around the circle again and again, with a dubious, inquisitive look, as it were to catch some dubious hint, or to question the risk, by diving into the eyes of the company. They were all sparkling with delight, and at length, half assured, he was rising the cup to his lips, when the sedate face of his old friend, Shamus Rhue, caught his attention in the corner. He thought he saw him wink at him, once or twice, and, only that he had at the same moment stirred up the ashes in his pipe, with his finger, to which it might possibly be an accompaniment, Brian could not mistake the hint. A shake of the head, the next minute, decided the matter, and so terrified was he at the warning, that he instantly let fall the vessel, inadvertently ejaculating a loud, "Lord save us!" as it went to pieces. There was an instant clear decks among the gentlemen, as is usual when any pious invocation is made use of in their presence; a circumstance which never fails to excite their eternal enmity. A whirring noise announced their dispersion in all directions, and before it had done vibrating in his ears, Brian found himself in utter darkness, by the side of Darby Whelan.'-pp. 285–291.

We are

We must absolutely have done here. Neither the' Brown Man,' nor the Persecutions of Jack Edy;' neither the Unburied Legs,' nor Owney and Owney-na-peak,' shall be spoken of, because the notice of them could not be as extensive as they deserve. under the necessity of dismissing them with an expression of cordial and unreserved praise, mixed with a sentiment of personal gratitude for a great deal of entertaiment. These latter tales are, doubtless, of the true Hibernian stamp, the genuine emanation of the mud cottage, redolent of turf and whiskey; and we recommend them as specifics against the spleen.

ART. VII. Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind. By Dugald Stewart, Esq., F.R.S., &c. Volume Third. 4to. pp. 567. 21. 2s. London: Murray. 1827.

(Concluded from page 274).

IN our former notice of this volume, we confined our remarks to the first chapter, which treats of language, and to the two first sections of the second chapter, which is occupied with the principle or law of sympathetic imitation.' In the third section Mr. Stewart discusses several phenomena, which he thinks are in part resolvable into the principles previously laid down-if principles they may be called-which are all dependent upon that mysterious sympathy that is known to exist between the bodily organization of different individuals.

It is worthy of remark, that Lord Bacon touches slightly on this branch of the philosophy of the mind, to which he gives the title of Doctrina de fædere, sive de communi vinculo anima et corporis;' and that he resolved the effects of this mental and corporal chain,' to a magical transmission of spirits from body to body.'

It is a

strange thing in nature,' says that acute observer, in his Sylva Sylvarum, 'when it is attentively considered, how children and some birds learn to imitate speech. They take no mark at all of the motion of the mouth of him that speaketh; for birds are as well taught in the dark as by light. The sounds of speech are very curious and exquisite; so one would think it were a lesson hard to learn. It is true that it is done with time, and by little and little, and with many essays and proffers; but all this dischargeth not the wonder. It would make a man think (though this which we shall say may seem exceeding strange) that there is some transmission of spirits; and that the spirits of the teacher put in motion, should work with the spirits of the learner a predisposition to offer to imitate, and so to perfect the imitation by degrees.'

Medical writers scarcely render the subject more intelligible, when they refer the contagious nature of convulsions, of hysteric disorders, of panics, and of all the different kinds of enthusiasm, to the mere principle of imitation. Mr. Stewart contends, that the imagination also enters into the combination of causes which produce such sympathetic effects, though he does not attempt to draw any line between those causes, or, indeed, to investigate or analyse them at all. He deals only with the practical applications of which the facts, afterwards mentioned by him, are susceptible, abstracted from all consideration of the laws to which they ought ultimately to be referred.

Among these facts, he refers to the religious frenzy which formerly operated so powerfully on the minds and bodies of the enthusiasts of Cevennes, commonly called the Camisards; to the curious and incontrovertible phenomena produced in France, in the reign of Louis XVI., by the practice of animal magnetism; and to some instances of fanatical excitement, which occurred in Scotland, at the time of Whitfield's first visit to that country. He mentions also a description, somewhat visionary, in our opinion, of the operation of what the Quakers are pleased to call 'the spirit,' upon not only the minds, but the bodies, of their congregations. From these, and other similar facts, Mr. Stewart concludes that certain bodily affections are contagious, but that the contagion operates through the mind. He suggests, therefore, for the consideration of physicians, an important question, whether certain kinds of insanity have not a contagious tendency. It is impossible, we think, for any person to entertain a doubt on this point, who has ever visited a madhouse. Unless habituated to that most lamentable of all scenes, the soundest observer can hardly contemplate it, without feeling his thoughts unsettled for some hours after.

