matter with which chemistry deals. These are the "processes" by which force is generated, and in the grand operations of nature many and wonderful changes are the result. But they are all merely physical, and may be constantly reproduced by like

causes.

Now what are the properties of mind? Without aiming at scientific definitions, it will be sufficiently correct to say, thoughts, feelings, and volitions. We exercise the reason in comparing ideas, and are led to the discovery of some new truth. A vision passes before the eye, and suddenly images of beauty are painted on the soul. A strain of harmony is flung carelessly upon the passing breeze, and in the bosom of some distant listener the fountains of delighted feeling at once are stirred. Through the wilderness of forgotten fears and joys memory wanders back, and the past lives again with the freshness of yesterday. Sympathy, friendship, and love form tender ties, yet so elastic that intervening continents and seas cannot sever them. In short, the attributes of mind are seen in the countless daily phenomena | of thinking, reasoning, imagining, hoping, fearing, doubting, believing, and so forth. They have a distinct character, and evidently belong to a class of their own.

Will it be said that these different phenomena are only the excitements of a chemical influence wrought by the contact of food with the stomach-of the blood with the brain, and of oxygen with the blood? In the process of comparing ideas is there anything analogous to the effervescence of gases? In the decisions of a firm will do we perceive anything like the fulminations of gunpowder? If oxygen comes in contact with the tissues or the brain, does it produce ideas in the same manner that its union with sulphur produces an acid? If so, what is the nature or character of these ideas? Are they mathematical, poetic, political, utilitarian, philosophical, or what? or tell us what shade of difference in the action of oxygen on the brain causes one man to be a fatalist and another religious; this one to be a Democrat and that a Whig-here a Methodist and there a disciple of Calvin? Why is it that the same identical cause acting on different brains should produce results so different? or why in the same brain should there be such an endless succession of ever-changing thoughts and feelings?

The truth is, that all the "properties" of matter are totally unlike those of mind. If it be said that those properties which are usually ascribed to mind are likewise the properties of matter, though differing from the properties commonly ascribed to matter, it is a sufficient answer to demand the proof. Where is the evidence of this? Has any searching chemical analysis detected in the brain or any other organized substance these intellectual attributes? To assert their existence without reason is not philosophy, but mere assertion. Surely in a matter of such importance we may be excused if we call for evidence.

There is a curious and unavoidable inference from this chemico-spiritual doctrine, which is also a conclusive argument against it. If these intellectual attributes are the properties of organized matter, the properties must inhere in the matter itself independent of the organization. Organization is simply the orderly arrangement of the particles according to the organic law. Arrangement, it is obvious, can produce no change in their nature, and hence the properties must remain when the organization is dissolved. Hence as Dr. Paine observes, in his lecture on the soul, "When man dies and is resolved into the elements of matter, his vital properties, or his vitality, continue to exist in those elements; and when the same elements become a part of the organization of inferior animals, or of plants, his vital properties will then animate or constitute the vitality of the toad or mushroom. It follows, also, upon the great plan of materialism, that the soul must observe the same rule of construction, appearing under the manifestations of instincts in animals and in plants, according to the nature of the organization. This is the old doctrine of transmigration figuring under the auspices of modern science."

In this ridiculous doctrine our chemicospiritual philosophers were anticipated by the poet Simonides in his rough satire on women. The unclassic reader may find a literal translation of this satire in the 209th Spectator, where he will see the doctrine practically applied.

2. This theory is not reconcilable with the soul's independent existence, nor, therefore, with its immortality.

If the soul depends for existence upon bodily organization, when the body dies the

soul must die with it. Death, then, as the infidel affirms, is an eternal sleep; and we may say with St. Paul, If in this life only we have hope, our lot is miserable indeed. Then are the Scriptures a cunningly-de- | vised fable; Christianity, with its sublime morals and glorious hopes, a cheat; the judgment and its attendant solemnities, merely a terrible phantasy, and heaven and hell the creatures of a distempered brain. At one fell swoop the foundations of our faith and hope are taken away. The future becomes vailed in darkness, unrelieved by a single ray, and man a riddle to himselfhis nature and destiny locked up in the mazes of unresolved and unresolvable doubt.

