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    only possible efficient cause of tubercle It , s - ost ^ ^* at Pj «™ 1 tb / healthiesf . parents becomeJ **?^^ ' ^ J ^ ld proclaim th-t phthisis 1 L fSky ° ;[ Sa cur coS ^ l , that * o one need become consumptive * ho does not 1 choose it . ' ' 1 On the nature of tubercle he says : — . ^ liW the first time ia the history of disease , the proximate source of tubercle deposit , is immm ^ mwm 4 SXhaTissues , is deposited , mainly as a hydrocarbon , in the lungs and other organs I under the form of the bodies known by the designate of tubercles . The last link in the chain of causation , the bond of inference here seems clear to demonstration . Ihe <* rbon taken into the system , m consequence of the vice of resp ^ atxon is not suffi ciently burnt off in the lungs , is not adequately discharged l > y the liver or the sk , n . not deposited as sub-cutaneous fat . is not eliminated otherwise . \* but ^ f ]^! comes of it ? The reply to this is , vre find it in the foreign bodies which we term tubercles-bodies which inevitably form , when respiration , or rather a respiratory nisus is continued beyond a certain period in a corrupt and effete atmosphere . A diseased action is necessarily set up , the carbon finds no sufficient natural outlet , and tubercles h . ctic , wasting final decay , and death , are the result . I do not at all mean to assert that a merely superfluous supply of carbon lerds to tuberculous deposits . What I mean is , that an imperfect respiratory " process fails to purify and renew the blood , which , thus loaded with excretions and foulnesses , has , as if were , no alternative but to deposit them as tubercles , with all their consequent train of evils , in the different tissues . Carbon indeed , continues to be burnt off during the whole period of tuberculous deposit and softening , nature ' s abortive , simply because too commonly unaided struggles , with disease . Eut if so , it is under irregular , abnormal conditions , and as before , under cir cumstances which preclude the healthy , efficient discharge of the respiratory function . We have already confessed the incompetence of this court . to decide on a question which palhologists alone can rightly decide on ; but us physiologists we put in a deimirrer . On the nature of tubercle we are silent ; on the physiological action which Dr . M'Cormac assumes as the cause of tubercle we entirely dissent from him . With this caveat , let us pass on to his exposition of the Proximate Cause of Consumption . We do not , after a due consideration of the Greek , Roman , and Arabic medical records , I conceive , find that phthisis , by them indeed often confounded with other diseases of the theracic organs , occupied thut place in their attention which , had it been -equally frequent in their times as in ours , it must needs have done . The ordinary habit of the ancients-Greeks , Uomans , and Arabs alike-was not only to spend a great deal of \ their lives in the open air by day , but also to pass the nig ht in chambers conmrnnica- tine by an open door with an open court . Modern usages are very different . Ihe shut' ¦ ¦ up bed-room , wiih its closed doors and windows , its curtains , carpets , blinds , and liang- ¦ ings ; in short , its cverv- apparent expedient for promoting the stagnation and impurity of the atmosphere is now the rule , as in former times it was the exception . 11 we j admit , as we must ne < ds admit , that air was g iven to be respired , and the lungs to re- \ spire it withal , how thall we explain our management of the atmosphere , which we I treat as if air pure and un . illoyed , were not day and night , ever ar . d always , the most : absolute and unconditional of " all r . quirenients , impossible short of disease and death to be done without ? The habits and usages of daily life , the palliation sought in , it not yielded by our climate , the requirements , real or artificial , of trade , commerce , industry , combined with the almost incredible ignorance and indifference as to organic neces .-ities of the masses , all unite to create and aggravate the disastrous results flowing from the respiration of an atmosphere loaded with , human excretions , and almost utterly unfitted for human requirements . Nay , he tells us that even silkworms , housed in close-heated , ill -ventilated rooms , as in Italy and the South of France , are subject to tubercle ; and what- ever may be the nature of tubercle , it is certain that defective respiration plays a most important part , if not the whole , in developing consumption . The reader curious in this subject is referred to Dr . M'Cormac ' s treatise for fuller details ; our object is attained in bringing forward the leading idea . Consumption is too terrible and familiar a malady not to make every one anxious to get some light on it ; nnd although we must await the decision of more competent judges before introducing Dr . M'Cormac ' s theory , as the theory on the subject , we feel called upon to give our readers the benefit of the suggestion of a new theory . The book is a very small book , and crowded with erudition , and with interesting facts . ¦

