are.

accordance with the Divine laws, and to rejoice in gratitude at all times when we receive benefits from their influence. The following exposition of the philosophy of accidents appears to be able and sound. "There is a prejudice," says Mr Brown Galloway, "in the minds of many men against the admission of a Providence superintending the unforeseen accidents or coincidences of events. We may hope partly to remove it by explaining what accidents or coincidences Now an accident, properly so called, is an event which forms no part of some certain train of causes and effects designed or contemplated by us, but enters into it from without, and affects its future progress either by impeding or by furthering it. When it obstructs or impedes, it is called an accident, but when it is favourable it is more generally named a coincidence. The majority of men, looking no farther than that train of causes and effects which they are engaged about, consider accidents as events altogether without causes. But a thinking man will readily perceive that the accidental event is part of another train of causes and effects, which impinges upon the train he was contemplating..

"There are innumerable co-existent trains of causes and effects going on in the world. These, though they have distinct and independent courses, yet are frequently meeting, uniting, or crossing one another; so that, if we may be allowed the expression, they are wrought together in a sort of network. Accidents are truly the meetings or crossings of two or more trains of causes and effects, and are consequently of much importance in the Divine economy; for they are thus the knots or nexuses which unite the whole system of events together. And shall we suppose that God, who has ordered the separate trains of causes and effects, has not contemplated and designed their nexuses, except in those few cases where human wisdom has foreseen? Impossible. History abounds with instances of the great importance of those nexuses, and common life affords many more.'

These remarks apply chiefly to the combined action of the physical laws; and I proceed to adduce instances of the

* Philosophy and Religion, with their Mutual Bearings, by William Brown Galloway, A.M., p. 222. London: Smith, Elder, and Co., 1837. This is an able work, but owing to the want of mental philosophy as its basis it is not practical, and has not commanded that attention which otherwise it would have merited.

combined action of the organic and moral, and also of the moral and physical laws.

The defective administration of justice is a copious source of human suffering in all countries; yet it is surprising how rude are the arrangements still in use, even in free and enlightened countries, for accomplishing this important end.

A jury in a civil cause in Edinburgh consists of twelve men, eight or ten of whom are frequently summoned from the country, within a distance of twenty or thirty miles round the capital. Several of these individuals probably hold the plough, wield the hammer or the hatchet, or carry on some other useful and respectable but laborious occupation, for six days in the week. Their muscular systems are in constant exercise, and their intellectual faculties are rarely called on for any great exertion. They are not accustomed to reading beyond the Bible and a weekly newspaper; they are still less in the habit of deep reflection; and in general they live much in the open air.

In this condition they are placed in a jury-box at ten o'clock in the morning, after having travelled probably from seven to twenty-five miles to reach the court: counsel address long speeches to them; numerous witnesses are examined; and the cause is branched out into complicated details of fact, and wiredrawn distinctions in argument. The court, until lately, was a small and ill-ventilated apartment, and in consequence it was generally crowded and over-heated. Without being allowed to breathe fresh air, or to take exercise or food, they were confined to their seats till eight or ten in the evening, when they retired to return a verdict, by which they might dispose of thousands of pounds, and in which they were required to be unanimous. Recently the court-house has been enlarged and ventilated, and now nine may give the verdict; but in other respects matters continue in the condition here described.

Here, then, is a tissue of errors which could not exist for a day if the natural laws were generally understood. In the first place, the daily habits and occupations of such jurors render their brains inactive, and their intellects consequently incapable of attending to, and comprehending, complicated cases of fact and argument. Secondly, their memories cannot retain the facts, while their skill in penmanship and literature is not sufficient to enable them to take notes; and their reflecting faculties are not capable of

generalising. Their education and daily pursuits, therefore, do not furnish them with power of mental action, and principles of thinking, sufficient to enable them to unravel the web of intricacies presented to their understandings. Thirdly, protracted confinement in a sedentary position operates injuriously on even vivacious temperaments :-on such men as those in question, it has a tenfold effect in lowering the action of the brain and inducing mental incapacity, because it is diametrically opposed to their usual habits. Add to these considerations, that occasionally a jury trial lasts two, three, or even four days, each of which presents a repetition of the circumstances here described; and then the reader may judge whether such jurors are the fittest instruments, and in the best condition, for disposing of the fortunes of a people who boast of their love of justice, and of their admirable institutions for obtaining it.

