Practical Essays | Page 4

as a model.
Lord Derby and Lord Sherbrooke on the extension of printing.
Defects of the present system becoming more apparent.
* * * * *
Notes and References in connection with Essay VIII. on Subscription
First imposition of Tests after the English Reformation.
Dean Milman's speech in favour of total abolition of Tests.
Tests in Scotland: Mr. Taylor Innes on the "Law of Creeds".
Resumption of Subscription in the English Presbyterian Church.
Other English Dissenting Churches.
Presbyterian Church in the United States.
French Protestant Church--its two divisions.

Switzerland:--Canton of Valid.
Independent Evangelical Church of Neuchatel.
National Protestant Church of Geneva.
Free Church of Geneva. Germanic Switzerland.
Hungarian Reformed Church.
Germany:--Recent prosecutions for heresy.
Holland:--Calvinists and Modern School.
* * * * *
I.
COMMON ERRORS ON THE MIND.[1]
On the prevailing errors on the mind, proposed to be considered in this
paper, some relate to the Feelings, others to the Will.
In regard to Mind as a whole, there are still to be found among us some
remnants of a mistake, once universally prevalent and deeply rooted,
namely, the opinion that mind is not only a different fact from
body--which is true, and a vital and fundamental truth--but is to a
greater or less extent independent of the body. In former times, the
remark seldom occurred to any one, unless obtruded by some extreme
instance, that to work the mind is also to work a number of bodily
organs; that not a feeling can arise, not a thought can pass, without a set
of concurring bodily processes. At the present day, however, this
doctrine is very generally preached by men of science. The improved
treatment of the insane has been one consequence of its reception. The
husbanding of mental power, through a bodily régime, is a no less
important application. Instead of supposing that mind is something
indefinite, elastic, inexhaustible,--a sort of perpetual motion, or
magician's bottle, all expenditure, and no supply,--we now find that
every single throb of pleasure, every smart of pain, every purpose,

thought, argument, imagination, must have its fixed quota of oxygen,
carbon, and other materials, combined and transformed in certain
physical organs. And, as the possible extent of physical transformation
in each person's framework is limited in amount, the forces resulting
cannot be directed to one purpose without being lost for other purposes.
If an extra share passes to the muscles, there is less for the nerves; if the
cerebral functions are pushed to excess, other functions have to be
correspondingly abated. In several of the prevailing opinions about to
be criticised, failure to recognise this cardinal truth is the prime source
of mistake.
* * * * *
To begin with the FEELINGS.
I. We shall first consider an advice or prescription repeatedly put forth,
not merely by the unthinking mass, but by men of high repute: it is, that
with a view to happiness, to virtue, and to the accomplishment of great
designs, we should all be cheerful, light-hearted, gay.
I quote a passage from the writings of one of the Apostolic Fathers, the
Pastor of Hermas, as given in Dr. Donaldson's abstract:--
"Command tenth affirms that sadness is the sister of doubt, mistrust,
and wrath; that it is worse than all other spirits, and grieves the Holy
Spirit. It is therefore to be completely driven away, and, instead of it,
we are to put on cheerfulness, which is pleasing to God. 'Every cheerful
man works well, and always thinks those things which are good, and
despises sadness. The sad man, on the other hand, is always bad.'"[2]
[FALLACY OF PRESCRIBING CHEERFULNESS.]
Dugald Stewart inculcates Good-humour as a means of happiness and
virtue; his language implying that the quality is one within our power to
appropriate.
In Mr. Smiles's work entitled "Self-Help," we find an analogous strain
of remarks:--

"To wait patiently, however, man must work cheerfully. Cheerfulness
is an excellent working quality, imparting great elasticity to the
character. As a Bishop has said, 'Temper is nine-tenths of Christianity,'
so are cheerfulness and diligence [a considerable make-weight]
nine-tenths of practical wisdom."
Sir Arthur Helps, in those essays of his, combining profound
observation with strong genial sympathies and the highest charms of
style, repeatedly adverts to the dulness, the want of sunny light-hearted
enjoyment of the English temperament, and, on one occasion, piquantly
quotes the remark of Froissart on our Saxon progenitors: "They took
their pleasures sadly, as was their fashion; _ils se divertirent moult
tristement à la mode de leur pays_"
There is no dispute as to the value or the desirableness of this
accomplishment. Hume, in his "Life," says of himself, "he was ever
disposed to see the favourable more than the unfavourable side of
things; a turn of mind which it is more happy to possess than to be born
to an estate