Part 3
Suppose then we agree to call no man old till he is past sixty-three. Let us set down the names of some of the illustrious people of the world who have prolonged their days of usefulness after that age. We shall make a table of them, and begin it with those who have died at seventy,--that is to say, with those in whom the springs of life have not stood still till they have had at least seven years of old age. It will be found, however, to be far from exhaustive, and every reader may find pleasure in adding to it from his own stock of information:
_Age at Death._
70--Columbus; Lord Chatham; Petrarch; Copernicus; Spallanzani; Boerhaave; Gall. 71--Linnæus. 72--Charlemagne; Samuel Richardson; Allan Ramsey; John Locke; Necker. 73--Charles Darwin; Thorwaldsen. 74--Handel; Frederick the Great; Dr. Jenner. 75--Haydn; Dugald Stewart. 76--Bossuet. 77--Thomas Telford; Sir Joseph Banks; Lord Beaconsfield. 78--Galileo; Corneille. 79--William Harvey; Robert Stevenson; Henry Cavendish. 80--Plato; Wordsworth; Ralph Waldo Emerson; Kant; Thiers; William Cullen. 81--Buffon; Edward Young; Sir Edward Coke; Lord Palmerston. 82--Arnauld. 83--Wellington; Goethe; Victor Hugo. 84--Voltaire; Talleyrand; Sir William Herschel. 85--Cato the Wise; Newton; Benj. Franklin; Jeremy Bentham. 86--Earl Russell; Edmund Halley; Carlyle. 88--John Wesley. 89--Michael Angelo. 90--Sophocles. 99--Titian. 100--Fontenelle.
It may be said that they were exceptional in living so long, but if what the best authorities say be true, the exceptions ought to be the people who died young, and not those who prolong their lives and carry on their work till they are old. Few of us may find ourselves, like Lord Palmerston, in our greatest vigor at seventy, or be able, like Thiers, to rule France at eighty, or have any spirit for playing the author, like Goethe and Victor Hugo, when over eighty; or for playing the musician, like Handel and Haydn, when over seventy; but by good management we may do wonders.
The wisest men and the best have been conspicuous for working to the end, not taking the least advantage of the leisure to which one might think they were entitled. They have found their joy in pursuing labors which they believed useful either to themselves or to others. John Locke began a "Fourth Letter on Toleration" only a few weeks before he died, and "the few pages in the posthumous volume, ending in an unfinished sentence, seem to have exhausted his remaining strength." The fire of Galileo's genius burned to the very end. He was engaged in dictating to two of his disciples his latest theories on a favorite subject, when the slow fever seized him that brought him to the grave. Sir Edward Coke spent the last six years of his life in revising and improving the works upon which his fame now rests. John Wesley only the year before he died wrote: "I am now an old man, decayed from head to foot.... However, blessed be God! I do not slack my labors; I can preach and write still." Arnauld, one of the greatest of French theologians and philosophers, retained, says Disraeli, "the vigor of his genius and the command of his pen to his last day, and at the age of eighty-two was still the great Arnauld." It was he who, when urged in his old age to rest from his labors, exclaimed, "Rest! Shall we not have the whole of eternity to rest in?"
A healthy old age cannot be reached without the exercise of many virtues. There must have been prudence, self-denial, and temperance at the very least. According to the proverb, he that would be long an old man must begin early to be one, and the beginning early just means taking a great many precautions commonly neglected till it is too late. More people would be found completing their pilgrimage at a late date if it were not that, as a French writer puts it, "Men do not usually die; they kill themselves." It is carelessness about the most ordinary rules of healthy living.
The enjoyment of old age may be looked on then as a reward, and the aged may pride themselves on being heirs to a rich inheritance, assigned to forethought and common sense. Many years are an honor. They are an honor even in the case of the worldly, and a great deal more so when life has been regulated by motives higher than any the world can show. "The hoary head," says Solomon, "is a crown of glory;" but he adds this qualification, "if it be found in the way of righteousness." Old people form a natural aristocracy, and to be ranked among them may be recommended to all who have an ambition to close their lives well up in the world.
