very judicious and excellent remarks. And all those remarks, with the suggestions that accompany them, are founded in phrenology. Public penitentiaries he regards as so many moral schools, in which the pupils, in addition to the requisite amount and kind of book knowledge, and of that derived from personal instruction, learn trades, or acquire other modes and means of future subsistence, become versed and confirmed in habits of industry, and, above all, in which they are to be disciplined in the principles and practice of virtue. These are all so many processes of moral training and reform, powerful in their influence when conducted with judgment and skill, and pursued with the steadiness and perseverance which occasions demand. As repects the general mode of executing these processes, Mr. Combe makes the following instructive observations.

"Our object in criminal legislation may be at, once to protect society by example, and to reform the offenders themselves. This appears to me to be the real and legitimate object of the criminal law in a Christian country, and the question arises, how may it best be attained?

"A condemned criminal is necessarily an individual who has been convicted of abusing his animal propensities, and thereby inflicting evil on society. He has proved by his conduct, that his moral and intellectual powers do not possess sufficient energy, in all circumstances, to restrain his propensities. Restraint, therefore, must be supplied by external means; in other words, he must, both for his own sake and for that of society, be taken possession of, and prevented from doing mischief; he must be confined. Now, this first step of discipline itself affords a strong inducement to waverers to avoid crime; because, to the idle and dissolute, the lovers of ease and pleasure, confinement is a sore evil-one which they dread more than a severe, but shorter infliction of pain. This measure is recommended, therefore, by three important considerations: that it serves to protect society, to reform the criminal, and to deter other men from offending.

"The next question is, how should the criminal be treated under confinement? The moment we understand his mental constitution and condition, the answer becomes obvious. Our object is to abate the activity of his animal propensities, and to increase the activity and energy of his moral and intellectual faculties. The first step in allay. ing the activity of the propensities, is to withdraw every object and communication that tends to excite them. The most powerfully exciting causes to crime, are idleness, intoxication, and the society. of immoral associates. In our British jails, criminals in general are utterly idle; they are crowded together, and live habitually in the

society of each other; intoxication being the only stimulus that is withdrawn. If I wished to invent a school or college for training men to become habitual criminals, I could not imagine an institution more perfect for the purpose than one of our jails. Men, and often boys, in whom the propensities are naturally strong, are left in complete idleness, so that their strongest and lowest faculties may enjoy ample leisure to luxuriate; and they are placed in each other's society, so that their polluted minds may more effectually avail themselves of their leisure in communicating their experience to each other, and cultivating, by example and precept, the propensities into increased energy, and more extensive activity. The proper treatment would be to separate them, as much as possible, from each other; and while they are in each other's society, to prevent them, by the most vigilant superintendence, from communicating immoral ideas and impressions to each other's minds. In the next place, they should be all regularly employed; because nothing tends more directly to subdue the inordinate activity of the animal propensities than labour. It occupies the mind, and physiologically it drains off, by the muscles, the nervous energy from the brain, which, in the case of criminals, is the grand stimulus to their large animal organs. The greater the number of the higher faculties that the labour can be made to stimulate, the more beneficial it will be. Mounting the steps of a treadmill exercises merely the muscles, and acts on the mind by exhausting the nervous energy and producing the feeling of fatigue. It does not excite a single moral or intellectual faculty. Working as a weaver or shoemaker, would employ more of the intellectual powers; the occupations of a carpenter or blacksmith are still more ingenious; while that of a machine maker stands higher still in the scale of mental requirement. Many criminals are so deficient in intellect, that they are not capable of engaging in ingenious employments; but my proposition is, that wherever they do enjoy intellectual talents, the more effectually it is drawn out, cultivated, and applied to useful purposes, the more will their powers of self-guidance and control be increased.

Supposing the quiescence of the animal propensities to be secured by restraint and by labour, the next object obviously is, to impart vigour to their moral and intellectual faculties, so that they may be rendered capable of mingling with society at a future period, without relapsing into crime. The moral and intellectual faculties can be cultivated only by addressing to them their natural objects, and exercising them in their legitimate fields. If any relative of ours possessed an average developement of the bones and muscles of the legs, yet had, through sheer indolence, lost the use of them, and

become incapable of walking, should we act wisely, with a view to his recovery, by fixing him into an arm-chair, from which it was impossible for him to rise? Yet, when we lock up criminals in prisons, amidst beings who never give expression to a moral emotion without its becoming a subject of ridicule; when we exclude from their society all moral and intelligent men calculated to rouse and exercise their higher faculties; and when we provide no efficient means for their instruction, we do in fact as effectually deprive all their superior powers of the means of exercise and improvement, as we would do the patient with feeble legs, by pinioning him down into a chair. All this must be reversed. Effectual means must be provided for instructing criminals in moral and intellectual duty, and for exercising their moral and intellectual faculties. This can be done only by greatly increasing the number of higher minds that hold communion with them; and by encouraging them to read and exercise all their best powers in every practicable manner. The influence of visiters in jails, in ameliorating the character of criminals, is explicable on such grounds. The individuals who undertake this duty, are, in general, prompted to it by the vivacity of their own moral feelings; and the manifestation of them towards the criminals, excites the corresponding faculties in them into action. On the same principle on which the presence of profligate associates cultivates and strengthens the propensities, does the society of virtuous men excite and strengthen to moral and intellectual powers.

