should gargle assiduously with the above mentioned 'decoct." "We hasten to communicate to our readers this important discovery, (which we borrow from the Petersburgh Miscellaneous Treaties in the Realm of Medical Science, for 1821.') which certainly deserves the full attention of all medical practitioners; and which, if confirmed by experience, may have the most beneficial results."-Ipswich Journal. REMARKS ON MENTAL AFFECTIONS. (Continued from col. 553.) If we are troubled with indigestion, or have drunk any intoxicating liquor, the thoughts are confused and disordered, and it is more difficult to pay attention to any particular subject; and under the influence of complete intoxication, the diseased ideas and feelings will overpower the suggestions of reason, and cause temporary derangement, similar to permanent insanity; while a diseased or overexcited imagination shall make a lasting impression upon the feelings and affections, in direct opposition to the dictates of reason, where no insanity is at all visible. It is not at all times easy to distinguish betwixt ideas of sensation, and ideas of the imagination, that is, betwixt an impression actually made upon one or more of the senses, and an impression made by the force of imagination, in a dream, or waking revery; and such is the power of habit, that when an impression of the latter kind has been long indulged, we cease even to suspect that it was not a reality. I myself have observed, what at first was well known to be a falsehood, repeated till it was thought a truth, by those who related it. But all this arises from defects or diseases of the invoJuntary action of thought, and does not prove any defect or disease of the mental faculties; and, confining my ideas of mind to what are its real faculties or powers, I must contend, that insanity is not a disease of the mind. I admit that it is a disease which produces temporary effects upon the mind, and so does gout or rheumatism; but take away the cause, and the effect ceases, as certainly as it does in gout or rheumatism. I must contend that there is no such thing as a primary idiopathic disease of the mind, and that if there were, we have no means of curing it; yet insanity we well know is very frequently cured. I would contend, too, that there is no such thing as mental declension or decay, unconnected with physical disease. I argue from this, that if there were any thing to produce a real disease upon, or to injure or destroy the real faculties of, the mind, it would be insanity, for that complaint has certainly a more intimate connection with the faculties than any other, and produces stronger effects upon them; and yet I have known several who have been afflicted with insanity for many months, and even years, and have actually sunk under the disease, who might be properly said to die of an insane atrophy, or decay; that is, the disease harassed the constitution so as to wear it out: and yet they have been quite rational at their last moments, their reasoning powers being as free, and clear, as ever they had been before. This could not have been the case, if the mental faculties had been destroyed, or injured; but the near approach of death had either made an important change in the constitution, so as to suspend the action of the disease, or it caused impressions upon the involuntary thoughts, so strong as to drive away the hallucinations of it, and left the reasoning powers free to act as before the disease; they having been overpowered or deranged till then by the insanity. I have, too, seen old people who were said to have lost their mental faculties by age; but upon examination I found it was not so, but that they were acted upon by a physical and an intermittent disease, and during the remissions of it, however short, could reason as well as ever. Admitting that the integrity of the mind may be preserved, and yet that it shall occasionally be overpowered by a diseased excitement of the involuntary ideas, then all the various phenomena of the disease of insanity are at once accounted for: a certain train of erroneous and visionary ideas prevail; under their influence we are insane: our ideas, though involuntary, are at times correct; under the influence of these, we are perfectly sane: and if this theory is correct, it is only in degree we differ, none of us are free from insanity at all times, for none of us are at all times free from the influence of erroneous and visionary ideas. So, none of those who are called insane, are at all times deprived of correct ideas; and under the influence of these, it may be they can reason as well as ever, and exhibit their knowledge as clearly as ever they could prior to the affliction: and as the senses are not at all affected by this disease, the constant diverting of the thoughts by strong impressions upon some of the senses, particularly the sense of seeing, is as far as moral agency will permit us to go, in the attempt to cure it. It may be proper to explain what I mean by mind, as distinguished