cool and methodical representation to one's self of things absent and as they exist in nature. Imagination is the impassioned representation of the same things, not merely in the forms and arrangements of nature, but in new combinations made by the mind itself. Perception, therefore, is the first, conception the second, and imagination the third degree of activity of the perceptive and reflective faculties. Memory is not a faculty of the mind: it is solely a mode of action of the faculties which perceive and reflect. The emotions experienced through the propensities and sentiments cannot be recalled by merely willing them to be felt: hence, it is held that these faculties do not possess memory, are incapable of performing the act of remembering. Memory differs from conception, in that it implies a new conception of impressions previously received, attended with the idea of past time and consciousness of their former existence generally, the act of remembering follows the order of events as they happened. On the other side, in conception and imagination, new combinations of ideas are formed, not only without regard to the time or order in which the elementary notions had previously existed, but even without any direct reference to their having formerly existed at all. Judgment is the perception of adaptation, of relation, of fitness, or of the connexion between means and an end: it is an act performed exclusively by the reflective faculties; it is the decision of these upon the feelings furnished by the propensities and sentiments, and upon the ideas furnished by the whole intellectual powAn analytical view of Lord Bacon's character is given by Mr. C. at p. 642, as an example, how poor an endowment, even the most transcendent intellect is, when unaccompanied with upright sentiments. ers. Mr. Combe accounts for the phenomena of dreaming, by showing that it proceeds from the activity of the organs of some faculties which continue to be awake while those of all the rest are asleep. This subject is curious and involves topics of high consideration : his philosophy of dreaming is ingenious, clear, and substantial. It is followed by disquisitions on consciousness, attention, association, passion, pleasure and pain, patience and impatience, joy and grief, sympathy, habit, and taste. After these come others on the effects of organic size on the mental manifestations; on the effects of the organs when in different relative proportions or size; on their combinations in activity; with a practical application of the doctrine of the combinations of the mental faculties and their organs. These disquisitions establish many views well calculated to improve the practical adaptations of philosophy, morals, and legislation. Two essays stand next in the System. The first is on the coincidence between the natural talents and dispositions of nations and the development of their brains. This brings under review successively the national characters of the Hindoos, Caribs, New Hollanders, New Zealanders, North American Indians, Brazilian Indians, Negroes, Sandwich Islanders, Swiss, Ancient Egyptians, Ancient Greeks, Scotch Lowlanders, English, Germans, and French: and the characteristic differences delineated in the essay are confirmed by figures demonstrating fundamental distinctions in national heads, both in size and shape. The second is on the importance of including development of brain as an element in statistical inquiries into the manifestations of the animal, moral, and intellectual faculties of The value of this essay is greatly enhanced by comparative tables of the statistics of insanity, crime, and instruction. man. Mr. Combe concludes the System with a truly philosophical examination and refutation of objections to the new mental science, especially those founded on materialism, and the effects of injuries of the brain. His appendix contains four documents,-additional evidence that the brain is the organ of the mind; objections to classifications of the mental faculties; table of Dr. Gall's original names of the faculties; and a list of testimonials in support of a representation addressed, in 1836, to the Secretary for the Colonies, recommending a method for classifying convicts sent to New South Wales, as a punishment for their crimes. The preceding dense outline of Mr. Combe's System, will serve to exhibit the very comprehensive and influential bearings of his doctrines upon the foundations of man's virtue, happiness and power, as he is a responsible agent in this world and an aspirant for an higher inheritance which will be permanent as his immortality. May these doctrines be impartially, deliberately, and fully investigated. 271 HORACE ON INSANITY. BY D. W. NASH, SURGEON. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, TRUE, O princely Dane! And there is more philosophy in Horace than the world in general dreams of, and which, if matters progress after their present fashion, will, in all probability, ere long "be dipped in Lethe and forgotten:" for in these utilitarian days, when cui bono? is the universal question, and the dulce is too often divorced from its long and pleasing union with the utile; when, to use the favourite phraseology of the Göethe school, the substantial has usurped the throne of the ideal; when the argent comptant of practical information is more readily received than the promissory notes of the imagination-there is apparently a growing depreciation of the politer branches of education, and a not unnatural, though perhaps, comparatively, an over-estimate of the value of those acquirements which are more directly available in the world we live in. It has often been