But we are forced to no such dire conclusions by the pushes of this materialistic psychology. Already have we seen that the analogy which it affects to trace between the processes of chemistry and those of mind does not exist. Its foundation is an unsupported conceit-shadow and not substance. In short, this pretense of science is one of those ridiculous absurdities into which learned folly sometimes stumbles, as if the Almighty had smitten it with judicial blindness to punish its self-sufficient pride.

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We deem it unnecessary in this place to frame a formal argument in favor of the soul's capability of existence independent of the body. It is sufficient to say that the theory under discussion abnegates the doctrine, and is burdened, therefore, with the consequences of this denial. It denies, indeed, that the mind, as an entity, has any existence at all. It is merely a manifestation" of the organic elements of matter. "Any one," says Professor Mülder, "who imagines that there is anything else in action (in living bodies) than a molecular force, than a chemical force, sees what does not exist." Those phenomena usually ascribed to mind are only "properties of matter”— sui generis-developed in organic beings only in these idealistic forms by the peculiar effect of oxygen acting on the food and on the brain!

us then to say that these powers after death do not exist, simply because we do not know them to exist, is equivalent to saying we do know because we do not know. It is a form of sophism which makes acknowledged ignorance the premise on which to build a certain conclusion. No mind, unless it had "lost the stirrups," like the famous knight of the windmills, would venture on the use of such logic.

But let us pursue this thought for a moment. It is not the eye which sees, but the soul sees by means of the eye. It uses the eye as an instrument of vision, just as we make use of a telescope for the same purpose. And so likewise of the limbs. With the arm we thrust at a certain object; or, if the arm is too short, we make use of a stick. But in this case the stick is no more an instrument than the arm. The power of self-motion exists in the one as much as in the other. Both are instruments employed by the soul. If a limb is lost, the tendency and the power to use it remain. We are conscious that if there, we could use it as before; that is to say, we have whatever evidence consciousness and reason afford, that the soul possesses powers independent of the body, and therefore of independent existence.

But the wisest minds tell us-aside from the revelations of Scripture-that there is no reason for believing that death is the destruction of our spiritual powers. These powers do now exist, and they seem to be independent in many things of the body; or rather, they make use of the body merely as an instrument. For

Again, there are some forms of disease in which death conquers life by gradual approaches. He saps, and mines, and advances his parallels with slow and tedious progress. The powers of vitality one after another give way as the body fails, but amid it all, the soul seems buoyed up, and even to show increasing power. Memory, reason, imagination, hope, fear, conscience, and so forth, all grow stronger as death approaches, and in the last moments sometimes flash out with a brilliancy which astonishes all who are around. Is it credible, now, we ask, that the cause which produced no effect upon these spiritual powers up to the last vital gasp, should in that gasp destroy them. Is that which is as nothing in the parts, everything in the sum? Is it compatible with reason or philosophy that the addition of negatives, no matter how numerous, should ever by any possibility make a positive?

"For aught we know," says Bishop Butler, "of ourselves, of our present life and of death, death may immediately, in the natural course of things, put us into a higher and more enlarged state of life as

our birth does; a state in which our capacities and sphere of perception and action may be much greater than at present. For as our relation to our external organs of sense renders us capable of existing in our present state of sensation, so it may be the only natural hinderance to our existing, immediately and of course, in a higher state of reflection."

3. This new philosophy is unphilosophical in presenting dogmas for faith on insufficient evidence, or evidence sufficient only for the sheerest credulity.

