as to attend always to the main proposition or propositions, on which the whole theory rests; and when this happens, it is apt to glide insensibly into truth and nature, not aware that this adoption of truth is either subversive of the doctrine which it seeks to establish, or at least, that it leads to conclusions which must necessarily expose the fallacy on which it rests. Mr. Knight, for whose correct taste and critical discrimination I profess the highest respect, overturns the entire of his theory on the Source of Tragic Pleasures, by an admission which he unwarily made in commenting on a passage in Aristotle. "In tragedy," he says, "it is not the actual distress, but the motives for which it is endured, the exertions which it calls forth, and the sentiments of heroism, fortitude, constancy, or tenderness, which it, in consequence, displays, that produce the interest, and awaken all the exquisite and delightful thrills of sympathy." Here, then, we find many other sources of Tragic Pleasure, besides the exertion or energy which distress calls forth; and, what is completely subversive of all that he has written on the subject, these sources lead us to innumerable others, in which no trace of energy can be discovered. If, according to himself, sentiments of heroism, fortitude, constancy, and tenderness, be sources of Tragic Pleasure, so must also sentiments of generosity, pity, resignation, mildness, sensibility, sympathy, sublimity, fear, hope, joy, sorrow, and all the passions that ever agitated the human breast. Instead, then, of confining Tragic Pleasures to the display of strong energies, innumerable other sources are disclosed to us, from which this pleasure may proceed, in many of which,

the characteristic feature is absence of energy, as fear, mildness, sorrow, resignation, and all the passive affections of the human breast. Besides, if it be not the actual distress that moves us, but the motives for which it is endured, what energy can there be in motives? All motives have their existence independent of us. If I go and fight the enemies of my country, my motive for doing so is to defend its rights and liberties against foreign usurpation; but this motive has its existence independent of me, and would continue to exist whether I fought or staid at home. I was not accessary to the attempt made on the liberties of my country: it was not brought about by my contrivance; and therefore I had no concern in it; but still it is the motive that leads me to action, and it would be a motive, even though I neglected to perform the duty which it required at my hands. There can be no energy, then, in motives, because there is nothing in them in which we can claim a share, and, consequently, the interest which they excite cannot be ascribed to energy. Mr. Knight himself admits this truth afterwards, not reflecting, that it was in direct opposition to what he here asserts. His theory, as we have already seen, consists in deriving all our Tragic Pleasures from the display of strong energies or exertions; and to do this more effectually, he tells us, that the interest excited in many of the scenes in Shylock, does not arise from his hatred or malignity, but the energies which resulted from them. The pleasure, then, does not arise from the cause, but from the effect; though we are told above, that it is not the effect, but the cause or motives that awaken our sympathies. A similar contradiction oc

curs where Mr. Knight traces the pleasure we derive from witnessing executions, not to the sufferings endured, in which, he says, "we take no delight, but to the heroism and gallantry of the person executed.' How can we reconcile this to the assertion, that "it is not the actual distress, but the motives for which it is endured, that produce the interest." At one time we are told it is the motive that affects us; at another, that it is the heroism and energy elicited by the motive. Such are the inconsistencies that necessarily cling to all erroneous theories.

I know of no theory that can account for the interest excited by Lear's madness. It is not, surely, the energy which it displays that produces this interest, for it was the result of weakness, not of energy. Had Lear more fortitude of mind to endure his misfortunes, he would not have yielded to lunacy, and, therefore the most strained reasoning cannot associate it with energy or heroism of mind. Yet, it is infinitely more interesting than the heroism of Macbeth, and even in the latter, it is not his courage or heroism that affects us at all, but the strong agitation of mind to which he was constantly a victim. Is there any thing in all Macbeth that excites a deeper interest than the following celebrated passage?

Is this a dagger which I see before me,

The handle towards my hand? Come let me clutch thee:

I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.

Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible

To feeling as to sight? Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind; a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain ?
I see thee yet in form as palpable

As this which now I draw.

Thou marshallest me the way that I was going;
And such an instrument I was to use.

And on thy blade and dudgeon, gouts of blood,
Which was not so before.

Here the whole interest is excited by the fears and terrors of Macbeth; for how attribute energy to a man whose fears create images or instruments of destruction, that existed only in his own mind. Yet these fears are more interesting to us than the boldest display of personal courage and mental energy, or the noblest descriptions of the "dignity of human nature."

Philosophical Inquiry into the Source of Tragic
Pleasure, by M. McDermott.

THE PHYSICIAN.

ON CORPULENCE.

I HAVE Somewhere met with the observation, that there are persons in imaginary health who are not so deserving of ridicule as the Malades imaginaires, at whose expense that satirist of physicians, Molière, made himself so merry; but for which the vengeance of Hygæa overtook him, since he was seized, during the representation of this celebrated comedy, with an illness which afterwards carried him off. These healthy persons in their own imagination are the plethoric and corpulent, who take weight for the standard of health,

and look with pity on the spare and meagre. It is to such great folks that I address this paper, and I claim no thanks from them if I should be so fortunate as to convince them of their error. I am well aware how gratifying it is to retain errors which persuade us that we are happy; for this very notion confers happiness. I know what pleasure is felt by one who is congratulated on the portliness of his corporation, and the goodly rubicundity of his visage. It is this pleasure of the corpulent that I intend to spoil. I shall prove to them that they are diseased; and, instead of confirming them in the idea that they are pictures of health, I will strike a terror into them that shall penetrate to the very centre of their sub-pectoral protuberances. I can easily foresee how they will reward me for my pains, and I shall, therefore, reply to them in the words of the culprit, who, when the judge had commented on the heinousness of his crime, and concluded with asking him, what he thought he had deserved by it-coolly answered, "Oh! 'tis not worth mentioning-I desire nothing for it!"

When the blood contains too many nutricious and oily particles, these transpire by innumerable, almost invisible pores, through the arteries and veins, and collect in the cellular substance, which covers nearly the whole body. Here they form vesicles, or small bags of fat, which become fuller and larger the more of this superabundant nutritious matter is conducted to them. In this manner the otherwise empty interstices of the body are filled up, and it acquires rotundity and corpulence. The fat deposited in these interstices has all the properties of an oil, when it appears in a