The influence of the bodily condition of a human being on his mental capacity seems never to have entered the imaginations of our legislators as a matter of importance in the administration of justice. In the Circuit Courts of Scotland, the judges frequently sit for several days in succession in a crowded apartment, intently engaged in business, from ten o'clock in the morning till eight, ten, or twelve at night, without any extensive intermission or exercise. They go to their hotel at these late hours, dine, take wine, retire to bed, and next morning resume their seats on the bench. By the laws of nature, which never cease to operate, the effect of this conduct is to impair the vigour of the moral and intellectual organs, and by constraint, want of exercise, and obstruction of the bodily functions, to irritate and exalt the activity of the animal organs; so that, at the close of a circuit, even the strongest and most estimable and gifted men are physically deteriorated, and mentally incapacitated for the distribution of justice, compared with themselves when they began their labours. It is accordingly observed that, in proportion as a long and heavy session in circuit advances, irritability, impatience, and intellectual obscuration, appear in the judges. The accused who go to trial first, therefore, have a far higher chance of obtaining justice than those who appear last on the roll.

In these instances there are evident infringements of the organic and moral laws; and the combined result is the maladministration of justice, of which the country so loudly

complains. The proper remedies will be found in educating the people more effectually, in training them to the exercise of their mental faculties, and in observing the organic laws in the structure of court-rooms, and in the proceedings that take place within them.

Another example of the combined operation of the natural laws is afforded by the great fires which occurred in Edinburgh in November 1824, when the Parliament Square and a part of the High Street were consumed. That calamity may be viewed in the following light:-The Creator constituted England and Scotland with such qualities, and placed them in such relationship, that the inhabitants of both kingdoms would be most happy in pursuing their separate vocations, and acting towards each other, under the supremacy of the moral sentiments. We have lived to see this practised, and to reap the reward. But the ancestors of the two nations did not believe in the moral government of the world, and they preferred to act according to the suggestions of the propensities; that is to say, they waged furious wars, and committed wasting devastations on each other's properties and lives. It is obvious from history that the two nations were equally ferocious, and delighted equally in each other's calamities. This was clearly a violent infringement of the moral law; and one effect of it was to render the possession of a stronghold an object of paramount importance. The hill on which the Old Town of Edinburgh is built was naturally surrounded by marshes, and presented a perpendicular front to the west, capable of being crowned with a castle. It was appropriated, and the metropolis of Scotland was founded there, obviously under the inspiration of the animal and intellectual faculties. It was fenced round with ramparts, built to exclude the fierce warriors who then inhabited the country lying south of the Tweed, and also to protect the inhabitants from the feudal banditti who infested their own soil. The space within the walls, however, was limited and narrow; the attractions to the spot were numerous; and to make the most of it, our ancestors erected the enormous masses of high and crowded buildings which now compose the High Street and the wynds or alleys on its two sides. These abodes, moreover, were constructed, to a great extent, of timber; for not only the joists and floors, but the partitions between the rooms, were made of massive wood.

Our ancestors did all this in the perfect knowledge of the physical law, that ignited wood not only is consumed itself, but envelopes in inevitable destruction every combustible object within its influence. Further, their successors, even when the necessity for close building had ceased, persevered in the original error; and, though well knowing that every year added to the age of these fabrics increased their liability to burn, they not only allowed them to be occupied as shops filled with spirituous liquors and other highly inflammable materials, but let out the upper floors for brothels -introducing thereby into the heart of this magazine of combustibles the most reckless and immoral of mankind. The consummation was two tremendous fires in November 1824 (the one originating in a whisky-cellar, and the other in a garret-brothel), which consumed the Parliament Square and a portion of the High Street, destroying property to the extent of many thousands of pounds, and spreading misery and ruin over a considerable part of the population of the city. Wonder, consternation, and awe, were forcibly excited at the vastness of the calamity; and in the sermons that were preached, and the dissertations that were written upon it, much was said of the inscrutable ways of Providence, which sent such visitations on the people, enveloping the innocent and the guilty in one common whirlwind of ruin.

According to the exposition of the ways of Providence which I have ventured to give, there was nothing wonderful, nothing vengeful, nothing arbitrary, in the whole occurrence. The only reason for surprise was, that it did not take place generations before. The necessity for these fabrics originated in gross violations of the moral law; they were constructed in contempt of the physical law; and latterly the moral law was set at defiance, by placing in them inhabitants abandoned to the worst habits of recklessness and intoxication. The Creator had bestowed on men faculties to perceive all this, and to avoid the calamity, whenever they chose to exert them; and the destruction that ensued was the punishment of following the propensities, in preference to the dictates of intellect and morality. The object of the destruction, as a natural event, was to lead men to avoid repetition of the offences: but the principles of the Divine government are not yet comprehended. Acquisitiveness whispers that more money may be made of houses consisting of five or six floors under one roof, than of houses consisting of only