was, like "wax to receive, and marble to retain," he plainly evinced those other inseparable accompaniments of true genius:

Ir were impossible to do anything like justice, observe, parenthetically, that it is matter of little wonwithin the narrow bounds of a magazine article, to der, that the offspring of such parents should possess the the life and character of the distinguished patriot, and abilities, as well as the will, or that indomitable courage brilliant genius, of whom the above portrait is a which is so essential to the champion of an enslaved faithful and striking likeness. We must, therefore, people. He received the rudiments of education in content ourselves with merely glancing at the his father's house, and, afterwards, when sent to more prominent traits that have characterized him school, his proficiency, both in classical and mathethrough all the vicsisitudes of his career, but more par-matical learning, soon rendered him the favourite of ticularly while advocating the cause of his oppressed his teacher. For, combined with a memory which and ill-fated country. Mr. Mitchell is the son of a Unitarian Clergyman of Newry, in the county of Down, and province of Ulster, and is now in the 34th year of his age, having been born in the year 1814. His father was a gentleman of considerable talent-one who possessed a deep knowledge of the world-was a shrewd observer of passing events, and It very rarely happens that boys of this exemplary who commanded the esteem and respect of all who character, do not, by exciting envy, elicit the ill-will had the pleasure of his acquaintance. His mother, of their fellow pupils. But with John Mitchell the upon the other hand, was a lady of a highly cultivated case was different; for he was looked upon, rather mind of the finest sensibility, and whose love of with a feeling of kindly admiration, than that of envy country amounted to an ardent passion. We may herea circumstance, which was doubtless to be attribu

"The wish to know-the endless thirst,
Which even by quenching is awak'd."

kindred dust!) he immediately entered upon the stormy sea of politics. It is due to justice and to his character to remark here, that he could have had no object in taking this step but the regeneration of his country, and no motive but his devoted love for it. The well known fact, that his yearly profits as a lawyer, far exceeded the salary he was to have received from Mr. Duffy as a writer for the Nation, sufficiently demonstrates that he was not actuated by the slightest feeling of selfishness in relinquishing his profession. Away, then, with the vile calumnies of those heartless enemies of Ireland, and of Freedom, who would endeavour to tarnish his fair fame, by branding him with the name of a "selfish adventurer."

ted to his sprightly temper, and mild, conciliatory | are now, to the inexpressible loss of their country, and conduct. It is a remarkable fact, that so early as the the deep regret of all who knew them, mixing with age of twelve years, he is represented to have shown a strong predeliction in favour of the study of Logic and Composition, and to have excelled in each, even the most experienced of his fellow pupils. While yet a mere boy he was taken from school, and apprenticed to an eminent solicitor in the neighbourhood, and soon afforded unmistakable evidence that he possessed forensic abilities of a very high order. No sooner did he make his debut, as a solicitor, in his native county, than he gained the confidence of the public, and consequently got immediately into very extensive practice at the same time eliciting the esteem and respect of his brethren in the profession; so that in a short time he became partner in the firm of Mitchell and Frazer, solicitors of Newry. It is worthy of remark that while thus studying the dry technicalities of law, he did not forget to cultivate his literary talents. | At his leisure hours he wrote pieces, both in prose and verse, for some of the local newspapers, but principally for the "Belfast Vindicator," which was at this time ably conducted by Mr. Gavin Duffy, the present proprietor of the "Nation" newspaper. Even then, when comparatively a novice in literature, his productions were distinguished by a degree of raciness, energy, and originality, which showed that the pen which produced them was far above the ordinary standard; and they were equally remarkable for that noble spirit of patriotism, and that bursting feeling of indignation towards the oppressors of his country, which, we need hardly say, have continued to be his ruling passion. We must here pause to refer to an event, Thus, in comparative obscurity, but with the greatwhich is far too interesting to pass unnoticed-weest devotion and energy, did he continue through all mean his marriage, at the age of seventeen, to a highly accomplished and interesting young lady-the niece of Colonel Sir William Verner, M. P.-one of the greatest Orangemen in Ireland, and of the warmest advocates for what is called " British connection," but what is, in reality, Irish thraldom. It might be expected that such a union would produce a chilling influence upon the patriotism of the young lawyer; but his amiable young wife loved him with far too much tenderness to thwart him in any sense of the term-nay, but on the contrary, she became herself, in a short time, quite as devoted as he to her country, and begat as deep a hatred to its oppressors, as is compatible with the natural softness of woman's heart.

