me to show to you the effects of mental causes on this organic vitality.

I was in professional attendance on a married woman in the lower rank of life, who, however, was a person of considerable mental sensibility and shrewdness. Her past life, alas! had not been such as she could look back upon with satisfaction; and I was one day summoned to visit her. She was confined to her bed, and was evidently in a very thoughtful mood concerning the great hereafter. Soon after my entrance into her room, and when I had taken a seat at her bedside, she fixed her eyes earnestly on mine, and with a rather firm voice she pointedly asked me my candid opinion on the likelihood of her recovery. Her words are still fresh in my memory after the lapse of so many years. I hope, Sir, that you think that I shall recover?" She looked earnestly at me; and I replied conscientiously in the negative. She still stared at me, and with yet wider eyes, and more fixedly on mine. An attendant just had time to exclaim "she's dying!" and in less time than you, dear Sir, are now taking to read the words which tell the circumstance, she really died! The message in my reply to her question acted as a depressing mental agent too strong for her low state of organic vitality. The organic and vital function of the heart could no longer continue, and it ceased to act, and she to live!

In striking contrast to this affecting case, I could tell you of others in which the happiest results took place; chiefly in regard to the vast interests of the deathless soul, and the dread concerns of eternity; but, doubtless, also, in raising the organic nervous energy, to the great benefit of the bodily constitution; in causing a prolongation of life, and in smoothing the rugged passage to the grave.

Allow me to relate a few instructive particulars of a case which occurred many years ago, and which has an opposite bearing to that of the one just mentioned, in illustration of the curative force under the influence of mental causes. I will first make a few remarks in relation to the points before us. The conscientious physician is occasionally in a position of some

difficulty how to decide in regard to his proper duty to the patient. I allude to the duty of making known to him the approach of death; not only when there is unquestionable indication of the event being near, but also when his experience and knowledge enable him to foresee, that at a more distant, but not very remote period, it must necessarily take place. To some unreflecting though well-meaning people the duty appears plain and imperative; and that is, always and at once to make it known to the patient; because, say they, of the incalculable interest of the soul, which may greatly depend on the early

announcement.

However, dear Sir, there are certain things which demand consideration in these cases. The safe and proper performance of the duty to the patient will depend on the circumstances, bodily and mental, of his case. Under all circumstances, the manner and time of making known the approach of death will be of the greatest moment. This was demonstrated in the afore-mentioned instance of sudden death, in which I had a part which will be a cause of regret to my mind whilst memory

holds her seat there.

To return to the happy case I am to tell you of. It is, indeed, one out of many happy ones, the remembrance of which yields pleasure and profit to the mind. I received a neatlywritten note, in which I was politely requested to visit professionally a young woman at a distance of seven miles from my house. She intimated in her note that she was very ill, and particularly wishful to see me, and to have my candid opinion on her case. Without any knowledge of the nature of her illness, I proceeded to her place of residence in a neighbouring town. On my arrival I found the house of a more humble description than I had expected from the style of her note

to me.

I was met at the door by an aged woman, who told me that her daughter was really very ill; that she had been under the care of a surgeon for some months, without receiving any benefit; that now he very seldom visited her; that he would not or could not tell them what was the disease under which she had

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suffered so long. Forthwith I was conducted to the chamber of the sick.

On my entrance I beheld a young woman of prepossessing appearance reclining on her bed. Her form was much emaciated by disease, but intelligence and amiableness of mind were depicted in her expressive countenance. She received me with complaisance and respect; and I was soon seated at her bedside, and occupied in examining her pulse and the symptoms of her complaint. I had no difficulty in deciding on its nature, and its sure termination. On resuming a settled posture in my chair, she fixed an inquiring and expressive gaze fully on me, and in a tone of some firmness, she said, “Sir, I have sent for you that I may have your decided opinion on my illness. I have very particularly to request your candid reply to two questions, which are-what is my complaint? and, what hopes are there of my recovery ?" Instead of making immediate and direct answer to these two questions, I again felt her pulse, begging to be allowed a short time for consideration. The fact was, that I felt somewhat undecided as to the propriety of returning an answer as plainly as she had put the two questions. I was making some desultory remarks, and keeping her in conversation for awhile, when, with an earnest but kindly tone of voice she interrupted me, saying, "The two questions, Sir, do be so kind as to answer them. Under an impression that I had no choice-no power of further evasion, I replied, placing my hand on hers, " Your complaint is pulmonary consumption, far advanced-your hopes of recoverynone whatever." I had no time to doubt of the effect of this reply, for she at once exclaimed exultingly—“ Bless God, I am satisfied." She said it in a tone and manner which denoted thankfulness and joy. I was at once convinced what kind of person I had before me. I then said, "I see that you are not afraid of dying." Well do I remember the emphasis with which she uttered-" Oh, no, no, Sir, death is only sleeping in Jesus."