For a picture of an old man in this enviable state of mind take Cornaro. In his eighty-third year we find him congratulating himself that in all probability he "had still a series of years to live in health and spirits and to enjoy this beautiful world, which is indeed beautiful to those who know how to make it so." Even at ninety-five he wrote of himself as "sound and hearty, contented and cheerful." "At this age," he says, "I enjoy at once two lives: one terrestrial, which I possess in fact; the other celestial, which I possess in thought; and this thought is equal to actual enjoyment, when founded on things we are sure to attain, as I am sure to attain that celestial life, through the infinite mercy and goodness of God."
Jeremy Bentham, who lived to be eighty-five, retained to the last the fresh and cheerful temperament of a boy. John Wesley, who died when he was eighty-eight, also had a happy disposition. "I feel and grieve," he says, "but by the grace of God I fret at nothing." Goethe, who reached his eighty-third year, is another good example. Then there is Boerhaave, one of the most celebrated physicians of modern times, who held that decent mirth is the salt of life. Indeed in the case of most old people, we believe it will be found that cheerfulness is one of their leading characteristics.
* * * * *
The recent death of Mr. Beecher, who with his splendid constitution ought to have lived twenty years longer, illustrates the principles of hygiene which he blindly disregarded. For years he was threatened with the form of death that seized him, and came near a fatal attack some years ago in Chicago while delivering a lecture. Men of a strong animal nature, hearty eaters, and restless workers, making great use of the brain, are liable to such attacks. If Mr. Beecher had observed ordinary prudence, and had a little scientific magnetic treatment, he would never have had an apoplectic attack; but he was commonplace in thought. He went the old way, and died as short-sighted men die. He had read my "Anthropology," and told me he kept it in his library, but its thought did not enter into his life.
JUSTICE TO THE INDIANS.
BY JOHN BEESON.
President Grant placed them under control of the churches, making them responsible for all their Indian agents, whom the churches were to nominate. But as fraud and war have been more or less as rampant as ever, it seems that the first thing should be, to relieve the Indians from church rule, and recognize at once the Indian's inalienable right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," the same as we claim for ourselves; so long as they do not disturb the peace or violate the rights of their white neighbors, we have no right to interfere with either their religion or laws upon their reserves. It is this meddlesome injustice which makes all the trouble; it would make trouble with any other community, if another religious sect should be allowed to dominate over them in all their affairs. It is not Indian, but human, nature, to do so, the world over. Dr. Bland, editor of _The Council Fire_, says:
"I have been long and intimately acquainted with many tribes. I find that they are not savages, but the peers of white men, with great self-respect, a high sense of honor, and love of truth."
Even the civilized tribes still retain their mutual confidence. Hence, they use no locks, no bolts nor bars, when absent from their homes; a stake in the ground, about three feet from the door, is a sufficient guarantee from intrusion. It would be deemed a reflection upon neighborly honor to lock a door in the Indian Territory. I was there when they built their first prison; they now number sixty thousand, most of whom have lived there forty years, and then, they said,
"The new railroad brought so many white renegades among us that we had to build a prison for them."
I asked, "What do you do when one Indian kills another?" They answered: "We have a trial, and if the killing was without great cause, we sentence the guilty one to be killed by the near of kin to his victim; we appoint the time and the place, and we have never known an Indian to fail to come voluntarily in time for his own execution."
They believe that the Great Spirit will give all the hell or all the heaven that each deserves; that there is no possibility of escape from a just penalty and no danger of losing a deserved heaven, but to them it is unjust to hope for anything on the merits of another. H. W. Beecher said in his first lecture after his return from the Pacific Coast:
"I made special inquiry of those who are posted on Indian affairs, as to their moral status, and was always told that when fairly treated they are quite reliable."
Gen. Crookes said of the Apaches, that while they were protected on their reserves from outside aggression they were as well behaved and orderly as any community of people in the United States.