A short time subsequent to his marriage he went to live with his beloved wife to the town of Banbridge, within nine or ten miles of Newry, where he possessed not only all the necessaries but most of the luxuries of life. In this locality he soon, by the profits of his profession alone, became master of from £500 to £700 a year. His practice was still becoming more and more extensive, while his reputation and wealth were making equal progress until the beginning of the year 1843, when Mr. Duffy had launched into existence, in the city of Dublin, that powerful advocate of the People's rights-the "Nation" newspaper, and sought to bring to bear upon it all the available Irish first class talent which it would be possible for him to command

Mr. Mitchell, notwithstanding his unprecedented success, and brilliant prospects in his profession, was one of the first to tender his services for this great and arduous undertaking, and, with Thomas Davis and Thomas McNevin as his colleagues (both of whom

But to recur to our narrative-such were the transcendent abilities of each of those three young men-Mitchell, Davis, and McNevin,-as political writers, both in prose and verse, that it was long a matter of dispute, between their mutual friends and admirers, as to which deserved the palm for superiority. But as it would be foreign to our purpose to enter upon any thing like an examination of their respective merits, we shall content ourselves by merely observing on this point, that Mr. Mitchell being always a man of retiring habits and extreme modesty, he seldom, until very recently, took any part in public speaking; but confined himself, almost exclusively, to the writing desk, and hence was known as a man of genius and talent, only to his own personal friends and acquaintances.

the political vicissitudes that marked the eventful period between the years 1843, and the present-in relation to the Repeal of the Union-to perform his duty to Mr. Duffy, and his country, unawed by power, and undaunted by threats or danger. When Mr. O'Connell and his fellow traversers were brought to trial for " sedition," and when some of the songs and articles which had been published in the " Nation" were adduced as evidence against them,-when all Ireland looked on, and awaited the issue with apprehension and dismay-when even Mr. O'Connell himself cowered before the power that stood arrayed against him, Mr. Mitchell still continued to hurl his scathing denunciations at the British Government. The same strength and force of thought, the same power of argument, and the same burning indignation towards England, pervaded every one of his articles; so that in a short time his productions were known, as soon as read, even by the most careless of the readers of the "Nation." It was, in consequence, taken for granted by the public that he was the author of the celebrated article which appeared in that journal in 1846—which, in reply to an insulting one in the London " Morning Herald," suggested to the people the possibility of destroying the railroads, and of making the iron rails available against the British troops. It will be in the recollection of most of our readers, that the government instituted a prosecution against Mr. Duffy for having published in his paper this powerfully written article; and he only escaped being ruined, by the mere accidental circumstance of the jury having failed to agree as to his guilt-there being, as well as we can now remember, nine for a verdict of guilty, while there were only three who sought his acquittal.

FAITH.

BY CAROLINE C

[ORIGINAL.]

QUACKERY AND THE

QUACKED.

Numerous as are these patent medicines, they are, in fact, almost identical in composition. They are simply purgative pills, very analogous to the colocynth or compound rhubarb pills of the druggists' shops. Now purgative medicine is sometimes useful and sometimes injurious. Any person, then, taking these pills at random is a fool. So we will say no more about patent medicines.

SOCIETY at large has been so often likened to an | beginning with that bugbear bile, and ending with individual being, that the comparison has become consumption. almost vulgar. In many points, however, the simile is undoubtedly correct. In one respect it is unquestionably so. When any person looks back upon his past life (often no very pleasant retrospect), memory pictures to him many follies which he has committed, many absurd opinions which he has entertained-the why and the wherefore of which he cannot for his life account for. He knows that he did them, but he marvels what possessed him to do so; and he knows that he believed such and such doctrines, and he is astonished at his past credulity. In like manner, when we look back upon the past career of society, either national or universal, we behold similar absurdities which it has committed, and for the commission of which it is difficult to assign a reason. To be sure many false steps and erroneous opinions, if indeed not all, evidently depend upon the same cause-an indulgence in ignorance, and its invariable accompaniment, self-conceit. It is the old tale of Phaeton and the sun. We want to drive the sun's chariot --we are determined to do it, and we don't know how.