from the involuntary ideas; I mean, then, our mental attainments, the knowledge we possess, what we have acquired by learning and observation; and the power we have of reflecting and reasoning upon our knowledge, and of communicating it to others. An infant is not born with mind, as I have said before, it is only born with those functions from which mind may proceed; it is born with a thinking principle, for it is susceptible of feelings and sensations, and it soon acquires the faculty of recollecting them, and this is the first development of the reasoning power. When the infant first begins to distinguish its nurse from others, and to express a feeling of pleasure on the recognition, it may then be said to possess mind, and not till then. IF detection would universally stop the career of the vicious, or exposure terminate the evils of society, there would be some hope, that the labours of the magistrate and philanthropist were as beneficial to others as they were well intended by themselves. But although the knowledge of a disease has been considered as half its cure, yet the proverb does not hold good with regard to the evils or diseases of human society. They are there deeply rooted, and, as it were, sanctified by long growth. They bid defiance to the hand of him that would either extricate himself or mankind from their thraldom; for to overcome the scruples of the bigoted, and remove the prejudices of the ignorant, is a task of no ordinary nature; and he that would aim at reformation amongst his fellow mortals, has all these difficulties to encounter. Opposition will retard, neglect and contempt will in their turn obstruct his progress; and after he has obviated the objections of the perverse, he will be mortified by the contempt with Memory, or the recollective faculty, which his labours are estimated by the is the foundation of mind; without it generality of mankind. Yet although we should have no mind, for all our disregard is commonly the reward of exertions of judgment, contrivance, such exertions as these, there are or design, are but so much of mind some individuals who cannot but debrought into action through the me- precate certain evils which seem incidium of memory: I would not be un-dent to society, and yet are so radiderstood to mean what is called recollective memory; if called upon to reason upon a particular subject, we do not stop to recollect a similar one; but we have what is termed intuitive memory, that is, we possess knowledge which we bring into action upon it; and obliterate all traces of former ideas, and we should possess no knowledge, we should possess no mind. Now insanity is no injury whatever to the memory; on the contrary, it might seem to improve it; and the most minute circumstances cally opposed to its best interests. Amongst the many evils which seem thus at variance with its fundamental principles, there are none more afflicting or pitiable than the frequent occurrences of mutual discontent, and personal ruptures, amongst individuals and communities. The most superficial observer cannot fail to see, that cach is ultimately his own fate, by opposing the welfare of his neighbour; and these disputes and variances are the more lamentable, because they have not always the elucidation of truth, or the restoration of right, as their final aim. Mankind seem always to oppose whatever is new, either from dislike or prejudice; and we are armed against every innovation as chimerical, and every new project as fraught with absurdity; such precautions may be a surety against error, but they are as often a rejection of what is truth. very basis of society. Party may divide, but individuals warring against each other, weaken, and render themselves inactive against a common enemy. Who that remembers the account of the sad divisions which agitated the commonwealth of Rome, when the Volsci were suffered to lay waste the country, and come in arms to the very gates of the city, but will agree in ascribing to discord, the evils and the insults which were afterwards perpetrated? but we need not search the records of ancient times for a confirmation of the adage, "Discord is weakness, while unanimity is strength." JUVENIS. Aberdeen, 1822. REMARKS ON BYRON AND WORDS- Aristarchus's general Reply. Perhaps the greatest evil common to society, is the manner in which the rights and emoluments of one individual are regarded by another. We look too much on men as beings separated and detached from each other; as though the interests of one were subversive of those of his neighbour. We do not reflect that individual prosperity may contribute to general good, and that, through the medium of society, whatever of good falls to the lot of one, is quickly, though sometimes unwillingly, distributed to all around. It would, perhaps, be rather an unqualified assertion to say, that, were it not for the interceptings and thwart- " Λιεν αριστεύειν, και υπείροχον εμμεναι ings of projects by one another, the regular succession of events, and the common