I must not go much further, or tell you of the many instructive and cheering particulars of the hour I spent at the bedside

of that happy triumphant believer in Christ; nor of the many happy hours I afterwards spent there at my future visits. One significant incident I must relate to you, which came before me at that first visit. It shows, dear Sir, how much others may be affected by what we sometimes say and do, and when we ourselves have lost all recollection and thought about it. When I had answered her two questions to her satisfaction, we soon became intimately acquainted. She told me that she had seen me two years before; and she had often thought of a striking sentence which she then heard from my lips. "It was at a missionary meeting," she said; "I was late in entering the chapel, and was going down the middle aisle of it, when you, Sir, in the chair, had just risen after the speech of another, and you said to the audience, 'Happiness depends not on external circumstances, but always on a principle within us.'"

The facts of the case she alluded to I soon recollected. The preceding speaker she mentioned had been telling of a number of missionary converts, who were shipwrecked; and who, in the very jaws of death, and amid the waves of the sea, shouted praises to God and the Lamb! This gave him occasion to say to the audience, that happiness depends not on external circumstances. When he had concluded his speech I rose, in my office of chairman of the meeting, and added the latter half of the sentence for its completion. This was the time and circumstance to which she alluded. "Oh!" exclaimed my patient, Jane Ingledue, with holy emotion, "how often have I thought on that sentence which I heard two years since from your lips, Sir, but now, bless God, I experience the truth of it;" and placing her thin white hand on her bosom, she repeated, "It is the principle within, the principle within, Sir, and now I feel it, the principle of faith in Christ Jesus!"

I conclude unwillingly. That scene, Sir, which I then witnessed, was one of the sublimest character, and of moral grandeur far beyond all that the unaided philosophy of man could furnish. My patient lived most happily for several months after my first interview with her, and then died triumphantly, through the grand principle of faith in Christ within her, “the

hope of glory." This principle, which caused her to rejoice with exceeding joy, became the mental cause which had also a very favourable influence on her curative force, or innate organic vitality, and had much to do in prolonging her doomed life.

On the contrary, under different mental circumstances, and as I have known occasionally in this disease of pulmonary consumption, despondency has had an unfavourable influence, and has hurried the victim to the tomb. It is a well-known circumstance that so many who die of this disease entertain the hope of recovery to the last. But that delusive hope cannot have a power to prolong life as must have the cheering assurance of glory everlasting.

When I reflect on the trying circumstances in connection with the hours of sickness and of death, and when I recall to mind the instances which I have witnessed of the truest heroism and magnanimity displayed under the extreme things of that extremity to which we must all come, I turn, with feelings near akin to contempt, to the much idolized heroism of the battle-field, and to the so much sought after greatness which wealth, and rank, and titles, and learning, bestow in this world. And reflect, dear Sir, that the true Christian's principle of faith within him increases in its power to bless him in proportion to the desolateness and severity of his external condition. This grand principle within him, I say, becomes most powerful to comfort him when he is most destitute of aid from external circumstances. Surely, Sir, you must see its divine origin in its nature; that it is from God. A sublime instance of this Christian triumph now recurs to my mind, as related by my friend the Rev. John Simpson, and called " The contrast," in his interesting little work "Smiles and Tears," published by Ward & Co.

Touching the great subject of this letter, the organic vitality, and the influence which mental causes have on it, it is well known to the intelligent practitioner, and is correctly inculcated by the best medical writers, that the patient must have confidence in his medical adviser in order to be benefited by his treatment. A rather extensive field of inquiry would open