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A NOTE to the fecond paragraph in p. 98, Vol. 1.

Dr. Johnstone, in his Effay on the ganglions of the nerves, has endeavoured to fhew that they are the fources of all the nerves which go to organs that are strictly automatic, as the heart, &c. and the checks or caufes that hinder our volitions from extending to them.

The ganglions (fays he), refpecting their ftructure, may justly be confidered as little brains, or germs of the nerves detached from them, confifting of a mixture of cortical and nervous medullary substance, nourished by feveral fmall blood-veffels, in which various nervous filaments are collected, and in them lofe their rectilinear parallel direction, fo that a new nervous organization probably takes place in them.

Refpecting their ufes, ganglions feem the fources, or immediate origins, of the nerves fent to organs moved involuntarily, and probably the check or caufe which hinders our volitions from extending to them.

Ganglions feem analogous to the brain in their office, fubordinate fprings and refervoirs of nervous power; they feem capable of difpenfing it long after all communication with the brain is cut off. And though they ultimately depend on the brain for its emanations, it appears from facts that that dependance is far from being immediate and inftantaneous.

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From the ganglions ferving brains, it is that the vital organs derive their nervous power, and continue to move during fleep, &c.

In a word, ganglions limit the exercife of the mind's authority in the animal economy, and put it out of our power by a fingle volition to ftop the motions of our heart, and in one capricious moment irrevocably to end our lives.

UNIVERSITY
CALIFORNIA

A SKETCH

OF THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF

Dr. HARTLEY.

DOCTOR DAVID HARTLEY was born on the 30th of Auguft, 1705. He was the son of a very worthy and refpectable clergyman, vicar of Armley, in the county of York. He received the first rudiments of inftruction at a private school, and his academical education at Cambridge. He was admitted at Jesus' College at the age of fifteen years, and was afterwards elected a fellow of that fociety. He was originally intended for the church, and proceeded for fome time in his thoughts and studies towards that object: but upon a clofer

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clofer confideration of the conditions attached to the clerical profeffion, he was reftrained by fome fcruples which made him reluctant to fubfcribe the thirty-nine articles. In confequence of these scruples he became difqualified for the pursuit of his first plan of devoting himself to the perfonal functions and service of the church.

However he ftill continued to the end of his life a well affected member of the church of England, approving of its practical doctrines and conforming to its public worship. As the church of England maintains all the useful and practical doctrines of Chriftian morality, he did not think it neceffary to feparate himself from its communion on account of fome contefted articles of fpeculative and abftrufe opinion. He was a Catholic Chriftian in the most extenfive and

liberal fenfe of that term. On the subject of religious controverfy he has left the following teftimony of his fentiments, in the laft fection of propofition eighty-eight on Religious Knowledge; viz. "The great dif"ferences of opinion and contentions which

happen on religious matters. are plainly "owing to the violence of men's paffions "more than to any other caufe. When religion

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ligion has had its due effect in restraining "these, and begetting true candour, we may "expect a unity of opinion both in religious "and other matters, as far as is neceffary "for useful and practical purposes."

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Though his talents were very general, yet undoubtedly his pre-eminent faculties were formed for the moral and religious fciences. These talents difplayed themselves in the earliest parts of life with so much diftinction, as could not fail to hold out to his ambition a future career of honest fame, in the fervice of the national church, if he could have complied with the conditions, confiftently with the fatisfaction of his own mind. But he had at all times a most scrupulous and difinterefted mind, which difpofed him in every part of his life, and under all circumftances, to adhere firmly to thofe principles which appeared to him to form the ftrict and confcientious line of

moral duty. It proceeded therefore from the most serious fcruples, irresistibly impreffed upon his mind, that he relinquished the profeffion of his firft choice, which may properly be called the prerogative profeffion of moral and religious philofophy.

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In confequence of this determination he applied his talents and ftudies to the medical profeffion, in which he foon became equally and in the firft degree eminent for fkill, integrity, and charitable compaffion. His mind was formed to benevolence and

univerfal philanthropy. He exercised the healing art with anxious and equal fidelity to the poor and to the rich. He vifited, with affectionate fympathy, the humblest receffes of poverty and ficknefs, as well as the ftately beds of pampered diftemper and premature decrepitude. His manners were gentle; his countenance affable; his eloquence moral and pathetic, not harsh or importunate; yet he was not unmindful that bodily fickness foftens the mind to moral fenfibilities, which afforded frequent opportunities to him of exercising mental charities to afflicted minds, whilft he employed the powers of medical fcience to the restoration of bodily health. He thus united all the talents of his own mind for natural and moral fcience, conformably to thofe doctrines which he inculcates, to that univerfal fyftem of final morality, by which each effort of fenfation or fcience in the various

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