where all are raised to a higher level, we have no greater inundation of pedantry. Nor need we fear that a book-worm spirit will arise to the destruction of those lighter accomplishments which in their proper place seem natural to women. Ascham

says of Elizabeth, that in music she was "very skilful;" and Heywood, quoted by Miss Strickland, says, that after the severer studies of the day were over, "she betook herself to her lute or viol, and after that, employed her time in needle-work." Indeed, we know that it was the golden age of English music. In the volume from which we have so much quoted, we find that Mrs. Murray, the mother of Lady Halket, had masters for her daughters for "playing on the lute and virginals and dancing; and a gentlewoman was kept for teaching them all kinds of needlework." Music and needle-work were much cultivated as relaxations. A race, not of trifling and shallow, but of strong-minded, well-informed women is required, if home life is to bloom with perpetual charms; and such women will not break out into any of the affected eccentricities of learning, nor forget in solid acquirements the lighter ornaments that become their sex; they will trim their minds as well as clothe them. We must, however, curb our pen, and content ourselves with having thrown out a few hints on the less important, but not unimportant, branch of the subject.

ART. III.-Essays on Partial Derangement of the Mind, in supposed connexion with Religion. By the late JOHN CHEYNE, M.D., F.R.S.E., M.R.S.A., Physician-General to his Majesty's Forces in Ireland, &c. &c. Dublin.

We do not know of any really important topic upon which the popular knowledge is so superficial as that of the connexion between the body and the mind, and of the modes in which they act and react upon each other. We fear we cannot except from the charge of lack of most useful, not to say necessary, information, that class of men to whom we are now chiefly addressing ourselves, although to them it is little less important than it is to the medical practitioner. It has long been our settled opinion, that the ignorance we so constantly meet with amongst our clerical acquaintances, of the machinery of their own bodies, and of the invariable operation of certain long-proved principles by which it is regulated, cannot be justified by a reference to their advancement in so many other branches of knowledge, which were once confined to distinct classes. There is something in the phrase, the study of medicine, which is still considered as prohibitory to an unprofessional person as the phrase, the study of the law; so that a work upon medical science seems as much a stray book upon a clergyman's table as Coke upon Littleton. The usual consequence is, that the practical knowledge-science would be an improper word to designate it-of so many, concerning the simple laws of health and disease, would but entitle them, we fear, to the worst epithet of the two in the old saying, that every man at forty is either his own physician or a fool. We are not now alluding to an accurate knowledge of the practice of medicine, which of course demands the energies of the whole life and the whole man; but only to that elementary philosophy of the human frame, which will confer on its possessor the power of protecting himself against the imposition of disordered nerves, and the like, or the baser imposition of dishonest practitioners; and, by necessary consequence, aid him in morally and physically benefiting others. We are only asking, that he who is not satisfied without knowing something of the many philosophies of the heavens and the earth, should not be satisfied without knowing something of the philosophy of his own microcosm. In ad

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vocating this, we do not think it necessary to guard ourselves against the old charge, that such knowledge will, probably, turn men into quacks or hypochondriacs. Superficial knowledge may do this; we mean that outside knowledge (which is often ignorance disguised by words), in contradistinction to that inside knowledge, of the corporeal machine, which would most surely defend its possessor from the quackery of tampering with disease, either in himself or another. When, however, it is considered that the noblest intellect, upon which the welfare of the human race may depend, is yet enshrined in a physical case of most exquisite construction, upon the continued perfection of which its successful operations depend; and that the preservation, or partial or total ruin of that case depends absolutely, speaking generally, upon the prudence, or carelessness, or ignorance of its possessor; so that, short of vital damage, ignorance of its laws may deduct days, weeks, and months, from pursuits for which life is altogether too short; certainly a prima facie case is made out, of sufficient force to bear down fanciful scruples and we have only to look over the examples of the living and the dead to ascertain the value of such information, by which we may learn the costly price which high intellectual attainments have so often cruelly forced from their possessor;-bodily sufferings, premature old age, an inactive life, which rendered their attainments little better than idle ornaments, or an untimely grave, which were the sole results of the palpable violation of physical laws, as certain in their operation, and as certainly known, as the best known laws of the inanimate world. Students, in pursuit of lofty knowledge, are warned by experienced friends of the future consequences, both to body and mind, of over-exertions; that is, of violating known laws; and instances, familiar to all, are pointed out, as buoys tell of past wrecks to the mariner. But the advice of grey hairs is too often thrown away upon the enthusiasm of youth, conscious of the present possession of an instrument which, as yet, responds to none of these forebodings: and this is not always from obstinacy or disregard of the respect due to affectionate seniors, but more often, because their warnings fasten upon no accurate knowledge of the unchanging laws of the machinery they are entreated to use rationally, in obedience to the plain designs of its Maker.