We pass them over the more readily, because we believe that it is only the astonishing facility which the modern system of advertising gives to the sale of patent medicines that keeps them in existence. Were it not for this, we suspect that they would die a natural death, as unsuited to the age, and belonging, in fact, to a past one. Formerly cheating, and imposition of all kinds, were of an unartistlike and inartificial character. It is not so now; downright but simple lying is, at any rate, straightforward, and therefore not now in vogue. Moreover, there has been so much of it that most people are rather suspicious of improbable statements so long as they are simple statements. But wrap such up in a theory, and particularly if it be a very novel and liberal one, and they slip down the throats of the lieges as a gudgeon does down the maw of a pike. Advertised nostrums are only popular among the very ignorant. The fashionable system of quackery now-a-days are homœopathy, hydropathy, animal magnetism, and the

A history of the follies and absurdities committed even by English society, if but for the last half-dozen generations, would be one of the most instructive and entertaining books ever written. What pictures would pass before the mind of its writer!-Anti-Dissent mobs, Gordon mobs, anti-Church mobs, South Sea schemes, military expeditions, Reform riots, meet-like. ings in conventicles, assemblages of Ranters, Joanna Southcott and her milk-white ass! But the catalogue is endless. One conclusion, however, that the philosophic reader of it would come to is, that bad as were the times of our ancestors in this respect, those of ourselves are not one whit better; and for this he might console himself with the reflection that those of our descendents will be just as bad. Ignorance, and conceit, and folly, and error, have had much to do with the management of the world for five thousand long years; and if the crazy old orb keeps together as long, they bid fair to maintain their hold for five thousand long years more. The varying manner, however, in which they guide their votaries is very curious.

Thus, our forefathers lived in dread of being bewitched; they feared secret and slow poisoning; they attributed to certain charms and remedies most potent and absurd virtues; they put faith in the divining rod, believed in the transmutation of metals, and dreamed of the elixir vitæ. Their quackery in disease was different from ours. But we do quack as much, nay more, than they did. Like as in their time, the greater part of even our educated population is ignorant of the principles of medicine. It is not, however, any less conceited than in former times, and is quite determined upon dosing and treating sickness. Hence, as of old, the land is full of quacks and quackery.

The patent medicines constitute the lowest and most vulgar form of quackery. Of these, and of their wonderful properties, the newspapers are full. Most of them profess to cure every disease in the nosology,

All these systems have sprung up since societyparticularly liberal society-took that turn which produced the French Revolution (No. I., we mean), and many a less revolution. Hahnemann, the founder of homeopathy, was born in Saxony, a little past the middle of last century. He graduated at Erlangen. He was undoubtedly a man of some, although very superficial abilities; infinitely superior, however, in point of both education and intelligence, to Priestnitz or Mesmer. Unfortunately his medical education seems to have been very imperfect; and in his writings he exhibits great deficiencies in his knowledge, not only of medical literature, but, what is of greater consequence, medical principles. He scarcely seems to have ever practised, but to have employed his time partly in attending to chemistry, but principally in translating English, French, and Italian works into German. Among the rest he undertook a translation of Cullen's Materia Medica.

This work contains allusion to some experiments of Alexander upon the action of remedies upon the healthy body. Such are, indeed, the foundation of every rational system of therapeutics and of practice. And, indeed, an attention to such action of drugs upon the healthy frame is nearly as old as the hills. But there is no doubt that it had never been brought forward into sufficient prominence. Hahnemann, how ever, appears to have considered it as something altogether new; and living in an age that demanded novelty, he eagerly seized upon the idea, and determined to dose himself.

He not unnaturally commenced his experiments by taking Jesuits' bark. According to his own account,

of these minute doses, we will borrow some details from an admirable work by Dr. Wood of Edinburgh,* who remarks:

