be the brown matter, and the brown matter alone. The white medullary substance, with all its curious cavities and arrangements, has nothing to do in such mental manifestations, and the whole nervous system is alike excluded. Dr Spurzheim, however, maintains, that the whole medullary substance is secreted by the brown, and that a communication can be shewn to exist between them by a system of diverging and converging fibres. Surely he must have discovered these fibres by an actual dissection-his writings assert this ;-their existence is a sine-qua-non to his whole system. Now Dr Gordon distinctly states, that Spurzheim never did demonstrate such communication between the brown and nervous matter-he did not demonstrate these diverging and converging fibres when called upon to do and moreover, Dr Gordon positively denies that any such arrangement can be shewn to exist in the cerebral mass. How does Dr Spurzheim attempt to parry this homethrust, which goes to terminate his craniological existence? Very simply, by an exclamation of " Hey ho! is it so?"

so;

cr

In another part of his pamphlet, indeed, p. 27, he offers to shew converging fibres to any one who shall procure a fresh brain;" and at p. 38, mentioning the " reinforcing fibres," which Dr Gordon denies are susceptible of demonstration, he offers "to demonstrate all these statements to any one who shall procure a fresh brain." Every one who knows the very great difficulty there is in procuring a recent brain, will easily perceive that Dr Spurzheim is making merry with his readers. He was provided at his demonstration with a brain in the most recent state, why did he not then " demonstrate all these facts?"-he did not do so he was unable to do so,-and his whole system falls to the ground.

66

Upon every occasion," says Dr Gordon, "where he was called upon to make good those affirmations which constitute the leading features of his system, he endeavoured to excuse himself from the task, by denying that he had ever maintained any such structure to be demonstrable."-P. 114.

As a reply to such serious accusations, Dr Spurzheim produced a pamphlet, professing to be "An Ex

amination of the Objections made in Britain against the Doctrines of himself and Colleague." We sat down to a perusal of it with a considerable degree of curiosity, and we closed it, quite satisfied as to the merits of these far-famed craniologists.

Never was there a more evident attempt to evade the overwhelming force of unwelcome facts, than has been made by Dr Spurzheim on this " examination." Instead of meeting fairly and decisively the objections so strongly urged against him ;—instead of a clear refutation, or a manly confession of mistake and error;-there is little else in this pamphlet but a most general and unconnected repetition of his former theories and assertions.We see in it only the signs of an imbecile irritability,-evidently sensible to reproach;-conscious that it is but too well founded, but unwilling to confess its justice, and unable to avoid its sting.

At p. 37, Dr Spurzheim wishes to I amuse," his readers by an anecdote, which we must not forget to notice. It is an account of a dissection which took place in the Royal Infirmary last December, and it will be seen how slyly a very formidable accusation is brought forward against Dr Gordon. We know that this gentleman was present at this dissection; but it happened not to be the week in which his official duty as one of the surgeons to the Infirmary would have given him the superintendence. This duty belonged to one of his colleagues, the next in seniority. Dr Gordon had therefore no necessary concern with this dissection-it was a point of etiquette not to interfere with it. We can assert, that the presence of Dr Spurzheim in the theatre was known neither to Dr Gordon nor to the surgeon who presided; no intentional obstruction could therefore be offered to his views by either of these gentlemen. We regret with Dr Spurzheim, that a dissection so interesting as this really was, afforded, as we are compelled to acknowledge, so little gratification or improvement to the students who crowded the anatomical theatre. Why were the whole posse-comitatus of the hospital,

clinical and surgical clerks,--assistant-surgeons, apothecaries, and dressers,-permitted to stand round the dissecting table, and totally to prevent the students from seeing the body?

merits of this destination of his property, as well as from many other instances of a similar description, it is impossible not to perceive how little encouragement is held out to such charitable, or, it may be, ostentatious donations. In the progress of society, as in that of the age and fortune of individuals, that which at one stage appears most interesting and praise worthy, is beheld at another with indifference or aversion. I. March 1817.

REMARKS ON GREEK TRAGEDY.

No I.

(Eschyli Prometheus.)

THE drama has formed an interesting and important part of the literature of every nation into which it has been introduced, and no nation that has cultivated literature at all is entirely without it. Among the Athenians, scenical representations were frequented with a degree of enthusiasm of which we cannot easily form an adequate notion. A successful play was the most certain and the shortest road to literary fame, and even to fortune and preferment in the state. The dramatic poets were men of eminent genius, and not more remarkable for the qualities of mind that form the poet, than for those that constitute the philosopher. Euripides was the disciple and the friend of Socrates, who saw the important moral purposes to which the drama might be applied, and the divine philosopher did not think it beneath him to aid the poet in the correction of his pieces. In the Greek theatre, not only was the taste of the people formed to a simple and natural style of composition, and their minds inspired with a love of virtue, but their piety and their imagination were equally improved by the unfolding of the beauties of a poetical mythology. It was not merely a place of public amusement, but rather a temple for the purification of the national manners, and the worship of the gods,-more moral in its tendency than their sacrifices and festivals. It is to be understood, that these observations apply only to tragedy, for the Greek comedy was often licentious and immoral.

