hong-chee, and who ultimately procured the recal of his master to his native province.-Choy-gno, and Choong-koong. The conversation of the sage with these pupils, principally on the social virtues, with their relation of his acts and sayings, constitute the substance of the Lun-gnee; which might, therefore, with propriety, be termed "The Life and Sayings of the Chinese Sage."

ASTROLOGY.

[From Galt's Life of Cardinal Wolsey.]

"ASTROLOGY has long, by the absurd pretensions of its professors, been so effectually consigned to oblivious contempt, that the books which treat of its principles are rarely to be found even in libraries of curious literature, and are never inquired for without provoking a sort of compassionate ridicule, not easily withstood. And yet, the study itself, as professing to discover, by celestial phenomena, future mutations in the elements and terrestrial bodies,* ought not to be despised. The theory of the tides is, altogether, an astrological doctrine, and, long before the days of Sir Isaac Newton, was as well understood as it is at this moment. The correspondence which the ancient physicians alleged to exist between the positions of the moon and the stages of various diseases, has certainly received a degree of confirmation, auspicious to a modified revival of the doctrine of celestial influences. It is not a just philosophy which rejects as vain what appears to be improbable. Though many things, of which the astrologers speak, be apparently fanciful, they are not the less worthy of being examined. They have asserted that the fits of a particular kind of madness are governed by the moon; that her rays quicken the putrefaction of animals ; that persons are rendered dull and drowsy who sleep abroad in the moonlight; that vegetables sown in the spring of the moon, differ in flavour from the same kind sown in her wane; that vines pruned during her conjunction with the sun, shoot forth a less rank foliage afterwards; and that timber felled at the same time, endures longest uncorrupted. They have also alleged that oysters, crabs, and all testaceous fish, grow fat

Sir Christopher Heydon's Defence of Astrology, p. 2. ed. 1603.

Dr. Mead's Treatise concerning the influence of the Sun and Moon upon Human Bodies, &c.

Heydon, p. 425.

Ibid. p. 186.

and full with the waxing of the moon, and dwindle with her waning. That she has an influence on the procreation of mares and horses; and that children born at the time of new moon are always short lived. Any man, possessing patience and inclination, might so easily ascertain the fact of these things, that it is surprising they should be still pronounced incredible, and denied rather than contradicted.

"Yet safe the world and free from change doth last;
No years increase it, and no years can waste.
Its course it urges on, and keeps its frame,
And still will be, because 'twas still the same.
It stands secure from Time's devouring rage,
For 'tis a God, nor can it change with age.'

And, therefore, say the astrologers, a correspondence and coincidence must exist throughout the universal phenomena; as in the machinery of a clock, in which the state of one part indicates what has passed, or is to happen in another.-The principles of astrology, like those of every other science, must have been founded on some species of experience. The first occurrences that probably attracted observation, would be those that naturally had some apparent concordance with the great luminaries and planets, such as the seasons of the year, &c. The tides, varying with the phases of the moon, would early obtain attention; their regular increase, corresponding to her opposition and conjunction, would lead to the consideration of the solar influence. Thence, perhaps, it was observed, that when certain planets were in particular constellations, and the sun in certain signs of the zodiac, the tides were otherwise affected. Hence the qualities of the planetary influence came to be studied.-A transition from the tides to the variations of the atmosphere, if they did not first attract notice, was very natural; and as valetudinarians are particularly affected by the weather, the progress towards that branch of astrology which relates to diseases would be the conse. quence. If the diseases of man be regulated by the stars, why not his passions also? And, as his passions govern his actions, making one class of motives more acceptable than another, why not by the means of his passions regulate his fortune? Fortune is but another name for situation, and men áre evidently allured into their various circumstances or situations by their passions. The next inquiry would naturally, therefore, be, to ascertain from what particular aspects of the skies the varieties of fate and character proceed. Hence the theory of nativities, and that branch of the study which has brought the whole into such disrepute. Ptolemy had vainly

warned his followers not to foretell particularly, but universally, as one that seeth a thing afar off; but, not content with telling particularly, they alleged, in the very face of their fundamental position, that man possessed a power of altering his destiny, by affirming that his will was free, and that he had the power of choice and election, forgetting that the foreknowledge of an apprehended future evil, generated a motive which might lead to the adoption of the conduct by which it was avoided.The notion of the unalterability of the world, as the atheistical astrologers entertained it, is at once curious and absurd, and warranted inferences which they would not, perhaps, have readily admitted. Proceeding upon the supposition that there does exist such a concordance in the universe as they maintained, it is obvious, from the motions of the earth, and of the system to which she belongs, that no two astrological observations could be found in the course of many ages precisely similar: a general resemblance of effect is the utmost that could be obtained, until, in the progress the various movements of the whole universe, the earth, in all respects, came again to the situation which she held, in relation to every other part, when the first observation was made. When she has done this, it must be allowed from the premises, that a new series of effects will commence, in every thing resembling the past. History having finished her tale, will begin to repeat it; and persons and events, under the same names, and in the same forms, as those of whom we have heard, will appear: yea, even fortune-tellers, as foolish as those who have rendered astrology ridiculous, will come again; and an essay, in no single phrase, point or circumstance, different from this, will, after the lapse of innumerable ages, be perused by such another being as thee, O Courteous Reader!

