The clafs of POLITE LITERATURE begins with Rev. Edward Ledwich. The page here confidered is that in which Prætus king of Argos is faid to have fent Bellerophon to Jobates king of Lycia, with letters directing that Bellerophon fhould be put to death. The question is, whether thefe lines imply that literal writing was or was not known in the age to which the writer is referring. The Greek fcholiafts and Jofephus aré of opinion that the ufe of letters was unknown in Greece even to the time of Homer; and fome moderns, especially Mr. Wood, have adopted the fame notion. Mr. Ledwich, in attempting to prove the contrary, begins with fome remarks on Greek paleography. The Pelafgians are faid by Diodorus Siculus to have had alphabetical elements preceding the Cadmean. Proofs are numerous of the commercial intercourfe between the early Greeks, Egyptians, and Phenicians; and it is highly improbable that the Greeks would not import into their own country fo important an invention as the art of writing. Cadmus probably improved the Pelafgian letters, and gave to them new forms and enunciations, and thus the first Greek alphabet was formed. The antient letters became obfolete; and hence Mr. Ledwich thinks that they were called by the Greeks onpata and onusia, or marks, and that in thefe the letters of Pratus were written. A prize memoir follows, on the fubject of a system of national education adapted to Ireland. By Dr. Stephen Dickfon. We are forry that we are not enabled to fet out on a confi deration of this effay with precife ideas of what the author of propofer of the question meaned by national education. As far as it is a plan for thofe who receive gratuitous inftruction from public inftitutions, we understand what is intended: but how it can comprize the higher claffes, or in general those who are able to provide for the wants of their own children in this respect, without fuch a fyftem of coercion, or at leaft.of partial advantage, as is incompatible with a free ftate, we do not readily comprehend. We are convinced alfo that, however well intended fyftems of this kind may be, they in general only add to the many inftances of the propenfity in all legiflators to govern too much. Dr. D. begins his effay with education as it concerns health; in which the greater part of his remarks apply folely to foundling hofpitals; a fpecies of inflitutions to which we think him much too favourable; their utility belonging chiefly to the worst poffible ftate of fociety, that of extreme indigence and profligate difregard of domeftic duties. He proceeds te con fider education as it promotes morality, under which head his remarks are liberal, but very general. The most really useful part of the effay is the fucceeding head of the elementary inftruction of children of the labouring poor. He propofes that the faculty of reading and writing the English language fhould be taught to every child in the nation without exception, as likewife the common rules of arithmetic; and this fhould be effected by parochial fchools, provided by the established clergy, (who are, it feems, by oath engaged to make such provifion,) with the addition of fuch other fchools as may be thought neceffary by the grand juries of counties. The Doctor then proceeds to inftruction in agriculture, as a bafis for which he proposes a profefforfhip of this art to be founded in or near the metropolis; whence pupils, fent up by bounties from the feveral districts of the kingdom, may diffeminate the knowlege which they have acquired, on their return, when fettled in fmall farms.-Inttruction in mining is the next topic; for which he propofes the inftitution of a fort of travelling fcholarfhips, and of a board of mineralogy in the metropolis. For instruction in manufactures, Dr. D. sketches an extenfive plan, confifting of schools in various parts of the kingdom, to teach the feveral branches of linen, woolen, cotton, &c. manufacture, under head masters and journeymen: the fcholars to be divided into different claffes, from different ranks in fociety. In this cafe, we have not the least doubt that the establishments which he propofes, expenfive and liable to abufe as they certainly would be, would not answer the end fo well as the common mode of apprenticeship, provided the latter were freed from fome unneceflary and impolitic reftrictions with which the antient fpirit of monopoly has burthened it. With refpect to inftruction in profeffional and polite literature, as this affects only the higher ranks, who can and ought to choofe for themfelves,-the only point, in which it seems connected with national education, is as far as public inftitutions already fubfift for that purpose. The corregion and improvement of these will be certainly an important, but at the fame time a very difficult and delicate, matter. On the whole, we cannot but deem this effay, extensive as it is, much too flight an effufion to deferve a place in a scientific publication; for which it is not qualified either by precifion of reafoning, or by manly chaftenefs of ftyle. We shall not detain our readers long with the next class of papers, that of ANTIQUITIES. Efay on the rife and progress of gardening in Ireland. By Jofeph C. Walker, M. R. I. A. &c. We We learn no more from this paper than that Ireland has followed, at an humble diftance, the changes and improvements which this pleafing art has undergone in the fifter-kingdom. Obfervations on the romantic history of Ireland, by the Rev. E. Ledwich. Regarding this hiftory as a collection of fiction and fable, Mr. L. endeavours to trace its origin. The Saracens in the eighth century brought into Spain the eastern spirit of magical and fictitious fabling, whence that country became its European centre. The Milefian tales, originating thence, have many circumstances of Arabian fiction and philofophy. This fpirit of romance was early cultivated in Armorica and Wales, whence it muft foon have reached Ireland, which had a clofe connexion with thofe countries. The legend of St. Patrick makes him a native of Cornwall, or of Armorica. From fome palpable forgeries in it, its date is fixed to the 12th century but the romantic hiftories of Keating and others are much later. It is clear that the Spanish chroniclers fupplied thefe, with many of their marvellous tales. Mr. L. concludes with fenfibly recommending, to his countrymen, an attention to fuch parts only of their antient hiftory and antiquities as are fupported by authentic records