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    AN INQUIRY CONCERNING RELIGION . An Inquiry concerning Relig ion . By George Long , Author of an u Essay on the Moral ' Nature of Man , " " The conduct of Life , " &c . Lonyman . Mb . Long tell us that these pages " contain the result of reading and reflection on subjects of unrivalled importance , commenced at an early age and continued through a long life . " The work , indeed , exhibits all the moral qualities which should characterize an inquirer after truth . It is calm , candid , and charitable ; and its tone , rather than its matter , has enabled us to read it through with pleasure . Mr . Long , however , docs not noem to us to have mastered the subject , or even to be aware of many of the difficulties , philosophical and critical , which have compelled not a few of the most learned divines and the best men of this age , to renounce or suspend , j their belief in Christianity . J ' or example , lie argues in favour of the ¦] authenticity of the History of Christ as though the only alternative were either to accept tlint history as it stands in the Gospels and the Ai : tn , or to regard the whole as a figment , and leave Christianity without any sisi-iigmi-. ble origin . " We need hardly tuiy the received theory on the other fide in , .: ' that the Gospels and Acts contain a lurge element of true natural history , j { surrounded with a supernatural halo by the fancy of an age when miraclcn j Were supposed to be things of common occurrence , or the root of evil as Well as of good , and epilepsy was taken for demoniac possession . Let Mr . Long take uny lift * of a Roman Catholic anint , that of St . Francis Xavier , for instance , or St . Philip Ned . lie will find in it a basis of historical tr . uth—the actual life of the man , the doctrines he taught , the names of his disciples , the order or other institutions that he founded , &c . —surrounded

    rf , is , , , - ( >¦ c t j j j ., c t A of by a grateful and ardent imagination , with ahalb of \? hat all but verj 3 e ignorant and credulous Roman Catholics admit to be false miracles . is Mr . Long devotes a good deal of space to an attempt to exhibit and 5 t harmonise the e \ idence for the Resurrection and Ascension ; and justly for that part of the Gospel history is not only of unspeakable importance , but , critically , seems destined to be the experirnentum crutis . He , however , Sj while far more candid than apologists in general , assumes , like apologists in ? , general , that the discrepancies of the narrative are only" of a minor kind , s , and such as rather confirm than invalidate the reality of the main event , j , instead of amounting , as they do , to a total diversity , extending even to the e place of the Ascension . He is driven to account for the absence of any r specific mention of the Ascension in three out of the four Evangelists , by e saying that the Gospels of Matthew and Mark were left unfinished , and that ^ John omitted the fact , because it had been recorded by Luke . When critics ' ' resort to these strong hypotheses to get out of Biblical difficulties , they a should remember that they are not even dealing with ordinary histories , narrating common facts , but with what are tendered us as the inspired res cords of those events on which the salvat ' on of the world depends . We . have scarcely a rig ht to expect in such records more than common accuracy i and argument . Let us also observe that it is a principle sufficiently estab-, lisbed in profane criticism , that you cannot separate all the details of an 1 event from the event itself . ' We have not space even to glance at all the divisions of Mr . Long ' s work . ' " The Being and Attributes of God , " " Natural Religion , " " the Evidences 1 of the Truth of the Christian Religion , " " the Progress , Present Stale , and i Future Prospects of Christianity . " He treats the whole in the spirit of a sensible Christian layman , whose heart is much more set on the ethics than 1 oi the dogmas of his religion . He wishes to reform the national church by i emb acing in it all who are content to accept as the bond of communion a purely scriptural creed and liturgy . This is the natural aspiration of a religious and intelligent layman revolted by surplice movements and Grori ham controversies If such an extension of the national church could take i place , we