It is the glory of true philosophy that her tripod stands on no treacherous or uncertain basis. She is simple truth, and like her infinite source, looks abroad upon the world where conflicting interests, prejudices, and passions are contending in unceasing struggle for mastery, with the calm majesty of supreme intelligence. Indignity itself could offer no greater insult than to charge on her complicity with error, or to suppose her capable of perverting her high functions to the corruption of man, or the dishonor of God. Whenever she speaks there is light as well as voice. The attendant flash always reveals the quarter whence the thunder comes. She sees nothing more pitiful than learning stooping from its high estate, and filled with vain conceit, attempting to give currency to falsehood. But it is not a new thing under the sun, for that which is not science to claim to be science. It is an old trick for imposture to steal the livery of truth. Hypocrisy sports in the robes of piety. Perhaps we ought not to be surprised that the old Proteus of infidelity should thus attempt, through the science of physiology, to rectify the religion of the world. He is a veteran rectifier. He began this benevolent vocation even in the garden with the first pair, when they heard, "Ye shall not surely die." Proteus, a thousand times slain, has still a new life. Physiology has revealed to us much of truth respecting man's physical constitution; why should it not turn psychologist and theologian, and settle all questions pertaining to the soul and God?

We have already seen its failure to establish its main position, to wit, that the phenomena of mind are "properties of matter." Failing in this, it has nothing on which to stand. Though it still asserts its dogma, assertion is not proof. To claim it to be so in science is something

worse than false philosophy. It is a fraud. If it is science that speaks, it reveals the alarming fact that elements of depravity have entered its sacred precincts and corrupted its vision. Instead of looking with the serene and collected majesty of conscious rectitude, it leers with a sinister eye. It thrills us not with the true celestial voice. It has the accent of a fiend. In short, it is not philosophy that speaks. It is not science. It is Proteus in disguise.

4. This doctrine is hostile to human welfare by seeking to undermine the foundations of hope, and offering no substitute.

It is sound logic to test the pretensions of any doctrine by its influence upon the happiness of man in his different relations. The world in all its parts of matter and mind-its physics and metaphysics—is one grand, harmonious system, inspired by a common intelligence, and pulsating with the throbs of a common life. Skepticism, if it pleases, may shut its diminutive eye, and then assert that all is darkness. Doubt may cast stumbling-blocks in the way of willful folly, but to the eye of reason no truth beams forth from the face of nature with greater transparency than the harmonious ministration of all created things to man's spiritual and moral wellbeing. This, indeed, is the key which unlocks all mysteries. This is the finger of God, pointing us to those sublime relations which man sustains to him, and without which human life is an enigma—its incidents are accidents; and earth itself, with all its teeming forms of life, without a meaning.

We may assume, therefore, that nothing can be true which wars against the will of God, thus written on the constitution of the world. As well might we war against the laws of gravity, or the motion of the spheres. If a system of philosophy is at war with the laws of man's intellectual and moral being, it must, by consequence, be false. If it denies to God the honor of his creation, it must be false. If it saps the foundations of hope yearning after immortality, and struggling up to union again with heaven, it is at war with everything which contributes to purify and elevate humanity-is a foe to all goodness by taking away the motives to goodness, and is at war, therefore, with the laws of our highest nature. Such a system must be false.

The National Magazine.

MARCH, 1856.

EDITORIAL CORRESPONDENCE.

LETTER TO BISHOP SIMPSON.

PLAN FOR THE COLLECTION OF OUR HISTORICAL MATERIALE-MEMORIALS "HOW TO WRITE THEMRELATION OF EDUCATED MEN TO THE CONFERENCES -WHAT IS IT TO BE A TRUE CHRISTIAN MINISTER? -WHERE IS THE ITINERANCY?-HOW SHOULD WE TREAT MEN WHO ARE DEVOTED TO THE LITERARY OR EDUCATIONAL LABORS OF THE CHURCH.