This elementary acquaintance with the primary laws of health and disease, founded on what we are contending for a certain measure of popular philosophy of the corporeal system, which, we are sure, might be made easily accessible to all-must be regarded as pre-requisite to that higher knowledge, so transcendently im

portant to the clerical, as well as to the medical, practitioner,— the mutual effects of the body and the mind upon each other. We will not institute a comparison, to determine to which of the two this kind of knowledge is most important, but will merely say, that, as the medical practitioner, who does not know, philosophically, the influences of the mind on the body, must totally fail in many cases; so, in like manner, must the clergyman often grievously fail, who does not know, philosophically, the influence of the body on the mind. We have ourselves witnessed the humiliating consequences, in spiritual practice, resulting from a total ignorance of the effects of certain bodily diseases on the soul: we say humiliating, for surely it was mortifying to discover that we had grossly mistaken symptoms, which turned out to be more like the uncertainties of madness, than the certainties of penitence and faith.

For the sake of bringing forward and enforcing our views of this deeply important subject, we propose making free use of the work which stands as the text of this article. Its popular style, its freedom from technical words and phrases, and, above all, the deeply pious tone that pervades it, justify its claims upon the clergyman's thoughtful attention, for whose use the benevolent author wrote it. Moreover, the authority for its theories and facts is in every way so unexceptionable, that it must require considerable self-confidence in him who should attempt to gainsay them. For when this work is lying before us, it is to be considered that we are not listening to the dreams of inexperienced youth, or the hypothetical creed of the mere book-student, or to the limited opinions of one who writes timidly, because he tells us he has done his best only, amidst imperfect means for testing his theories. On the contrary, Dr. Cheyne appears before us as one who, in his day, was recognized by his professional brethren in Dublin as a leader in that ample medical field. It is impossible, we think, to peruse the unassuming autobiographical sketch prefixed to the Essays without yielding its author our full confidence. We there read of one who, from humble beginnings, and with but few adventitious aids, relying mainly on the laws of human prudence, aspired to, and reached, the summit of an arduous profession. Indeed, we have seldom met with wiser lessons for general success in life than are told in this brief story. We know of no liberal profession-not even the English Church, in which, constituted as it now is, patronage must of course depend mainly upon the accidents of birth and connexions-which could ultimately refuse success to him who should frame his life upon them.

We would gladly, could we spare room, enrich our pages

with some of those maxims of human prudence, so rarely practised, yet so easily learnt, which carried their obedient and persevering possessor through the gradations of an income of "three guineas for six months," and of 4727. for the next twelve months, to one averaging 5000l. per annum; together with the more rare, but infinitely more blessed, undying rewards of fair fame and ample love.

In a modest and brief preface, the author thus accounts for the imaginary imperfections of these essays, and explains the object for which they were composed:

"At a season when it was desirable to find such occupation as would divert him from anxious thought, he was induced to write the following Essays, which are obviously the result of recollection rather than of study, and, without exception, are in a crude and unfinished state. Had he been in the habit of recording his observations in writing, or even had he been possessed of the necessary books of reference, and had not his power of application been impaired by declining health, he is persuaded that he could have produced a fulness of evidence which would have more firmly established the positions to which he is desirous of obtaining the reader's assent. These positions are:

"1. That mental derangements are invariably connected with bodily disorder.

"2. That such derangements of the understanding, as are attended with insane speculations on the subject of religion, are generally, in the first instance, perversions only of one power of the mind.

"3. That clergymen, to whom these essays are particularly addressed, have little to hope for in placing divine truth before a melancholic or hypochondriacal patient, until the bodily disease, with which the mental delusion is connected, is cured or relieved.

"4. That many of the doubts and fears of truly religious persons, of sane mind, depend either upon ignorance of the constitution and operations of the mind, or upon disease of the body."

The work is divided into eleven essays, the titles of which will serve to show the importance of the topics discussed. The first is introductory and somewhat metaphysical. The others bear the following titles:-"On False Perceptions, and Supposed Demonism." "On Disorder of the Mind, confined to a single Faculty." "Of a Disordered State of the Affections." "On Insanity, in supposed connexion with Religion." "On the Constitution of Man, Upright, Fallen, and Regenerate." "On Conscience." "On Faith." "On Love to God, Charity, and Hardness of Heart." "On Hope. "On the Presence and Absence of Devotional Feeling."

One or two of these are almost purely theological, though based on philosophy, manifesting, however, accurate and deep