Even when passions and emotions are supposed to be felt by an individual, although not manifested by any external expression, they are, to a certain degree, contagious. Has it not often happened that one person, oppressed by low spirits in a small company, has thrown a damp upon their enjoyments, which no exertions

could counteract? Thus also, may a contrary sense of pleasure, and even the devotional feelings be excited, merely by the presence of persons known to be actuated by them. It is this operation of some inexplicable common cause, which gives to an earnest and powerful orator, such irresistible influence in a large popular assembly. Upon this subject Mr. Stewart has an admirable passage, which we must extract.

"There is something in the sight of a great multitude, more favourable to the excitement of the imagination and of the passions, than to the cool exercise of our reasoning powers. Every person who has been accustomed to address a large audience, must have experienced this in himself; and, accordingly, in popular assemblies, when a speaker indulges in declamation, or attempts to rouse the passions of his hearers, his eyes may generally be observed to sweep from place to place over his auditory; sometimes, perhaps, in a moment of more than common animation, to comprehend the whole at a glance: but, when he is about to reason, or to detail facts, he strives to concentrate his thoughts by forgetting the crowd, and fixing the eye of a single individual. His hearers, in the meantime (at least, such of them as have not learned from early and long habit to maintain their selfpossession and command of mind in circumstances so peculiarly adverse to reflection) become almost passive materials in his hands, and are prepared to follow wherever he leads the way :-So just is the maxim of Cardinal de Retz, that "all great assemblies are mere mobs, and swayed in their deliberations by the most trifling motives." In the history of human nature, few facts are more curious or more important than this; that where immense numbers of men are collected on the same spot, and their physical force is the most irresistible, their minds are the most easily subdued by the authority of (what they conceive to be) the voice of wisdom and of virtue. The consciousness of this power,-one of the proudest, unquestionably, which a man can possess over his fellow-creatures,-contributes more than any thing else to animate and inspire that eloquence which it supposes; and hence the foundation of a maxim laid down by Cicero, that" eloquence is impossible, without a listening crowd."

Buffon

'On such occasions, the contagion of sympathetic imitation will be found to aid so very powerfully the ascendancy of the speaker's genius, as almost to justify the exclusive stress which Demosthenes laid on action, when compared with the other constituents of the oratorical art. seems to have been fully aware of the same thing, when he introduced the following description of the effects of popular eloquence into the discourse which he pronounced on his reception into the French Academy. The description appears to me to be just, and to be executed with a masterly hand; but I quote it at present, chiefly to have an opportunity of expressing my dissent from the conclusion which it is employed to illustrate. "True eloquence implies an exertion of genips, and supposes a cultivated mind. It differs essentially from that fluency of speech, which is a talent possessed by all who have strong passions, flexible organs, and lively imaginations. Such men feel acutely, and express strongly, both by words and gestures, what they feel. Hence, by a sort of mechanical impression, they impart to others their enthusiasm and their affections :—it is the body which speaks to the body; all its movements, and all its expressive powers lending their aid. How little is sufficient to shake the opinions of most men, and to

communicate to them the sentiments of the speaker! A tone of voice vehement and pathetic; gestures expressive and frequent; words rapid and sonorous."

