544 MAXIMA OP STRENGTH. 



"born, the illegitimates are to the legitimates as 5 to 3. In the city of 

 Berlin, the illegitimate still-births are to the legitimate in as high a pro- 

 portion as 3 to 1. 



The passions of man are gratified in a manner that seems to be inde^ 

 pendent of religious profession. The open dissoluteness of one country- 

 is counterpoised by the secret crime of another. Protestant England 

 and Catholic France exhibit a striking illustration. In the former, in 

 1845, the number of illegitimates was 70 per thousand of the whole num- 

 ber of children born. In France it was about 71. 



During the process of the development of the intellect of man, various 

 Succession of P s y c ^ ca l persuasions in succession arise, which are frequent- 

 psychical per- ly imputed to education or tradition, but of which the origin 

 is undoubtedly to be traced to the organization. Those gen- 

 eral ideas that are found all over the world, among all races of mankind, 

 whatever may be the climate in which they live, their social condition, 

 or religious opinions ideas of what is good and evil, of virtue, of the 

 efficacy of penance and of prayer, of rewards and punishments, and of 

 another world : these, from the uniformity of their existence in all ages 

 and in all places, must be imputed to the stamp that has been put upon 

 our cerebral organization. In the same light we must view, as Dr. Prich- 

 ard has said, the delusions and fictions which are universal, such as 

 ghosts and genii, giants and pigmies. Universal opinions are not the 

 result of accident, nor always of tradition. They are often creations of 

 the mind, arising from peculiarities of its constitution. 



Arrived at maturity, the system of man commences at once to decline, 

 Successive max- the epochs of the maximum of physical and mental strength 

 and mental S1< l not however, coinciding ; that for the former occurring at 

 strength. about the 25th year, as previously remarked, but that for 



the latter not until between the 45th and 50th year. At this period, 

 when the powers of imagination and reason have reached their highest 

 degree, the liability to mental alienation and insanity is also at its max- 

 Order of men- i mum< Somewhat later, the physical system plainly be- 

 tai and physi- trays that it is pursuing its downward course, retracing the 

 steps through which it passed forward to development. Soon 

 there is an evident decrease of weight, the nutritive operations being no 

 longer able to repair the waste of the body. There is also a diminution 

 of the height. This corporeal decay is the signal for a depression of the 

 mental powers, the first which begins to yield being probably that of con- 

 centrating or abstracting the thought. As years pass on, external im- 

 pressions exert a diminished influence, and he who at an earlier period 

 reached the meaning of things, as it were, almost by intuition, now casts 

 his eyes over page after page without an idea being communicated to his 

 mind. The old man querulously complains that he reads his book, but 



