by pronouncing the religious teachers of the poet "worthy of incineration." Nor is there anything, we are constrained to say, in the over cautious, imperfect, and disingenuous, however interesting Memoirs by Haley, that forbids this inference. And yet, it could not but have been known by the author, or rather compiler of that work, that the period of his life, during which he enjoyed, together with the unclouded sunshine of reason, the peace and joy of religion, was the interval from 1764 to 1773, when he believed and openly professed every article of his faith, the effect of which was represented as afterward being so calamitous. It was then that his character was exhibited in all its attractiveness, unveiled by any of the mists that had come over it before, and which gathered again toward the close of his life. He was more cheerful and affectionate in his intercourse, partaking with lively interest in the common concerns of society, and happy in the enjoyment of his religion; and when he became subsequently the victim of his afflictive hallucination, he could

not avoid acknowledging that his gloomy persuasion was at variance with every article of his creed, and he was driven to regard himself as an inexplicable exception to his own principles. We have shown already that religious truth of any kind had nothing to do as a procuring cause of Cowper's malady. It was as clearly a case of hypochondriasis as are those instances in which the patient has fancied himself a tea-pot or a sack of wool; or as was that of the baker of Ferrara, mentioned by an Italian Count, who thought himself a lump of butter, and durst not sit in the sun, nor come near the fire, for fear of being melted, and his thinking substance destroyed.

We maintain then, that this unhappy condition, which, without due examination, has been imputed to religion, is an effect produced by physical causes. That a different opinion should have obtained to any extent, is to be ascribed to misapprehension, perhaps in part, but we doubt not that more frequently it may be traced to another source, which is thus noticed by Dr. Cheyne. "When a man from

having been worldly becomes religious, there is no one against whom prejudice is stronger. No change is less agreeable, not even a change from respectability of conduct to the sort of profligacy which defies public opinion, than that which leads a man, whose previous motives were of a purely secular kind, to make the attainment of the kingdom of God his first object, by which he necessarily rises in the moral scale. That any one formerly on our own level should take, or affect to take higher ground, offends our self-love. It is a constant rebuke, by reminding us of his superiority of principle. Hence, it frequently happens that when a man really turns to God, first he is represented as a hypocrite, then a fool, and last of all, a madman. That his motives and his judgment will be arraigned, every neophyte may expect, as being matter of uniform experience; and that madness is a consequence of divine teaching, is a conclusion which is as old as the days of Portius Festus."

A well known minister of London, who has lately died, was called to visit a woman whose

mind was disordered, and on remarking that it was a case which required the assistance of a physician rather than that of a clergyman, her husband replied, "Sir, we sent to you because it is a religious case; her mind has been injured by constantly reading the Bible." "I have known many instances," I replied, "of persons being brought to their senses by reading the Bible; but it is possible that too intense an application to that, as well as to any other subject, may have disordered your wife." "There is every proof of it," said he; and was proceeding to multiply his proofs, till her brother interrupted him by thus addressing me:-"Sir, I have no longer patience to stand by, and see you imposed on. The truth of the matter is this: my brother has forsaken his wife, and been long connected with an immoral woman. He had the best of wives in her, and one who was strongly attached to him; but she has seen his heart and property given to another, and, in her solitude and distress, went to the Bible as the only consolation left her. Her health and spirits

at length sunk under her troubles; and there she lies distracted-not from reading her Bible-but from the infidelity and cruelty of her husband." The reader need not be told that the miscreant made no reply to his brother's statement, but immediately left the room in the utmost confusion. Another use of this subject, and the last which we shall mention, is for

CONSOLATION.

And for this grateful ministry, its scope is as wide as the office is benignant. As may be well presumed, this doctrine of physical influences is easily capable of being perverted. Some may mistake the buoyancy of animal spirits for the influences of the Comforter, and others may ascribe the motions of sins which are by the law, to the power of bodily disease. But it is not intended by this admission of the effect of physical causes upon the soul, to offer an apology for sin, to furnish a convenient excuse for indolence, sullenness, a cynical temper, or any other culpable dispositions to which a man may be constitutionally prone.