should regard it as a great gain , even to those who might still be > excluded from the pale ; and certainly it is quite as g reat an advance as the \ main body of the nation arc prepared for in the direction of libevty and . truth . But looking to the present state and relations of the various parties , such a consummation seems almost hopeless . It would , of course , be necessary to eliminate the high church party , who to be sure would not surfer ¦ any great hardship in being c ompelled to migrate to tliat portion ot the , vineyard ( as Dr . Pusey calls it ) to which their doctrines and practices belong . But would it not also be necessary to give tip the evangelical " party to whom certain Calvinistic glosses upon Scripture ( which Mr . Long repudiates ) are quite as dear and essential as the Scripture itself *? There is one thing about this book which gives us great satisfaction , and that is to see a religious layman earnestly examining the evidences of Christianity . It is from laymen that the decision of this tremendous controversy must come . Clergymen , especially clergymen of this establishment , are bound not only in interest , but in honour , to uphold the doctrines of their Church . When a clergyman like Dr . Hampden , Mr . Maurice , or Dr Donaldson , dare attempt free inquiry , he becomes immediately the object of general reprobation and attack by his brethren , who !» P . « ten to put on the screw of the Thirty-nine Articles , and the Athanasinn Creed . Educated laymen , who have leisure , must train themselves to religious inquiry . They must not only cease to regard such inquiry as a province from which they arc excluded , but they must regard it as a province peculiarly their own . They alone are free to seek the truth . To them belongs the solution of a question unparalleled for importance in all the domain of science and throughout the history of man . Humanity will for ever thank and bless all who , being duly qualified , earnestly devote themselves to the task .

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    ^ t \ i A BATCH OP BOOKS . El lie ; or the . Human Comedy . By John Eaten Cookc Sampson , Low , and Co . This ia another of the American reprints , which have been growing very plentiful lately , and which , there is prttna facie cause for behoving , find lavou * With son ™ mysterious division of the reading public . The book now unde r notice contains a story written with didactic purposes very indistinctly stated in a preface . The writer ' s chief and novel aim , however , being to paint human buimrs as ihey think and act , when moved by those divers and conflictiixr passions nnd emotions which are the common inheritance ot humanity , ' wts are Fcwrculy surprised at being told , in addition , that the book ia " intended to contain types , so to speak , of huin . in Ulo ; " and still less are . we astonished to find that it does not . In the heroine , we are rcauirod to notice " the influence of purity and self sacrifice , even whett tlu-y arc exemplified in the character and actions of a child ; " but woare soiry to cay that Ellie , though undeniably angelic , does not fulfil tho things which are promised and vowed in her name ; inasmuch as all the good people seem to derive their goodness from a source independent of her l character and actions , " and nil llic bud people who are converted , are converted without her h .-lji . After KUio , the author ' s favourite character , and medium fnp the nnr < ' « ul of moral sentiments , is a Mr . Inclodon , whose »|> ecinlitics are 1 , iKjvoti ' m to principle ; ti , great strength of wind ? » , a . lignihcdcalmness , which I kik the ivmarki . ble olivet of driving antagonist tu the nccofHjilyot grind ng their teeth ; and , 4 , u piwsion for ui ^ eusoimblo inteiv . cw « , * , » c » l , o always conclude * by Haying to his victim " My anl won »« -- J Jj ^ f , fir Horn thing to that odid . Opposed to Mr . liielrc o ,, i « llio i . i « lHonaWO villain oftl . ou . le , a Mr . Kantian , who i » Boofumwl . it" will . co . - < ; tin ™« r . ^ e that , , coin . ! at lenftth to regard hi « normal cou . j . <¦*<<'" » " ' \ goes throuuli ucouivcof dreadful ii . i . juUicH , bu i-J >> "'' J l ll 'g ^ rl , i , ion „ , „! virtue by being pitched on ^^ J ^ J ' . ' 'There equally truthful rcprcB « . 1 luti ..,, 8 oi huinnn h <« «*> ^ ° f | , kic « t urgui * u Doctor J ?«« , yl , a cynic and " ^ f ^^ Thy ^ ' i « fblo pellet ! of n-ontH , on purpo , e that th « y n . ujr bo lv ock < m £ ^ ^ d Mr . « a » Houcy , n bonovolo . it , but wu k »» . L | 1 1 Jttrti < . ulur , a youth , deal of juvviiiJj virtue m JuwJy hla , Ijchkic * * -i « i

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 17, 1855, page 1111, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2115/page/19/