occurrences of human life, would be more favourable to the happiness and well-being of mankind, than they are generally found to be: although the evils prevalent in society, through the designs and malice of man, might preponderate when put in the scale with the good; yet there is certainly a concurrence of fortunate circumstances, which sometimes avert approaching calamity, and render abortive the purposes of the most vicious. αλλων.” HOMER. "It is no less a proof of eminence to have many enemies, than many friends; and I look upon every letter, whether it contains enco miums or reproaches, as an equal attestation of rising credit." JOHNSON. MR. EDITOR. SIR,-Before again descending into the arena, it seems advisable to review (at least as far as I have been a combatant) the origin and progress of the contest respecting the comparative merits of Lord Byron and Mr. Wordsworth. The following stateIt will generally be found, that, ment I believe your readers will find amidst the propensities of mankind to correct:-In the "Imperial Magatrouble and molest each other, there zine" for last July, a letter appeared are frequent manifestations of a higher on the character of Wordsworth's procontrol, that ruleth with a just hand ductions. Its writer (G. M. of Derby) amongst the inhabitants of the earth, exalted Wordsworth to the skies; and sometimes causeth the deep-laid and, not content with this, " traversed schemes of hatred and malice to ad- out of the record," to degrade our vance the good of those they were greatest living poet. In vindication intended to hurt. But this evil of of Lord Byron, I wrote a reply to separating from, and opposing our- G. M. which appeared in the "Impeselves to, our fellow-mortals, is seldom rial" for September, wherein I reconsidered in its full extent. If we marked, that "for the brilliancy of would reflect upon its consequences, Lord Byron's diction, for the corruscahaving been the ruin of states, and tions of his genius, the fire of his the subversion of empires; it has poetry, the flashes of his wit, and the been the foundation of all their weak- mordacity of his satire, his Lordship ness and misfortune, and finally, their had been justly termed by G. M.'s total overthrow; for it has been de-master spirits' of the times, the structive of unanimity, which is the greatest poet of the present age, and of almost every other; and that it was not in the power of any petty assailant to pluck the laurels from his brow." I also adopted the lex talionis, by condemning the puerilities of "the simple Wordsworth," and observed that "G. M.'s letter formed an illustration of his own remark, that much has been said to little purpose, upon Wordsworth, "The dull disciple of R. Southey's school." This letter infuriated G. M. who produced a rejoinder in the Imperial for October, in which "He storm'd so loud, and seem'd so wondrous grim, His very shadow durst not follow him. In the same number of the Magazine, a writer under the signature of H. had no mercy upon "Don Juan ;" and a gentlemen who signed his letter G. J. Christ Church, Surrey, replied to mine of the preceding month. These three letters occasioned my answer to "Farce, Comedy, and Tragedy," in which it was DEMONSTRATED, by extracts from Mr. Hazlitt's works, that his opinion of Lord Byron and Mr. Wordsworth was totally different from what G. M. (by transcribing a single line from "Table Talk") would have us believe. Portions were also quoted from Lord Byron and Wordsworth that SUBSTANTIATED my character of these writers; the sentiments of eminent reviewers were proved to coincide with my own; G. M.'s insinuation, that an admirer of Lord Byron's poetry must be an infidel, was indignantly repelled; and some beautiful Jines from the Grecian lyric were applied to Lord Byron and his reviler. In answer to H. I excepted from his sweeping censure, the exquisite song in "Don Juan," praising national freedom and glory, and adduced a celebrated reviewer's account of that poem as one that would have animated LONGINUS, &C. To G. J. I urged, in defence of Lord Byron's character and his poetry, his Lordship's wellknown beneficence to CHRISTIAN churches and ministers-that Lord Byron had elevated the literary taste of the age, and made even Wordsworth decline his " unmeaning prittle prattle;"-that to a classical scholar, his Lordship's "bright and breathing" descriptions of Parnassus, †Greece, Childe Harold, Canto I. + Giaour. and Rome, should atone for all his faults;-and that the English reader being deprived of the treasures of antiquity, ought to have his genius fostered, and his literary taste improved, by such a noble writer as Byron; his Lordship combining the fire of Homer with the elegance of Virgil, and blending the wit of Aristophanes with the satire of Juvenal. The obscenities of his Lordship were as much censured by myself as by my respectable opponent; but it was maintained that, excepting an unacknowledged poem, they were of very rare occurrence; that Lord Byron's poetry was purity