290 LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC. 



the vigour of the body becomes less sustained, the tissues shrink, the various 

 functions become, we know not why, enfeebled ; and at length the principle of 

 life abandons the corporeal habitation to natural decomposition. 



** The cessation of life, familiar to us in so many examples, cannot be said 

 to surprise us ; but it shocks us. Yet its long continuance, in constant 

 dependence on the accident of our taking food, or the mere transmutation of 

 extraneous and vulgar substances into corporeal elements, so as to preserve the 

 body in one form for a time, and its functions undiminished, — this seems the 

 greatest mystery, a greater than its decay. For even the mind remains the 

 same throughout these changes, retaining the impressions early made, and 

 ■which, although not always recalled with equal readiness, are indelible until life 

 has departed, and left the body to pass into fluids and into gases no longer held 

 in the forms of organised life." 



The lecturer then proceeded to describe the organs of mastication, digestion, 

 and assimilation ; explaining the structure and offices of the teeth, the oesopha- 

 gus, the stomach, the liver, the intestines, the lacteals, and finally of the lungs, 

 in which the traces of chyle, previously mixed with the blood returning to the 

 heart, wholly disappears, the chyle being then converted into true blood 

 to serve all the important purposes of that fluid. The diet of various nations, 

 and that suitable to different climates, was incidentally touched upon, and some 

 of the peculiarities in the digestive organs of carnivorous and of ruminating 

 animals were pointed out. The compound nature of the blood, and the provi- 

 sion in the higher classes of animals, and especially in man, for its being acted 

 upon by atmospheric air, were next spoken of, and the heart, arteries, and veins 

 described. The subjects of respiration and the circulation led to the considera- 

 tion of the functions of the brain, spinal marrow, and nerves ; and the different 

 offices of the latter, particularly of the nerves for motion, for sensation, and for 

 the involuntary functions, as of the heart, stomach, &c., were explained. 

 Connected with the nerves of touch, of hearing, and of sight. Dr. Conolly 

 entered into an explanation of the structure of the skin, of the ear, and of the 

 eye ; although this part of the subject was necessarily much condensed. Some 

 of the differences between the brain of man and that of other animals, were 

 then mentioned ; and the difference in the proportions of the cranium and face 

 in man, in the monkey, the dog, &c., were illustrated by sculls of those 

 animals. This part of the subject was followed by various remarks on the 

 mental faculties in man and in the lower animals. The finer sensations, the 

 greater power of attention, the richer memory, the wider comparison, the supe- 

 rior reflection and judgment of man, were noticed, with some of their many- 

 effects on man and on society. The faculty of speech, the invention and uses of 

 language and writing; and the gradual improvement of communities, were 

 here alluded to ; as well as the powerful affections, the self-examination, the 

 singular extent of intellect occasionally shewn in human beings. The power 

 delegated to man of altering so many substances by the help of fire, with all its 

 applications to science ; the benefits arising from man's social disposition ; the 

 fondness for harmony, leading to the science of music; and many other circum- 

 stances were successively mentioned, to which it is impossible to do more 

 than to allude. The strange peculiarity of the human species being the only 

 species perpetually in a state of mutual warfare, as observed by Cuvier, and 

 man's proneness to disease, concluded this enumeration. Several observations 

 were then made by the lecturer on the adaptation of the female character 

 to that of man ; and on the proportion of female to male births all over the 

 world. 



The details connected with these various notices having: occupied the lecturer 

 nearly two hours, the discourse was concluded by the following observations, 

 which were listened to apparently with untired and profound attention. The 

 passages relating to the structure of the globe were illustrated by fossil remains 

 and mineralogical specimens, from Malvern, Dudley, the Rowley Hills, Strat- 

 ford-upon-Avon, &c. &c. 



*' Such then are some of the characteristics of the human species, of which 

 the history, gradually fading into doubtful traditions, on the most ancient of 

 which, however, there are traces of truth which the modern science of the eartU 