Buffon proceeds afterwards to contrast this popular eloquence with that which was cultivated in the French Academy, giving the decided preference to the latter, and, indeed, treating the former with every expression of contempt. The proper inference, however, from his premises was, that if these secondary attainments of an orator can perform so much, where there is a real deficiency in more essential endowments, what effects might they not produce, if united with the higher gifts of the understanding! Why undervalue an art, merely because it is adapted to the principles of our physical as well as of our moral frame; an art which, in ancient times, was cultivated by men not more distinguished by the splendour of their military virtues, than by those accomplishments which adorn and humanize the mind; and who, to a skill in composition, which it is our pride to imitate at a distance, seem to have added all the energy and all the grace which pronunciation and gesture, regulated by taste and philosophy, could supply? The eloquence of the French Academicians, when considered in relation to its professed objects, justly claims our admiration; but why contrast it with that eloquence-to which it bears no resemblance, but in name-which, in free states, has so often fixed the destiny of nations, and which the contagious sympathy of popular and patriotic emotions could alone have inspired? The compositions of Buffon himself, the most finished models, perhaps, of that polished and courtly style which he valued so highly, what are they, when compared with those mightier powers of genius which

Fulmin'd over Greece

To Macedon and Artaxerxes' throne?

What are they, even when compared with that eloquence (tempered and subdued as it is by modern institutions and manners), of which our own age and our own country has furnished so many illustrious examples ;* and which, in political assemblies far more wisely and happily constituted than those of the Athenian commonwealth, secures to its possessors an authority which no other distinctions can command? Such an ascendant is to be acquired only by talents as various as the principles of that nature on which they are destined to operate; and whoever, in the cultivation of the same art, forgets how closely the physical frame of man is linked with his imagination and his passions, may abandon all ambition of that empire over the minds of others to which the orators of antiquity aspired, and must rest satisfied with the praise of refinement, ingenuity, and wit.'-pp. 209-213.

In the fourth, and concluding section of the chapter, Mr. Stewart justly observes, that the principles upon which the phenomena, already referred to, depend, are subservient, on the whole, to beneficent and important purposes;' that the power of imitation is an essential matter to be attended to in the education of children; and that there are many accomplishments, particularly all those connected with grace, both in utterance and gesture, which children might be taught merely from the habitual sight of good models, -instead of consuming their time afterwards, -as arts which are to

be systematically studied. The section concludes with a dissertation upon ventriloquism, the connection of which with the subject under consideration is, we own, not very apparent to us.

The succeeding chapter is devoted to the varieties of genius and of intellectual character among men. What are the original disparities in their capacities, Mr. Stewart thinks it impossible to ascertain; but he considers it as presumeable, from the analogy of the body, that such disparities exist, notwithstanding the theory of the original equality of all minds, which has been ingeniously maintained by Helvetius and others. That the varieties existing in the form of the head, and in the cast of the features, are significant of original varieties in the intellectual capacity, seems to be sufficiently established by the whole course of human experience. But even if this had not been the case, it scarcely admits of dispute, that the different circumstances in which men are placed, will produce great diversities in their talents. For instance, it is a matter of daily observation, that great personal beauty, either in man or woman, diverts them from the cultivation of the mind; whereas, deformity produces the very opposite effect. If it be true, as that profound observer of human nature, the author of Gil Blas, asserts, that "little men are commonly decisive and oracular in their opinions,' it must be admitted, that stature also has its effects upon the intellect. But, undoubtedly, the most obvious cause of the varieties in the intellectual faculties, by which men are distinguished, arises from the different pursuits to which they dedicate themselves in civilised society. The metaphysician, for example, the mathematician, the poet, the critic, the antiquary, strengthen, by their respective pursuits, a corresponding combination of faculties and principles, while they suffer others to remain without due cultivation.' We regret that we cannot follow Mr. Stewart in his observations on some of these characters, shewing in what respects their intellectual faculties may be expected to be severally marked and discriminated, in consequence of their peculiar occupations. We can only find room for his reflections on the disposition to generalization, which usually increases upon men as years add to their experience.

'This tendency to abstraction and generalization commonly grows upon us as we advance in life; partly from our own growing impatience in the study of particulars, and partly from the inaptitude of our declining faculties to embrace with accuracy a multiplicity of minute details. Hence, the mind is led to experience an increasing delight in those vantage grounds which afford it an enlarged survey of its favourite objects. The flattened eye which can no longer examine the microscopical beauties of an insect's wing, may yet enjoy the variegated tints of an autumnal wood, or wander over the magnificence of an Alpine prospect.

Is it not owing to this, among other causes, that time appears to pass more swiftly the longer we live? As the events we contemplate swell in magnitude and importance (the attention being daily less engrossed with individuals, and more with communities and nations), the scene must, of