in the abstract, when contrasted with some classic authors constantly read, and that were it even compared with Shakspeare's, his Lordship would be found to be the This vindication of purer writer. Lord Byron made some of Wordsworth's admirers wax warm, and pen replies which I should now proceed to notice, but that a writer, (M. M. of Acton-place,) in the Magazine for November, claims the precedence. In my letter of October 2d, I exposed Wordsworth's PROFANITY, and another gentleman (CHRISTIANUS) branded an impious passage as little less than BLASPHEMY; yet M. M. asserts that "there is nothing in Wordsworth's writings that can offend the most delicate ear, or corrupt the heart, and that every thing is to be admired in their perusal !" M. M. may deem Wordsworth's " BLASPHEMY" worthy of admiration, but from such a notion, I must beg leave to be a DISSENTER. M. M. states, that he "cannot resist the temptation of asking" my "opinion of the conclusion of Wordsworth's Cumberland Beggar," in which its writer is said "to display a head and heart worthy of the patronage of the people of England." Sir, I see nothing very excellent in these verses. Wordsworth wishes that the old man's "blood" may "Struggle with frosty air and winter snows, And let the charter'd wind! that sweeps the heath, Beat bis grey looks against his wither'd face," &c. I think that Wordsworth would have displayed a better "head and heart," if, instead of letting the poor fellow "struggle with winter snows," Childe Harold, Canto IV. he had humbly imitated the beneficence of Lord Byron, by calling the old man into his house, warming him at his fire, and giving him a glass of wine and a good great coat, to keep out "the frosty air." And now, Mr. Editor, I" cannot resist the temptation of asking" M. M. the NAME of the "French writer," whose "introductory observations" he has discovered. I was in Paris last summer, and also in 1820, and I did not find the French so very religious. Both times I saw several editions of Lord Byron's poems, in English and in French, the introductory observations" of which I carefully perused; but never saw any thing resembling what M. M. has asserted. "Tis strange, 'tis passing strange," that a writer should depreciate the very author, whose works he has translated, and which he must naturally be anxious to sell. M. M. declares that "the noble poet thinks an hereafter a phantom of man's creation," because in one of Lord Byron's poems, (he does not know which,") there occurs the following character of death. The first dark day of nothingness, Now, Sir, it is of material consequence to "know which." Upon examining Lord Byron's poems, the lines will be found in the "Giaour," i. e. the Infidel; and every thing then becomes natural; for readers of taste will readily admit that there should be some resemblance between the character pourtrayed, and the sentiments advanced, in order to preserve the costume, &c. But M. M. intimates that an author imbibes the very feelings, and becomes the very character, he delineates His logic is quite unique; it would transform Shakspeare into a Coliban, and the religious Milton into an impious demon. M. M. seems like the poor Indians, who thought every horseman to be a part of his horse. Lord Byron is thought to be a deist; if so, considering ex. grat. arg. the censured language as conveying his own sentiments, this accounts for it. God forbid that I should ever palliate infidelity; but justice to the subject requires me to observe, that, were we to discard every author who is not a Christian, and all of whose sentiments are not exactly approved, we must reject all the Roman and Grecian classics, and many a valuable English author. But I would "hope better things of" Lord Byron, and the wellattested accounts of his Lordship's beneficence to CHRISTIAN churches, and of his distribution of Testaments, warrant such candour. "Charity hopeth all things," and the lines condemned may merely imply that his Lordship does not believe the doctrine of an intermediate state: if so, he only concurs with many erudite and pious divines. May I be allowed to digress for a moment, to observe that the following passage, Religions take their turn," &c. which has been reiterated as a proof of Lord Byron's infidelity, may only intimate the historical FACT, that religions have taken their turn. Where are the seven churches of Asia? The Righteousness once shone; and the crescent now glitters where the Sun of banners of an infamous impostor wave where the glorious standard of the cross was erected. To look at the more pleasing side of the picture, Christianity triumphs over the superstitions of Heathenism, and "the idols" of Otaheite, if not "cast to the moles and to the bats," are yet to be seen in our Missionary Rooms, as that in that pleasing memorials, island, as well as in many other countries," the inhabitants are turned from dumb idols, to the service of the only living and true God." And this change" will take place, till, in the language of Byron, 66 |