stated, of late, in works professedly on education, that the time employed by young persons in the acquisition of the Greek and Latin languages is, in fact, so much time thrown away; for that a knowledge of these languages is not productive of sufficient advantage to them in after life to compensate for the labour and time bestowed on their acquisition, which time and labour could of course have been available for the purpose of acquiring more useful knowledge. In a former number of the Analyst, a quotation from Dr. Shirley Palmer's Popular Illustrations of Medicine was adduced to strengthen the arguments of a writer against the utility of a classical education. "It may even be questioned," says Dr. Shirley Palmer, in the work before mentioned, "whether the literary acquirements of early age are worth the sacrifice and the risk incurred in their pursuit. Many a weakly stripling has spent the brightest and most joyous years of a precarious existence in irksome drudgery upon the works of Homer and of Virgil, long ere his mind could comprehend the majesty of the Greek, or be smitten with the splen dour and elegance of the Roman, poet. And what, after all, has he acquired, that can compensate for the lost opportunity of more fully evolving his physical powers, and fortifying his constitution against the inroads of future disease? A knowledge of which, in riper age, a few month's application, under an enlightened system of instruction, would have given him a far more perfect possession; and in the attainment of which a maturer intelligence would then have afforded the most exquisite gratification." Of course the weakly stripling would suffer the same martyrdom whether he applied himself to German or Greek, to logarithms or to Latin; the only question is upon the point of what is to be gained by either, in short, the old query of cui bono? Now I do not purpose entering into an argument on the value of classical acquirements either to the medical practitioner or to students in general, though, in the course of such an argument, I could enlist on my side many of England's best and wisest; but, after these few preliminary observations, will endeavour to shew that a great deal of both moral and medical philosophy may be acquired from the writings of the lyric bard of Rome. One of the chief characteristics of a great poet, of whatever country, is an intimate knowledge of human nature. The face of a country may alter in appearance under the influence of increasing civilization, languages and religions may be modified or lost, the manners and customs of a people may gradually change, but human passions and human affections remain unchanging and unchangeable. Ambition, love, hatred, avarice, revenge, are the same in the barbarian as in civilized man, though clothed in a different dress and seen in a different light. In vice and virtue themselves time has made no alteration, though it has changed the fashion of their garb; the same passions produce the same effects in London and in Paris, as in ages gone by they produced in Athens and in Rome; and the picture which Horace drew of the vices and follies of his day requires but little change to render it a faithful representation of the present time. Horace himself held the same opinions, and tells us, in his Epistle to Lollius, that he was in the habit of reading Homer for the sake of the moral philosophy which it contained. "Trojani belli scriptorem, maxime Lolli, Qui, quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non, What Horace here says of Homer is true of Horace : "Mutato nomine, de te, fabula narratur” was his own remark, though with little foresight of the future extent of its application. To prove our position, let us take our old school Horace, imprinted in Ædibus Valpianis, or the Delphine edition, if preferred, and read the conversation which took place between Damasippus and the poet.* What says the heading? "Damasippus, Stertini, Stoici verbis, omnes insanire docet." "Stertinius," says Lempriere," was a Stoic philosopher ridiculed by Horace." This seems more than doubtful: Horace has put his sentiments in the mouth of the Stoic, but by no means does he place him in a ridiculous light; on the contrary, he makes him utter many very philosophical and profound remarks. And, first, he proceeds to tell us the grounds on which he makes the assertion that "all men are mad." "Nunc accipe," says he, "Nunc accipe quare Desipiant omnes, æque ac tu, qui tibi nomen Insano posuere. Velut sylvis, ubi passim Palantes error certo de tramite pellit, Ille sinistrorsum, hic dextrorsum abit; unus utrique Crede modo insanum; nihilo ut sapientior ille And who is there that keeps in "certo tramite"-in the right path of reason? Who can say that he is not led away from it like the rest of his fellow cosmopolites? Who is there that has not some favourite pursuit, some prevailing fancy, which leads him to the right or to the left, and causes him to wander in the tangled paths of error-some hobby, whose prancing disposition carries him into the thickets, and too often deposits the unwary rider amid the briars? Again, how true the poet's remark, "Qui te deridet, caudam trahet!" How few are aware of their own follies! how few can discover their own eccentricities or weaknesses! σε γνωθί σεαυτον” was an excellent moral precept, but its accomplishment is hardly within the power of man; and the old fable carries with it much sound sense, which relates that Jupiter placed the wallet containing the faults of men at their backs; so that each man can discern those of his neighbour, while he remains ignorant of his own. * Satirarum, lib. ii., iii. VOL. VI.NO. XX, MM |