66

after he had done so he had ague. Upon this slen- a positive increase of the disease, or even death. der foundation is raised the whole structure of hom- The experience of such painful and dangerous aggraœopathy. Its illustrious founder reasoned thus: Ivation, in no case necessary to a cure, led Hahnewas well, I took Jesuits' bark and I had ague; ergo, mann to employ minute doses." the Jesuits' bark caused the ague; ergo, Jesuits' bark These minute doses constitute surely the funniest taken by a healthy individual always produces ague. contrivance in the annals of empiricism. The milBut Jesuits' bark cures ague; ergo, whatever produ- lionth of a grain is a common dose; and a trillionth, ces a disease can cure a disease; ergo, farther, nothing octillionth, even a decillionth, very usual ones. It can ever cure a disease but that which can produce it. must be remembered, however, that all the professors Ergo, all médicine is wrong, and I will found a new of homoeopathy have not the honesty of Dr. Black; system with a Latin motto and a Greek name. Si- and some of them, so far from admitting that large milia similibus curantur is the motto, and Homœo- doses administered homœopathically 66 cause an inpathy the name of my new science.' crease of disease or death," maintain that the smalThis mode of reasoning is really not exaggerated; ler the dose the greater is the strength of the drug." homœopathic writers themselves assert it. In it Hah- We are very bad hands at ciphering, and never, nemann jumps from specials to generals, and from even in our best days, had a clear idea of the multigenerals to universals, in a manner which is very ob-plication table. In order to illustrate the absurdity vious and also very amusing. But the very beginning of all, the fact that bark produces ague, happens, unfortunately to be perfectly untrue. After taking a dose of it, Hahnemann says that he had the ague. Now he either lived in an ague country, i. e., one exposed to fenny and marshy exhalations, or he lived in a country where ague was an uncommon disease. If the latter were the case it must be admitted, that as ague was unknown to him he might mistake the disease. If the former, as was, we believe, actually the case, why did not he take it like his neighbours, from exposure to miasmata? One of these two sup- "The distance between the earth and the sun is positions must have been the case, for although Jes- ninety-five millions of miles. Twenty of the homouits' bark and alkaloid quinine have been taken by opathic globules, laid side by side, extend to about an thousands of healthy individuals, both before and since inch-so that 158,400,000,000 such globules would the time of Hahnemann, it has never produced ague. reach from the earth to the sun. But when the thirIt is not, perhaps, an exaggeration to say, that it tieth dilution is practised, each grain of the drug so has been taken millions of times by people in a state divided, is divided into 100,000,000,000,000,000,000, of ordinary health. It is one of the few drugs that | 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000, 000,000, are employed by healthy people for the purpose of ex-000 parts. So that a single grain of any substance citing hunger, promoting digestion, or preventing in- in the thirtieth dilution, would extend between the fection. It is even taken in homoeopathic doses, sun and earth 1262,626,262,626,262,626,262,626,262, since many habitually use it as a tooth-powder. 626,262,626,262,626,262,626,262 separate times." Along with Dr. Wood we exclaim, "We make no comment."

Of such minute division no language can give even the slightest idea; and though calculations may express it in figures, yet they fail to convey any mental conception of its amount.

"A billionth of moments have not yet elapsed since the creation of the world; and to produce a decillionth, that number must be multiplied by a million seven separate times.

Hahnemann was, however, undeterred by any reflections of this kind. He made, or pretended to make, fresh experiments with other drugs, and soon People who can believe such absurd statements, propounded his new theory. The times were favour-are sure to attempt to explain them by still absurder able for its reception. The majority, or at any rate a hypotheses. Both Hahnemann and one of his dislarge number, of the inhabitants of middle and south ciples, Professor Dopler, have tried their hands at western Europe, looked upon every established opin- this. The erudite professor maintains, that the acion in the same light as a child looks upon its old tion of a medicine does not depend upon its bulk, but clothes when it can get new ones. Hahnemann, upon its surface; and that, when this latter is indoubtless, shared this feeling. He probably also creased, it acquires" a tremendous potency." He asthought of the advantage which his new doctrine serts, of course, that the superficies of any drug is inmight be of to him. Moreover, the notion that sim-creased by trituration and subdivision. As what folilia similibus curantar is, and was, somewhat con- lows is rather strange, we will give it in the words of genial to a muddle-brained and enthusiastic German. the homœopath Black. He says,The system obtained some degree of success, and has now a number of professors in Great Britain, as well as a number of admirers, who know nothing whatever about its true principles or professions.

Proceeding on the moderate assumption, that by each trituration the particles are reduced to the hundreth part of their previous size, we shall find the surface of a medicine, originally the cube of an inch, will become at the third trituration equal to two square miles; at the fifth, to the Austrian dominions; at the sixth, to the area of Asia and Africa together; and at the ninth, to the united superficies of the sun, the planets, and the moon."-Black's Homœopathy, p. 88.

It is evident that the administration to a sick man of a remedy which would, if he were well, cause a like disease, would aggravate the malady. The way to cure a black eye is certainly not to give it another blow. When drugs, which would cause symptoms similar to those present, are administered in appreciable quantities, it is admitted by the homoeopathists that the disease is made worse. "With large doses," says Dr. Black, "patients may be treated homœopathically, but then we may frequently expect burgh."

Hahnemann and the majority of his followers,

.

*Homœopathy Unmasked. Published by Menzies, Edin