impair our faculties, and to bring us nearer to the beasts that perish ?

There is a good deal about Dr. Glynn in "Nichols's Anecdotes," where more than one allusion is to be found to the part he took in what was very properly denominated, the Rowleyan controversy; for such was Chatterton's ingenuity, that he had, at first, almost as many with him as against him; and, among the former, none was more strenuous than Dr. Glynn. He even paid a visit to Bristol for the sole purpose of having ocular demonstration of the true character of the original papers; and, so far were his eyes from correcting the errors of his judgment, that he returned to Cambridge more than ever convinced of Chatterton's not being an impostor. His own simplicity, charity, and honesty of heart and purpose, made him incapable of weighing the evidence impartially; and I very much doubt whether the history of the fraud, so clearly elucidated as it has since been by Mr. Cottle, who possessed a thorough knowledge of the facts and circumstances connected with it, would have led Dr. Glynn to alter his opinion. The innocency of the dove was not combined, in him, with the serpent's cunning.

I have been unable to ascertain whether, at any part of his life, he mixed much in general society. In the early part of it, the society into which he was thrown was differently constituted from what it is at the present day; and we find him, accordingly, receiving the first suggestion respecting the Seatonian prize poem, at a coffee-house,

where, as I have before said, he was twitted by his boon companions for not entering the lists with Smart, the previously thrice successful candidate. As far back as I have been able to trace his habits, they were, in a considerable degree, monastic; being imbued with whatever can be deemed estimable in the lives and conversation of a class of men, who, through a long period of the Christian era, kept the almost expiring embers of literature from going out, and who, amidst great temptations to listlessness and animal indulgence, often passed their lives in the laborious study and transcription of volumes, which, to all the world but themselves, were sealed books; or else, devoting themselves to the more active concerns of their neighbourhood, administered equally to the spiritual and bodily necessities of those around them. It was only by luminaries, such as these, that the darkness of the middle ages was broken; and remembering, as I do, the singular appearance of Dr. Glynn, as he traversed the streets of Cambridge, with his cloak wrapt about him, it is no difficult matter to transfer him to a period of time when, instead of quitting, of a morning, his elegant and spacious apartments in King's College, he might be supposed to have issued forth from the narrow portal of a monastery, bent on passing the live-long day in works of charity and mercy. That, in either case, there was a well-replenished board to which the inmates of the house might, at stated hours, repair for luxurious refection, there is no room left us for doubting; but, for many years, at least, it was Dr. Glynn's custom

to eat only in compliance with the demands of appetite. A faithful old servant was in constant attendance upon him, and, whenever his master felt inclined to eat, he was prepared to set before him some plain dish, and a can of malt liquor, I believe of porter. Thus did this good Doctor eat to live, and to enable others to live. It was from some peculiarity of constitution, probably, that he adopted a mode of living inapplicable to the generality of mankind; but not, therefore, the less consistent with those rules of temperance which enabled him to extend his usefulness, and carried him, with little or no bodily suffering, to a far advanced and honoured tomb. Nor will it be inconsistent with my purpose of embalming the recollections of early years with mature reflections, if I compare the results of different courses of life, especially when claiming attention from their application to individuals under nearly similar social and professional obligations.

The maxim, " de mortuis nil nisi bonum," is entitled to all due respect; but it must be entertained in spirit, and not merely in letter; it must not go the length of cancelling the important lessons of human frailty and human turpitude; since, in their dire effects, the evil deeds and errors of mankind are the very beacons which ought to be set up to warn us to escape from the unnumbered perils with which we are beset; and, painful as the contemplation of them must be in particular instances, they serve, by the very depth of their colouring, to make the contrasted

tints of a well-spent life brighter and more attractive. I shall never forget the melancholy picture which a late valued and amiable medical friend used to draw of a popular lecturer on the practice of medicine, who might, with the greatest truth, have said to his pupils, to whom he gave very excellent and useful instructions,-Behold in me the victim of indulgence in animal gratification, with the aggravating guilt of having been a solitary and not a social glutton: my infirmities are precisely such as necessarily result from the neglect of those rules of temperance which it has been my task to impress upon your minds.—He had, in fact, before he gave over lecturing, become a burden to himself, and a spectacle to be deplored by others. His lower extremities were enormously swollen, and his whole person and aspect but too plainly indicated the vulture that had long been preying upon his liver. I did not learn from the friend to whom I have alluded, what the precise habits of's life were; but they have since been made known to the public, through the medium of a popular journal, from which the following is an

extract :

"He dined every day, for more than twenty years, at Dolly's Chop House. His researches in comparative anatomy had led him to conclude, that man, through custom, eats oftener than nature requires; one meal a day being sufficient for that noble animal the lion. At four o'clock, his accustomed hour of dining, the doctor regularly took the seat at the table always reserved for him, on which

was placed a silver tankard full of strong ale, a bottle of port wine, and a measure containing a quarter of a pint of brandy. The moment the waiter announced him, the cook put a pound and a half of rump-steak on the gridiron, and on the table was placed some delicate trifle, as a bonne bouche, to serve until the steak was ready. This was sometimes half a boiled chicken, sometimes a plate of fish; when he had eaten this, he took one glass of brandy, and then proceeded to devour his steak. At the conclusion of his meal, he took the remainder of his brandy, having, during his dinner, drank the tankard of ale, and afterwards a bottle of port! He thus daily spent an hour and a half of his time, and then ("which shows the wonderful force of his natural bodily and mental temperament") returned to his house, to give his six o'clock lecture on chemistry. He made no other meal until his return, at four o'clock next day, to Dolly's."

The few observations with which this case was preceded, render medical comment upon it superfluous. It will be seen, that the individual described, so far at least resembled Dr. Glynn, as, like him, to have kept aloof from the convivial board, thereby teaching us that no temptations are greater than those which dwell within us, and that the knowledge of the almost certain consequences of particular acts will not afford sufficient protection without the necessary accompaniment of mental and moral discipline. The very lessons of wisdom which ought to be derived from science may be perverted. The carnivorous instinct of