A Poet too he was, not very bright, RICHARDSON, ROUSSEAU AND GOETHE. From Thompson's Paradise of Taste. W HAT other names some other tombs might show, Full in the midft a fable coffin stood, Of proud Bologna's melancholy maid, Two penfive pupils at his feet were laid, (a) Knight and Jerningham. Soyez plutot maçon, si c'est votre talent, VOL. XXXVHI. LI Avis de Boileau, A. P. ch. 4. ACCOUNT ACCOUNT of Books for 1796. Zoonomia; or the Laws of Organic Life. Vol. II. 4to. By Erasmus Darwin, M. D. F. R. S. 1796. HAVING AVING in our volume for 1794, given an account of the first volume of this ingenious work, it might perhaps be sufficient for us barely to announce to our readers the appearance of the second volume of a work, the former part of which has already excited the attention of most of those who pursue the study of of medicine as a branch of science, and intereft themselves in all its ingenious novelties; and indeed, we mean to do little more than give fuch a general idea of its contents, as may ferve to afford information of what may be expected from it. A full analyfis of the work would be dry; a minute criticism would occupy too many of our pages with a topic addressed only to profeffional men; and partial criticisms would be unfair and impertinent, where the whole is concatenated by a system, only to be properly comprehended in an univerfal view. The volume confifts of part 2d and 3d of the Zoonomia. The 2d contains a catalogue of diseases distributed according to their proximate causes, with their subse quent orders, genera, and species, and with their methods of cure.' The 3d comprizes 'the article of the Materia Medica, with an account of the operation of medicine.' Thus the volume is properly a practical system of physic, founded on the doctrines of the animal economy laid down in the preceding volume. The classification of diseases follows that of the faculties or powers of the sensorium, established in the first part of Zoonomia. As all diseases are affirmed to originate in the exuberance, deficiency, or retrograde action, of these faculties; and to confift in difordered motions of the fibres, the proximate effect of the exertions of these difordered faculties; four natural claffes of diseases are derived from the four powers of the sensorium; which the author denominates those of irritation, of sensation, of volition, and of affociation. The orders, under each of these classes are formed from the circumstances of increase, diminution, and retrogradation of the actions: the genera are derived from the proximate effect; the species from the locality of the disease in the system. It is not to be expected thata classification, founded on fuch peculiar and abstract notions, should coincide coincide with those of former paThe thologifts and nofologifts. reader must therefore prepare himself for a confiderable portion of furprize, at the view of affemblages of which he has had no previous idea: and at the appearance of many things in the catalogue of diseases which he had reckoned mere symptoms, and even some that are natural actions, and reducible to no received definition of disease. It would be easy for us to anticipate his furprize by the production of examples of this fort: but this would be acting unfairly towards the truly ingenious author; who could doubtless shew that a regular pursuit of his system led to analogies and affociations, which no other train of reasoning could difcover. Meantime, it is obvious that an arrangement of diseases from their proximate causes is a business so thoroughly scientific, that it must suppose a degree of perfection in our knowledge of the animal body in its healthy and diseased state, which elevates medicine from its humble rank of an experimental art, to that of a true and full formed science. This state, indeed, is that in which every friend to its progress would wish to view it, and that which every man of genius will attempt to acquire for it:-but the misfortune is that fuch attempts, if premature or inadequate, interfere with the humbler efforts of practical utility, and miflead by false views as much as they instruct by true conceptions. It is not easy to imagine an arrangement of diseases less applica ble to common purposes than that in the present work; nor is it probable that even those who re ceive, and comprehend, the au thor's system of medical philofo- We by no means intend, how- L12 The diftri Principles 1 Principles of Legislation. By Charles Michell, of Forcett, Efq. 8vo. 1796. A S the most useful publications are not always the most entertaining, those which are calculated chiefly for the inftruction of mankind are rarely perused, Acept by the small circle of readers who are endowed with a clear understanding and found judgment; and who, divested of paffion or party spirit, seek only for the improvement of the mind, or the means of meliorating the condition of the bulk of their fellowcreatures. The great mass of men in every nation, though they feel oppreffion with as much sensibility as the most enlightened, are rendered incapable, through the want of education, of finding out a remedy of precifely that degree of strength which is fufficient to remove the evil of which they complain, without producing in its place any other grievance of equal or greater magnitude. Those who feel pain