of

"The professors of alchymy have written the records of their processes, in a language of types and symbols, as inscrutable as that of the priests of Anubis. Whether they did or did not possess the art of making gold, may be fairly questioned, until the knowledge of their secrets is complete, and their experiments have been renewed; but that no natural impediment exists to the attainment of the art, Mr. Davy has gone far to show. From the reported testimony of one of themselves, it would appear that the hope of making an immortalizing elixir was not seriously entertained by the alchymists. The utmost which they professed to make, was a cordial which should refresh and preserve the animal spirits, when the frame was not vitally impaired. Possibly, extricated from the cabalistic technical jargon which they used, their studies may VOL. I. New Series.

Y y

have been both rational and ingenious; at least an opinion of them ought not to be formed from the ridicule which ignorant pretenders so justly provoked. John Frederick Helvetius, doctor and practitioner of medicine at the Hague, in the year 1666, gives a curious account of a conversation which he had with an alchymist on the subject of the Stone and the Elixir, and which he introduces with a description of the alchymist's person, that, even in the bad translation before me, has the merit of being remarkably vivid and natural. The doctor inquired whether, by the use of that elixir which Elias affirmed was known to the alchymists, the pristine nature of man may be converted into a new one, the sad into cheerful? Not at all, Sir,' said the artist, for so great power was never conferred on any medicament, that it could change the nature of man. Wine inebriating, taken by diverse individual men, in him who is drunk changeth not his nature, but only provokes, and deduceth into act what is naturally and potentially in him, but before was, as it were, dead. Even so is the operation of the universal medicine, which, by recreation of the vital spirits, excites sanity, for a time only suppressed, because it was naturally in him before; even as the heat of the sun changeth not herbs or flowers, but only provokes the same, and from the proper potential nature of them deduceth them into act only: for a man of a melancholy temper is again raised to exercise his own melancholy matters; and the jovial man, who was pleasant, is recreated in all his cheerful actions; and so, consequently, in all desperate diseases, it is a present or most excellent preservative.' Soon after he adds,' But if any prolongation of life, by some philosophical medicament, could have been induced against the predestination of the omnipotent God, undoubtedly neither Hermes, Trismegistus, or Paracelsus, or Raymund Lully, or Count Bernhard, and many more like illustrious possessors of this great mystery, would not have yielded to the common death of all mortals, but, perhaps, have protracted their life until this very day. Therefore, it would be the part of a fanatic and foolish man to affirm this, yea, of a most foolish man to believe and assent to the same, touching any one medicament in the things of nature.'-Presently the conversation changed to the transmutation of metals; and Helvetius affirms that Elias gave him a specimen of the philosopher's stone, with which he performed a successful experiment. Helvetius himself does not appear to have been an alchymist; he was unacquainted with the sub

Raymund Lully is said to have taught Edward III. the art of making gold. Sinclair, Hist. Revenue, p. 75. ed. 1785.

jects of which Elias spoke, and had written a book against Sir Kenelm Digby, who professed to make a sympathetic powder, which could cure wounds at a distance. In refuting the pretensions of Sir Kenelm, he had made use of some expressions relative to the pursuits of alchymy, which induced Elias to call on him.-Golden Calf, pp. 99, 100. ed. 1670. A good name for such a book! The Rosicrucians were a particular order of alchymists, and professed to be able to transmute the metals. The names of secret substances employed in the process were communicated to the members at their admission into the society; or, rather, the meaning of the symbolical language by which the materials were described was explained to them, and it was the use of that language which gave rise to the opinion, that the Rosicrucians held particular notions relative to spirits. They were, in fact, a society of experi mental philosophers, and used, according to the fashion of the age in which the society was founded, a cabalistic mode of expression, in order to enhance the merits of their knowledge. This society is still supposed to have some sort of an exist ence; but whether its members believe they possess the key to the symbolical language, and are able to convert common into precious metals, is not easy to be ascertained. I have met with a gentleman who said he was a Rosicrucian. There is a dictionary, in French, which says, that Ovid's Metamorphoses describe alchymical processes. I have not been able to meet with it."

ON FEMALE LITERATURE, BY MADAME DE STAEL-HOLSTEIN.

[From the Universal Magazine.]

["Misfortune resembles the black mountain of Bember, situated at the extremity of the burning kingdom of Lahor: while we ascend it, we see before us only barren rocks; but no sooner do we reach the summit, than we perceive the heavens over our head, and the kingdom of Cachemire at our feet."-The Indian Cottage by Bernardin de St. Pierre.]

THE rank which women hold in society is still, in many respects, indeterminate; a desire to please draws forth their natural understanding, while reason advises them to remain unknown, and their success is as absolute as their failure.

I cannot but think that a period will arrive, when philosophical legislators will bestow a serious attention upon the education of women, upon the civil laws by which they are protected, the duties incumbent upon them, and the happiness which may be secured to them; but, in the present state of