It was fortunate for the Greeks that in their literature they had no mo

dels to copy. It was the growth of their own soil, rooted in their usages, laws, legends, mythology, and peculiar modes of thinking and conformation of character, and was native to Greece as the vine to her mountains. It was drawn directly from nature, and the likeness was pleasing, because it was the faithful copy of a fair original; not, as too frequently happens among the ancient Romans and the modern nations of Europe,- -a servile imitation-a tame copy of a copy; it was like nature herself, fresh, and rich, and vigorous, and unconstrained, ever varying and ever graceful.

On a first view of the Greek tragedy, what strikes the reader, if he is at all conversant in the drama of the moderns, is its simplicity. The characters are few, and the fable neither intricate nor the incidents surprising. Its whole interest arises out of the simple expression of natural feeling in situations of suffering and sorrow; yet scanty as the materials are, by their judicious arrangement, a beautiful superstructure is raised. It may be likened to a fine painting, in which the figures are correctly drawn and skilfully grouped-the costume appropriate the drapery easy and graceful-the expression of the passions, such as naturally flow from the circumstances of the actors-the story perspicuous-and the lights and shades disposed with such art as to give to the whole the most pleasing effect.

It has been often repeated, and as of ten acknowledged, that the composition of a tragedy is one of the most difficult of all the efforts of human intellect. It requires a knowledge of the nature of man, and of those general laws by which he is governed in every stage of society, which is the portion only of a gifted few,-of those main springs of thought, and feeling, and action, that are universal, and of all the varieties of their modification produced by his moral, physical, and political statethe temperature or severity of climate

the purity of religion or the grossness of superstition-the exaltation of liberty or the degradation of slavery. The dramatic writer must be endowed with the eye that can unveil the human heart, detect the passions in their source, and trace them in their intricate windings, and give to all fit utterance. He must be possessed of a pliancy of mind, by which he may

place himself almost simultaneously in the situation of all his characters-of a sympathy with the beings of his own imagination, which will enable him to think with their minds, to feel with their hearts, and speak with their tongues, as if they were real characters-to become at once a Shylock and a Portia-a Hamlet and the Queen Mother. So to conceive and to paint character, as to clothe it in the garb of nature, to model it to symmetry, and to inspire it with the animation of life, not merely in description, but in representation-so to invent a fable as to make it at once probable and interesting, to lead us into the society of men and women in the moment of suffering or heroism, and to light the whole with a radiant atmosphere of poetry-from the frequency of the failure, must be concluded to be one of the most arduous of the enterprises of genius. Hence the miscarriages of men, even of great poetical talents; of whom some have brought upon the stage characters so cold and so correct, so stiff and so formal, so unlike the men and women with whom we mingle in real life, that we have no more sympathy with them than with the inhabitants of the moon. They are mere puppets, through which their authors pour forth their declamations on stale morality, and without the smallest regard to propriety; every thing is spoken in the same tone, and with the same emphasis. With these writers, every breeze is a whirlwind, and every feeling an ecstasy. They do not suit the language to the sentiment, nor study the processes of Nature, who never errs in fitness, but gives to every stream its own particular key-sound, according to the weight of its waters and the rapidity of its descent. These hints, crude and undigested as they are, will be of practical application in my remarks on Greek Tragedy.

Eschylus, in a glorious age, had perhaps a fairer claim to originality than any of his contemporaries. He did not improve, but create tragedy. He not only paved the way in which Shakspeare was afterwards to move with a splendour that should eclipse his own and every other name, but he gave to the acting manager the mechanism of scenery that was to represent the beauties of the landscape, not merely to delight the eye of the spectator, but to give a fit place for the action.

The claims of this writer to the

high reputation which he has obtained among the poets of Greece, is now to be examined; and I shall begin with a short analysis of the play of Prometheus. It is founded on a well-known fable. In the wars of the gods, Prometheus had joined the party of Jupiter, to whom he gave important aid in the unnatural expulsion of his father, Saturn, from the throne of heaven. Jupiter, however, forgetful of past services and of solemn oaths, was no sooner seated on the throne, than he began to exercise his authority in acts of the most abominable tyranny over gods and men. His amusement was in insulting the subject gods, but men he determined to exterminate, by at once depriving them of food and fire. Prometheus was not like the submissive throng of courtier gods, so far corrupted by the contagion of servility, as not to feel pity for the distresses of mankind. In defiance of the tyrant, he interposed to save them from the threatened destruction, and not only gave them fire and food, but instructed them in many of the useful and ornamental arts. Jupiter, enraged at this act of disobedience to his despotic mandates, condemned him to be chained to a rock on Mount Caucasus, there to remain till he should expiate his crime, and offer submission; and this sentence was carried into execution with many circumstances of cruelty and insult. This preface was necessary to the right understanding of the play.

The main object of Eschylus, in writing this tragedy, was to exhibit to his countrymen, in Jupiter, a ferocious tyrant, stained with every crime; and in Prometheus, a suffering patriot. Among the Athenians, such a subject could not fail to awaken the deepest interest. Never was an altar erected to freedom in any country on earth where her flame burnt purer than in that city; and this drama was an of fering worthy of such a shrine.

The fable is more than commonly simple, and all the characters mytho logical or allegorical except one. They are, Prometheus-a Chorus of Ocean Nymphs-Io, the Daughter of Inachus -Ocean-Vulcan-Force-and Violence;-of whom the two latter, under the direction of Vulcan, bind Prometheus to a rock with chains of adamant. In their presence, neither pain, nor the insults of Force, who is a well painted executioner-nor the sympa thy of Vulcan, who is his kinsman