REVEREND AND DEAR SIR,-I am not yet done with our denominational literature and our educated men. The subject has not received its due proportion of attention from the press of the Church. It is of no small importance to us, at this stage of our progress; to all of us it ought to be deeply interesting; and to many it appeals, with no little personal interest, as connected with their position in the denomination.

I do not wish to prolong these discussions; they are not written as substitutes for my usual editorial articles; on the contrary they have been, in most instances, thus far, extra to my ordinary amount of editorial writing per month. I have thus prepared them because, relating, as they do, to some of the greatest interests of our cause, I have deemed them worthy of a special review.

There are two topics which I could not compress into my last letter, though they properly belong there, and to which I ask attention in the present, viz., our Historical Literature and our treatment (in their relation to the conferences) of men who are devoted to the Literary or Educational labors of the Church.

morials of Methodism," are what we need, preparatory to our general history. They should combine both biographical and historical at tributes and data.

I used some emphasis in my late remarks on our historical literature. It was seen that of trans-Atlantic Methodism we have no history whatever; that of American Methodism we have some good but very limited attempts at a history-but need yet almost universally those local works which are the necessary preliminaries of a history. These preliminary works we have now only in the form of biographies; if ever we are to have a good general history of of the Church, sectional histories must be provided; and, if they are not soon provided, our most interesting materiale will be irrecoverably lost. I think that the last opportunity for saving much of that material is now passing away. The primitive Methodist ministry is almost gone; we must appeal quickly to its few remnants, or lose the aids which they can afford Methodism has done more than any other Church in laying the moral foundations of many of these states; but it has hardly had a paragraph devoted to it in our national history. Its own history must be more fully prepared before it can be appreciated. You will hear me patiently, then, on a subject of so much interest to ourselves and our children. I have thus far, in these letters, dealt in matters of fact and direct practical suggestions; allow me to do so at present.

us.

Local histories, I repeat, in the form of "MeVOL. VIII.-19

Though local, they could take in a somewhat extended area; and if our whole territory could be districted by a few good writers, and brought under this kind of historical review, the data of a general history would be provided.

Besides the historical value of such works, it may be said, as an inducement for competent hands to undertake them, that they can hardly fail to be remunerative. The area comprised might be sufficiently large to afford an ample market, independently of the general demand, which could hardly fail to be excited by a really able and interesting book of the kind. The memorials of Methodism, which are included entirely or mostly in the State of New-York, could not fail to be deeply and even romantically interesting. That field alone presents some chivalric old characters and many extraordinary incidents. A suitable pen could present them in a form and style that could not fail to render them attractive.

The same may be said of that section of the Church now comprising the New-Jersey, Philadelphia, and Baltimore Conferences. There are some veterans of our primitive ministry remaining in that region who could furnish interesting data. Is there no ready writer, and diligent searcher after historical antiquities, in these sections, who will take the hint?

Memorials of the "Old Western Conferences" would be exceedingly attractive as well as important for the history of the Church. Some of the most heroic characters of Methodism fought and triumphed in that field. It extended as a single conference from Detroit to Natchez-from the Alleghanies to beyond the Mississippi. Its early annals are interwoven with the romantic history of the first emigrations and settlement of the West. Many heroes of those chivalric days still bend on their pilgrim staffs, in various parts of the West, and could furnish valuable and even thrilling reminiscences. If they are not applied to soon, the opportunity will be lost forever. Some Memoirs, like those of Quinn, Collins, and especially Finley, would afford aid; the articles of Theophilus Arminius," in the old "Methodist Magazine," would especially help the design.

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I am not familiar enough with the Southern and South-western portions of Methodism, to be able to say how far they afford materiale for such preliminary works; but, I doubt not, that they have their romance, also-and their comparative recency would be an advantage to the writer.

It may not be amiss to indicate here a little more minutely the course to be taken by the writer of such a book, so far as I have learned it by my own experience; for I preach not without having practiced on this subject, as you personally know.