are unquestionably best able to tell in what part they are affected, and how acute are their fufferings: but it does not follow that they beft know how to get rid of it without destroying themselves. The cafe is the fame in the political as in the natural body. The poor can tell, for instance, when the scarcity of provifions raises the price of them, and when the usual fum with which they go to market will not produce the usual supply of food; but we may venture to say that they are not the best judges of the causes of scarcity, nor of the means either of guarding againft or removing it. Some may 4 think that it arises from too small a divifion of farms, others from too great a confolidation of them; fome from the policy of allowing an exportation of grain, others from want of a bounty on the importation: and fome from a radical defect in the organization of government, while others afcribe it to fome particular measure pursued by adminiftration. These various causes having numbers of partizans, each propofing different remedies, and having nothing in common between them but the certain experience of the scarcity, the remedies, if left entirely to those who fuffer, must be as various as the parties propofing them; and, confequently, the evil, instead of being destroyed, would necessarily be aggravated. Fully convinced of the calamities that may be brought on society by a departure from found principles of legiflation, or by the adoption of fuch as are suggested by the uninformed, the prejudiced, or the defigning, the author of the work before us makes an appeal to the found sense of his countrymen, and calls them to the serious confideration of the grounds on which political conftit cons ought to be raised and maintained. Those who look into books/only for amusement; those who are incapable of feeing objects with calm philofophic temper and clearness, or whose judgments are chained down in adamantine fetters by their passions or by party connections, we advise to throw aside, without reading, the volume that we are going to review: but let it be ferioufly perused by those who are in search only of truth, and who are ready to embrace it under whatever whatever form it may present itfelf. Let such perfons open it, in the fully certainty of meeting with principles, we will not say in all cases irrefragably juft, but in general irrefiftibly true. They may be fure of finding calm difcuffion, and a fair appeal to their understanding. They will find the author the steady friend of rational liberty, and the determined enemy of defpotifm, whether arifing from the cold blooded tyranny of an individual, or from general confufion and anarchy. They will fee that Mr. M. combats many opinions which are at present extremely popular, not because they are entertained by a great part of the people, but because they are calculated, in his opinion, to injure the public, and to endanger the throne of liberty. There are many points in it on which we differ widely from Mr. M: but what work of equal extent, particularly in the present ferment, could be produced, that muft command the acquiefcence of mankind in all its doctrines? His conceptions, in deed, are generally just, and his arguments powerful; his knowledge of human nature is profound; his acquaintance with the hiftory of antient and modern times is extenfive and correct; and his powers of reafoning are to be furpaffed only by his moderation and temper:-which failed but once (we believe) in the course of 513 pages, and that was when speaking of Thomas Paine. Having thus characterized the publication before us, we will now proceed to give a fummary of its contents. It is divided into two books, the former subdivided into eight, the latter into ten chapters. The author sets out with a quotation from Mr. Burke's celebrated Reflections on the French revolution, "that circumftances alone render every political principle beneficial or obnoxious;" and he strongly controverts the truth of it, or at least shews that it might lead to error from the ambiguity of the term "political." Politics, he observes, is a word that ferves to express both the whole science of government, and the art and practice of adminiftering public affairs. It ought, therefore, to be afcertained in which fense it is ufed. Legiflation he employs as a more proper, because an unambiguous term, for expreffing the former. He says it may be refolved into principles that are invariable; and that the mode only of applying them depends on the circumstances of the moment. doctrine of expediency, he admits, may be useful to a statesman actually engaged in the government of a particular nation: but even with him the author would have it operate only negatively. The 'Circumstances (fays he) may render pernicious a measure abstractedly good, but no circumstances can render permanently beneficial a measure abstractedly bad. A virtuous and intelligent ftatefman is influenced by expediency no further, than if occafion requires to defift from action. Unlike the mariner who is ignorant of navigation, and who therefore, for the fake of immediate ease and fafety from whatever point the wind may blow, steers his ship right before it: he proceeds in spite of adverse winds, by an oblique course, to his destined port, or at the worst cafts anchor. For from that exL13 tremity |