It is true, they killed Generals Canby and Custer, but the first had, contrary to preliminary agreement, moved his soldiers twenty-five miles, and placed them in two companies on each side of the place where the treaty was to be made. The first demand of the Modoc chief was, to take back the soldiers, and it was not until a long delay, and a firm refusal on the part of Canby, that the Modoc chief fired the fatal shot.
And as for Custer and his men, they fell while ignobly, and without right or authority, invading the peaceful home of Sitting Bull and his people.
General Harney says:
"I have lived fifty years on the frontier, and I have never known an Indian war in which they were not in the right."
Dr. McLaughlin said:
"I have been fifty-three years an Indian trader, and more than fifty years superintendent of the Hudson Bay Fur Company, and in all that time, I have never seen an occasion to shed the blood of an Indian. The American people suppose that their revenge is proof of savagery. But that is a mistake. It is their sense of justice, and whatever they do is but an echo of what has been done to them. They believe as Moses taught, blood for blood, life for life."
Gen. Fremont said:
"I lived two years among the Indians with only one white woman, and was never more kindly treated. I lost nothing, although all I had was accessible to them."
Surely, testimony like this, in connection with their healing magnetism so freely given to Spiritualism, should awaken sympathy if not gratitude in their behalf.--_New Thought_.
_Talent, Oregon_, Jan. 19, 1887.
MISCELLANEOUS INTELLIGENCE.
ANATOMY OF THE BRAIN.--Anatomy is considered the driest and most difficult of biological studies, but a careful attention to our description of the brain will show that it is very intelligible. After we get through with the anatomy, the description of organs and their functions is simple and practical. Every one should understand the outlines of cerebral anatomy, and then he can discuss the subject with imperfectly educated physicians, and show them their errors.
MESMERIC CURES of countless variety and marvelous success have occurred all through the present century. But when not effected by distinguished physicians, they have generally been ignored by the press, and their knowledge confined to a very narrow circle. Now, however, since eminent physicians at Paris are engaged, and the word _hypnotism_ is substituted for mesmerism and magnetism, their performances are proclaimed by journalists and even by the medical press. The following is one of the latest reports. The reader will observe that when the medical faculty after a prolonged opposition yield to any new idea, they endeavor to ignore entirely the pioneers by whom the discoveries were made, and by whom an interest was created in the subject while the faculty were hostile. It will probably not be long before they adopt the leading ideas of homoeopathy and endeavor to obliterate the memory of Hahnemann.
"Hypnotism has been employed with considerable success in Paris for some time past in the treatment of hysterical diseases, by Charcot and others, but the case recently reported by M. Clovis Hugues, in France, is the most extraordinary application so far on record. A young lady of twenty was attacked six months ago with a nervous ailment which completely derived her of her voice. Electricity was tried, with a certain amount of success, but after a time it lost its effect and was abandoned in despair. As a last resort, her friends applied to Dr. Berillon, the hypnotic specialist. After consultation with Dr. Charcot, he undertook the cure. The girl was thrown into a mesmeric trance by the usual means, and Dr. Berillon suggested that she should say on waking, 'I am twenty.' On opening her eyes she uttered these words without the least effort. On the second day the suggestion was that she should converse with Dr. Berillon, and this she also did, but could talk with no one else. On the third day the doctor commanded her to talk with any one and at any time that she chose. She has been able to use her tongue freely ever since."
MEDICAL DESPOTISM.--The infamous law juggled through the Legislature of Iowa, which deprives every citizen of the right of relieving her neighbor of disease without the authority of a diploma, and renders Christian benevolence a crime, does not produce much effect. The natural healers pay no respect to it. In every prosecution under the law so far, the attempt to enforce the law has been defeated. Juries are unwilling to aid an ignorant Legislature in trampling on the Divine law and the principles of American constitutions.