He should furnish himself, in the first place, with the bound volumes of Minutes. Having determined the period of his narrative, he should select from the minutes the names of the men whose services, within that time, have given them prominence. He should trace their

appointments from year to year-for a mere list of these will sometimes be full of significance. If they died in the itinerancy, brief biographies will be found in the obituaries of the Minutes, and will afford him some aid. If they died in a "local relation," some of their surviving fellow-laborers, or family, should be written to for information. The alphabetic list, at the end of Bangs's History, will enable him to determine which was the case. Having made out a list of these principal characters, he will find many means, not expected, of information concerning them.

Second. Asbury's Journals will assist him much, meager and unsatisfactory as they are in general. This great evangelist traversed the nation continually; nearly every part of the Church, therefore, has some record in his Journals. The historian may introduce him, year after year, and make him a principal character in the narrative.

Seventh. The local history of the prominent, and especially the primitive Churches, should be obtained. A visit to some of them will secure many details not to be obtained otherwise; where this is impossible, the interest which such societies will naturally feel to appear well in his volume, will generally induce them to respond to the author's inquiries.

Such is the outline of the" working method" of such a production. The author will find it beset with difficulties; but it will not be without its pleasures also.

Whoever undertakes such a work may expect to be fairly paid for his trouble, for it can hardly fail to sell, if brought out rightly; but he must not hesitate to risk somewhat his literary reputation, if he already has any, by the attempt. He cannot create his facts; and whatever may be his skill in arranging and picturing them, he will often find the most ostensible characters and important periods unsatisfactorily presented for want of the necessary information. I have had experience of this

trial in its most painful form. Had I not been publicly pledged to bring out my "Memorials" it is probable I should have abandoned the task in despair, and consigned the half-completed manuscript to the flames. No labor of my pen has been harder, yet none has been more unsatisfactory to myself; and I have always insisted that the critical reader should never ask himself whether I had produced a really interesting work, (for this does not always depend upon the writer,) but whether its interest is up to its material—whether the lack of interest, if it does lack it, is owing to the writer or his data.

In my own works of this kind I have only aimed to do the best I could with my resources, and thus prepare the way for some future writer to do better. I have derived no small satisfaction from the consciousness that I was saving what otherwise would be inevitably lost, though I were doing so at the risk of some loss from my own small reputation as an author.

Readiness to make this sacrifice, diligence in research, quickness in seizing and tracing the clews of his narrative and tolerable powers of portraiture-with these qualifications, the writer of such books may expect to do a good service for the Church; perpetuate his name, perhaps, as an historical authority of Methodism; and receive an adequate pecuniary reward. What an opportunity is here offered for the labors of the literary men of Methodism !

But let us turn to another topic.

I have thus far shown that both the educational institutions and the literature of the denomination present open and ample fields. We are met here, however, with an objection, viz., that these spheres, especially the former, are not appropriate to men who are divinely called to the ministry. My remarks thus far have not had exclusive reference to the ministry, but to the young literary men of the Church in general; the objection has therefore but a partial application. It is somewhat plausible, but quite novel among us, and, so far as I can judge, quite peculiar to us. It has recently been much discussed in the Southern Methodist Church. I know not, however, that it needs any elaborate attention in these more northern regions, where education is deemed something more important than a mere secular provision, and where it is so generally placed in its higher forms, at least, under the guardianship of religion.

This discrimination of preaching from instruction in general, is undoubtedly just in a formal or technical sense at least; but that the divine designation of men to a life of religious labor, in the sense of the "ministerial call," is confined to what we technically mean by preaching, I am not at all ready to admit. The original form of the commission was not merely to "preach," but also to "teach "-to "disciple;" and the great contrast between the circumstances of the Church now and in the apostolic age requires a large qualification of the original form.

The word "ministry" is the best designation of the office, because it includes all abilities and all kinds of labors which the necessities of the Church, or the opportunities of the times, may require.