shew him to have had much ideality, comparison and the higher sentiments; and whether this be a true representation, or a mere antique beau ideal of a poet; it proves that our forefathers knew what was the organization requisite for such a composer of heroic poetry, full, as it was, of metaphorical images. Perhaps the best lines of this father of Greek bards are those in the Odyssy in which he describes the meeting of Ulysses with his old and faithful dog Argus. The variety of style in Homer's works is not sufficient to oblige us to ascribe it to interpolation. Virgil the close imitator of Homer and the Greek poets in general must have had an elegant mind, and the busts, real or fictitious, which I have seen of him correspond to such an estimation of his character. In his compositions he is always dignified; and it is probably owing to his choice expressions and beautiful imagery that we can read his works longer without fatigue than those of most cotemporary writers. In that most pleasing of all didactic poems, the Georgicks, the Mantuan bard shews eminently the power of his selective judgment: I think it is Dr Jonhson who remarks of this author that he scatters the very manure about with dignity. This poem should be read after Ovid's Fasti: the one shewing the times, the other explaning the manner of performing rural operations. Lucretius may be more philosophic, but is far less elegant than Virgil, and we soon, tire over arguments in imperfeet though labour'd Latin verse which are compressed in modern books of metaphysicks in an easier style. But no regular treatises of Cato or of Columella, any modern authours posses the charm of the Georgicks, nor are capable of or of |