THE DANGEROUS CLASSES.--The existence of considerable classes, chiefly of foreigners, who are contemplating murder and rapine, should interest every good citizen. At Cincinnati on the 6th of March, it is said, "The institution of the Paris commune in 1848 and 1871 was celebrated tonight by the Cincinnati anarchists. It was the most revolutionary gathering ever seen in this city, and the speech of Mrs. Lucy E. Parsons, wife of the condemned anarchist, was of a very inflammatory character. The hall was crowded with men and women who drank beer at tables. It was a motley and dangerous looking throng. On the walls were mottoes with red borders, and the entire hall was profusely decorated with large red flags. There wasn't an American flag in the hall, and above the stage was a picture of the condemned anarchists. Several pictures of notorious Anarchists who have been beheaded for murder and riot were conspicuously displayed. The band played no national airs except the 'Marseillaise,' and everything said and done showed a bitter hatred of American institutions. Mrs. Parsons gave a history of the Paris commune of 1871, and said the mistake made was in showing any mercy to capitalists. Her remarks were loudly applauded, although a majority of her audience couldn't understand one word of English. Dancing followed the speeches, and was kept up all night."
ARBITRATION.--In the Sinaloa colony, "Any disputes that arise between colonists will be settled by arbitration. There will be one lawyer to protect the interests of the corporation in dealings with outside
## parties." This is a great step in advance. When a true civilization
arrives, arbitration will supersede courts, and psychometry will assist in making it perfect.
CRITICISM ON THE CHURCH.--If any readers of the JOURNAL think its criticisms on the church have been too harsh, because their own acquaintance is confined to worthy professors of the present time, I would call their attention to the unquestionable statements of Hallam, Guizot, and Draper, as follows:
"With respect to the last, the grandest of all human undertakings (i. e., the circumnavigation of the earth), it is to be remembered that Catholicism had irrevocably committed itself to the dogma of a flat earth, with the sky as a floor of heaven, and hell in the under world."--_Draper's Conflict_, p. 294.
"Persecution for religious heterodoxy, in all its degrees, was in the sixteenth century the principle as well as the practice of every church."--_Hallam's Middle Ages_, vol. 2, p. 48.
"When any step was taken to establish a system of permanent institutions, which might effectually protect liberty from the invasions of power in general, _the church always ranged herself on the side of despotism_."--_Guizot's History of Civilization in Europe_, p. 154.
"There was fighting and fighting between the old and new school, and all on a question that would make a crab laugh,--questions that were hypercritical and infinite, and about which everybody knew nothing at all, and they thought they knew as well as God. Questions were talked of with positiveness, and argued; and, when I look back upon them, I cannot help thinking they were no better than the contentions of children around the cradle. But all this gave me great repulsion for dogmatic theology, and it is a repulsion which I have not got over, and the present prospects are that I never shall."--_Henry Ward Beecher_.
EARTHQUAKES AND PREDICTIONS.--Professor Rudolf Falb, of Vienna, it is reported, predicted to an hour the earthquakes which have occurred in France and Italy.
"Writing in the Austrian papers some days ago, he pointed out that the annular eclipse of the sun, which commenced on Tuesday morning at 6.41 Greenwich time, was central at 9.13 P. M., and ended on the earth generally at twenty-five minutes past midnight on Wednesday morning, was likely to be accompanied with strong atmospheric and seismic disturbances. The learned physicist has gained great reputation by previous similar forecasts. His first and great success was the foretelling the destructive shock at Belluno, on June 29, 1873. Nearly the whole of Northern Italy was affected, and upwards of fifty lives were lost. Very shortly afterwards he gave warning of the probability of an eruption of Etna, which followed at the time anticipated in 1874."--_London Echo_.