"By this treatment, the offender would be restored to society with his inferior feelings tamed, his higher powers invigorated, his understanding enlightened, and his whole mind and body trained to industrious habits. If this should not afford society a more effectual pro tection against his future crimes, and be more in consonance with the dictates of Christianity, than our present treatment, I stand condemned as a vain theorist; but if it would have these blessed effects, I humbly entreat of you to assist me in subduing that spirit of ignorance and dogmatism which represents these views as dangerous to religion and injurious to society, and presents every obstacle to their practical adoption."

In a foot-note to page 329, our author observes:

"While these remarks are passing through the press, I have seen an excellent work, entitled 'The Philosophy of Human Life,' by Amos Dean, professor of Medical Jurisprudence in the Albany Medical College; on page 158 of which, there is a statement of improvements on prison discipline, suggested by the late Edward Livingston, which coincide very closely with the views expressed on pages 326 and 327 of this work. I have not seen Mr. Livingston's

own remarks; but I am gratified to find that Mr. Dean, in his able and instructive work, advocates principles similar to those in the text."

On that note we beg leave to remark, that Mr. Livingston's "statement of improvements on prison discipline," here alluded to, were contained in a letter addressed to the late Roberts Vaux, Esq. and dated, we think, in 1828 or 1829. But whatever might have been the date of the letter, a commentary on it, of considerable length, was written and published in Philadelphia, in pamphlet form, by Dr. Caldwell, in 1829. Of this pamphlet, which was afterwards republished entire, with commendatory remarks, in the Edinburgh Phrenological Journal, the title was, "New VIEWS OF PENITENTIARY DISCIPLINE AND MORAL REFORM." The opposition and denunciation of phrenology were fierce and loud, at the time, in most parts of the United States; and even in Philadelphia, the most distinguished seat of science in the western world, the knights of the pen, the press, and the pulpit, withheld not their succour from the merciless crusade. By some of those noisy declaimers and trashy writers, who mistook zeal for talent, and racket for reason, a belief in phrenology was denounced with as much wrath and bitterness, as if it had been one of the elements of the unpardonable sin.

Owing to this condition of things, the pamphlet of "NEW VIEWS,” though it did not fall altogether dead from the press, attracted in this country but little notice. In Europe, especially in Great Britain, and by many of the savans of France, it was received into much higher favour, and treated with more consideration and respect. In looking through that pamphlet, we find in it very many passages, strikingly analogous, in matter and thought, to much that Mr. Combe has embodied in the volume before us. In confirmation of this, we submit to our readers the following extracts from the "New Views," and could with perfect ease quadruple their number and amount, to the same effect.

"Culprits are but perverse and wicked children; and the more deeply and exclusively you punish and disgrace them, you harden them the more, and render them the worse. Many a froward and stubborn boy is driven, by harsh treatment, into vice and ruin, who, by mild and judicious training, might have been bred up to industry, usefulness, and honour. In like manner, the harshness and cruelty of an under-keeper, himself even lingering on the borders of crime, and awaiting but a slight temptation, and a suitable opportunity, for the actual commission of it, may confirm in the convict vicious propensities, which, by proper discipline, might have been thoroughly corrected, and rendered subservient to virtuous purposes.

"In saying that the moral and religious instructors of criminals should be themselves moral and religious, we shall probably be regarded as uttering one of the tritest of truisms. But we intend, by the position, more, perhaps, than is at first apprehended. Our meaning is, that the teachers should be constitutionally moral and religious; that both the moral and reflective compartments of their brains, but especially the former, should be fully developed.

"That this opinion is both true and important, can be shown, if we mistake not, on well settled principles; and we know, from observation, that, in analogous cases, experience has confirmed it.

"It is a law of nature, as immutable as the pointing of the needle to the pole, or the lapse of water down an inclined plane, that the language and true expression of any organ or compartment of the brain, in one individual, excite to action the corresponding organ or compartment in another. This is the natural and only ground of the influence of eloquence; and the true reason why the passions are contagious.

"One individual addresses another in the words and tones and gesticulations of anger; or, to speak phrenologically, in the language and manner of Combativeness. The consequence is known to every one, and is felt to be natural. The same organ is excited in the individual addressed, and he replies in the same style. From artificial speech and empty gesture, the parties proceed to blows, which constitute the greatest intensity of the natural language of the irritated organ; its ultima ratio, in common men, as an appeal to arms is in the case of monarchs."

"Does one man wish to conciliate the friendship of another? he mildly accosts him in the language of Adhesiveness, and thus excites a kindred organ. And when a lover strives to propitiate his mistress and gain her favours, he approaches and addresses her in the soft language and winning manner of the associated organs of Amativeness and Adhesiveness. This is the philosophy of what the poets denominate the sympathy of souls; the condition of an organ naturally and forcibly expressed, by looks, words, or actions, or by all of them, in one person, producing a similar condition of the same organ in another.

"In further illustration of our principle, let us suppose a lover to address his mistress in the language and manner of Combativeness, or an individual, intent on gaining the confidence of another, to approach him with a naked dagger, and the menace of Destructiveness. Would either succeed in his meditated object? We know he would not. On the contrary, the former would render himself an object of resentment and dislike, and the latter would become the