and remains. An antient Irish inftrument, in length 6 feet, 4 inches, refembling in appearance a barber's pole, and of uncertain ufe, is the unimportant fubject of the next paper. Some golden antique inftruments, found in a bog, and of equally unknown application, are defcribed in the next Memoir, by W. Molefworth, Efq. The volume is concluded by a paper entitled Cacinan, or fome account of the ancient Irish lamentations. By W. M. Beauford, M. A. The primeval inhabitants of Ireland, of Celtic race, were diftinguished by an extraordinary propenfity to crying, which was called forth into full exertion at the funerals of their friends, giving a proverbial celebrity to the Irish cry or howl. The funeral fong Caoinan is here prefented to the curious, with the words in Irish and English, fet to mufical notes, with its full choruffes of fighs and groans, and burden of Ulla luila lulla lù. ART. V. Thoughts on the Effects of the Application and Abftraction of Stimuli on the Human Body; with a particular View to explain the Nature and Cure of Typhus. By James Wood, M. D. &c. 8vo. Pp. 78. 2s. 6d. Boards. Murray. 1793. IT T was naturally to be expected that the new discoveries in chemistry would be the foundation of new theories and pracREV. APRIL, 1794. Ee tices tices in medicine, and various inftances have already appeared of fuch an application. The writer before us has probably as early a claim to ideas of this fort as any of his countrymen, the fubftance of the prefent work having been read before the Philofophical and Medical Society of Newcastle, in September 1792. It will not be eafy for us to give a clear notion of his opinions to thofe who are not well verfed in the language and fpeculations of the Brunonian school concerning irritability and excitability, as well as acquainted with the chemical doctrines and nomenclature of the French philofophers. We fhall therefore lay before the reader a general fummary of them, and of the practical conclufions deduced by the author, referring thofe to the work itfelf who wish to enter minutely into his reasonings. The property of fenfation in the medullary or nervous fibre, when agitated by a ftimulus, he calls extitability; that of contraction, in the mufcular fibre, irritability; and he confiders thefe two powers as cceval, and exifting in an equal ratio to each other. Taking, then, the mufcular fibre as the particular fubject of his reafoning, Dr. Wood calls that ftate, in which fo much irritability exifts as to be capable of being agitated by the weakeft ftimulus, a ftate of accumulated irritability; and the reverse, a state of exhausted irritability. Receiving it as an axiom that all matter is ftimulant, he regards what is called a fedative power as the mere diminution of the ftimulant power. The firft great ftimulus acting on the body is atmospherical air; which is compofed, according to Lavoifier's experiments, of azotic gas and oxygene gas. The oxygene is the part neceflary to life; it is therefore a ftimulus, but one of the mildest kind, its action being never followed by exhauftion of irritability, it rather feeming to be the power which reftores irritability. Vegetable matter, and ftill more animal matter, are higher ftimulants, and tend more to exhauft; as do likewife wine, and fome fubftances of the Materia Medica. The fame may be faid of fome impreffions on the fenfes and affections of the mind. Stimulants, therefore, are of various claffes, according to their chemical, their nutritious, their tonic, and their irritating and exhaufting effects. Dr. Wood gives two fcales, in order to explain his doctrine of ftimulant powers, through the feveral periods of life from infancy to old age. He fuppofes that the quantities of carbone and hydrogene exifting in the fyftem are in proportion to the state of irritability; that the accumulation of thefe principles tends to produce a putrefcent ftate, of which oxygene is the general and only cor rector. rector. Proceeding then to the difeafe Typhus, he confiders it as a fever of a genus diftinct from all others, and particularly contrafts it with the fynocha of Cullen. Its predifpofing causes he reckons to be thofe which accumulate irritability by the abftraction of the ordinary and proper ftimuli of food, and by depreffing paffions, &c. The principal exciting causes are impure air, filth, want of exercise, and cold with moisture. Its proximate cause he therefore ftates to be an over-proportion. or accumulation of carbone and hydrogene, and an exhaufted. ftate of irritability. This, he thinks, is only to be removed by the application of oxygene in fufficient quantity; and the most easy and effectual mode of throwing it into the fyftem he conceives to be in the ftate of the neutral falt nitre. As a practical proof of its efficacy, he refers to the fuccefs of his father, who, during a long and extenfive practice, has invariably made use of nitre in this fever.-We cannot say that we are not fomewhat furprized at the formality with which this fact is brought forward; as we are certain that there are few apothecaries in the kingdom, of 20 years' ftanding, who have not been taught, as a matter of course, to exhibit nitre in every fpecies of fever. If, as we are afterward informed, Dr. W. has cured every Typhus that occurred, with the ufe of a nitrous folution containing the dofe of 15 or 20 grains taken every two or three hours, we cannot avoid concluding that the nurse has had more fhare in the bufinefs than the doctor, and nature more than either.-He adverts to fome other remedies ufually adminiftered in these fevers, attributing the efficacy of fome to the oxygene which they contain, and doubting that of others. He difapproves the ufe of the ftrong ftimulants, in which the followers of Brown fo much confide; viz. wine, brandy, opium, &c. their ultimate effects being to exhaust that irritability which they at firft so powerfully excite; and he prefers, by way of regimen, thofe milder ftimulants which nourish the body, or give tone to the fibres. On the whole, this work is the ingenious effay of a young man who has carefully attended to and reflected on the doctrines of the schools, and who poffeffes a laudable ambition to improve the profeffion in which he is engaged. Even if his fpeculations fhould be found to point out nothing in practice which other systems, or mere empiricifm, had not before fuggefted, they may yet, at leaft, throw in a falutary counterbalance to much more dangerous extremes. |