"John S. Newberry, professor of geology and paleontology at Columbia College, being the American authority upon all matters pertaining to the crust of the earth, was naturally interested in the earthquake that visited Long Island on Wednesday. He derides the idea that the local seismic disturbance has any connection with the recent occurrences at Mentone, as the shocks were too far apart, and, if connected, should have been felt within eight hours of each other, whereas there was several days' difference. His theory, which is amply sustained by observation, is that an earthquake is a movement caused by a shrinking, from loss of heat, of the interior of the earth and the crushing together and displacement of the rigid exterior as it accommodates itself to this contraction. It has been noticed that the earth is shaken along the Alleghany chain nearly every year. It is impossible to predict a recurrence of the shocks, but it is quite probable they will recur. There is a record of 231 earthquakes in the New England States between the years 1638 and 1869."--_Brooklyn Eagle_.
## CHAPTER II--STRUCTURE OF THE BRAIN.
Man a triple being--Materialists and illusionists misconceive him--Relation of the soul to the brain and body--The nervous system; illustration--Embryonic condition--Anatomical descriptions unsatisfactory and the phrenological school incorrect--Exterior view of the brain in the head, illustrated and described--The cerebrum, cerebellum, and tentorium--Interior view of the base of the skull--Bones of the head illustrated--Division of the brain into lobes and convolutions, with illustration--Frontal, middle, parietal, tempero-sphenoidal, and occipital--Anatomical plan or grouping of convolutions differs from their actual appearance--View of the superior surface illustrated--Difference between the irregular convolutions and the angular maps--View of the inferior surface of the brain--Illustration and description of the parts--Interior view of section on the median line--Divided and undivided surfaces-_Corpus callosum_ explained--The two brains and their diagonal relations to the body--Penetrating and describing the lateral ventricles--The serum in the brain--Variations of serum and blood--Variations in hydrocephalus and insanity--Our power to modify the brain and change our destiny--Power of education--Responsibility of society--The lateral ventricles the centre of the brain--Base of the ventricles, the great inferior ganglia of the brain, _corpora striata_, and _thalami_--Their radiating fibres inclosing a cavity--The _thalami_ and their commissure and third ventricle--The _medulla oblongata_, cerebellum, and _arbor vitæ_--The _pons Varolii_ and crura of the brain--the _corpora quadrigemina_, pineal gland, fourth ventricle, and _calamus scriptorius_.
Man is essentially a triple organization, consisting of the permanent psychic being, intangible to our external senses, but nevertheless so distinctly recognized internally by consciousness and externally or in others, by intuition and understanding, that the psychic is as well understood and known as the physical being. This being is the eternal man--the material body being its temporary associate.
The physical being, or material form, consists of the portion directly and entirely occupied by the psychic existence--which is called the brain or encephalon, and is in life also beyond the reach of our senses in the interior of the cranium--and the non-psychic structure, the body, which, though not the residence of the soul, has so intimate and complete a connection with the entire brain that during active life it feels as if it were the actual residence of the soul, so far as sensation and action are concerned.
The soul, or psychic being, has external and internal perceptions (for which it has cerebral organs). When the former predominate too greatly, the human body and all external objects are realized most vividly, and the reality of psychic life is not so well realized or understood. Hence persons so organized are disposed to materialism, and either doubt the existence of their psychic being, or are indifferent to it.
On the other hand, those in whom the interior faculties predominate too greatly vividly realize their psychic life, but have more vague and feeble conceptions of material objects, including their own bodies, and attach undue importance to the imaginary and subjective in preference to the objective. The materialists and the illusionists, however, are not entirely composed of these two classes of subjective and objective thinkers. The majority consists of persons of moderate reasoning capacity, who simply follow their leaders.
In making a critical distinction between the psycho-organic brain and non-psychic body, the former may be confined strictly within the cranium, leaving the exterior portions of the head as a part of the non-psychic body; but as they are more intimately associated with the brain than any part below the neck, this distinction is not important; and if the whole head, as the environment of the psychic brain, be grouped with it, it may not lead to any material error. The brain is intimately associated with the entire physical person by twelve pairs of cranial or cerebral nerves, and by the spinal cord, which descends from the base of the brain through a great foramen or opening midway between the ears, and while passing down the spinal column gives off thirty pairs of nerves.