to the fouth. The third courtry, ftyled Ethiopia, comprehended the regions of Perfis, Chufiffan, and Sufiana.-Still farther eaft, beyond Carmania, was another region of this name, which by Eufebius is termed, the Ethiopia which looks towards the Ini, to the youth-raft. Foypt too inherited the fime name. It was

extended to the Co.chis of the Greeks, and to Simothrace :— and colonies of Ethiopians traverfed a great part of Africa, and fettled upon the Bartis, near Tarteffus and Gades. All thefe circumftances are confirmed, in the great work before us, by proper teftimonics from ancient writers. The original Etniopia was, however, the region of Babylonia and Chaldea:-and as the Scythe, or Cuthites, were the fame people with the Ethiopians, no wonder that they are reprefented as the most ancient people in the world; even prior to the Egyptians. The Scythe, lays Jullin, were ever ifte med of all nations the most ancient. But who were meant by the scythæ has been for a long time a fecret.

Another title, by which the Cuthites were diftinguifhe3, was that of Erythreans; and the places where they refided, received it from them. Here our Author thinks it not improper to take notice of the Erythrean Sea, and to confider it in its full extent. Accordingly, he fhews, by an abundance of evidence, that the Erythrean Sea was taken in a very extenfive fenfe by many of the ancients; and that the Erythreans were fettled in far diftant countries. It may fecm wonde ful, he obferves, that any one family fhould extend themfelves fo widely, and have, fettlen ents in fuch different parts. Yet,' he says, Yet,' he fays, if we confider, we fhall find nations within little more than two centuries, whɔ have fent out immenfe colonics, to places equally remote. Moreover, for the truth of the facts above mentioned, we have the evidence of the beft hiftories.' Several additional teftimonies are produced to this purpose; and the conclufion is, that the reciprocal evidences of the moft genuine history concur in proving, that the Cuthites, Ethiopians, and Erythreans were the fame people. They had a ftill more general name of Scuthai; which, though an incorrect appellation, yet almost univerfally obtained.

In treating upon Cuthia Indica, or Scythia Limyrica, Mr. Bryant makes it his bufinefs farther to fhew, that not only the Scythe of Colchis, Mafia, and Thrace, with thofe upon the Palus Mæotis, were in a great measure of the race of Chus; but that all nations ftyled Scythian were in reality Cuthian or Ethiopian. This may be afcertained, he fays, from the names of places being the fame, or fimilar among them all; from the fame cuftoms prevailing; from the fame rites and worship, among which was the worthip of the fun; and from thofe national marks, and family characteristics, whence the identity

of

of any people may be proved. Thefe feveral circumstances are copioully illuftrated by him; and, in fhort, he endeavours to evince, by a variety of erudition, that every thing in the countries about the Indus and the Ganges favours of Chaldaic and Egyptian inftitution.-Many learned men have contended that the Indians, and even the Chinele, were a colony from Egypt; while others have inified that the Egyptians, or at leaft their learning and cuftoms, are to be derived from the Indi and Seres. But our Author thinks that neither opinion is quite true: for they both proceeded from one central place: and the fame pe ple, who imported their religion, rites, and fcience into Egypt, carried the fame to the Indus and Ganges; and still further into China and Jpn. Not but that some colonies undoubtedly came from Egypt: but the arts and fciences imported into India came from another family, even the Cuthites of Chaldea; by whom the Mirraïm themiclves were instructed; and from Egypt they paff d weftward.

The Grecian writers, finding that the Ethiopians and Cutheans of the country between the Indus and the Ganges were not the original inhabitants, have very properly diftinguished them from thofe who were Aborigines: but they have been guilty, Mr. Bryant obferves, of a great miftake, in making thefe Aborigines the Indi, and feparating the latter from the Ethiopes. The Cuthites, ftyled thiopes, were the original Indi: they gave name to the river, upon which they settled; and to the country, which they occupied: -and almoft in every place, where their hiftory occurs, the name of Indi will be found likewife. Many teftimonies are brought to confirm this affertion; and the Author farther takes notice of the great character which the Cuthites of India Limyrica bore, in the most early times, for ingenuity and fcience. He concludes his inquiry into the Scythic nations of the Eaft, with a long, curious, and beautiful extract (accompanied with a poetical verfion) from Dionyfius Periegetes, concerning the habit and manners, the rites and cuftoms, the merchandize, industry, and knowledge of the Indo-Scythæ.

[To be continued.]

A&T. IX. Medical Ryearches: Being an Inquiry into the Nature and Origin of Hyfterics in the Female Conftitution, and into the Diftinction between that Difeafe and ypocondriac or Nervous Disorders, &c &c. By Andrew Wilton, M. D. Fellow of the Royal College of Phyficians at Edinburgh, &c. 8vo. 5 s. Hooper. 1776.

T

HIS is only a very fmall part of the copious title-page of this flighty performance. In the fu ceeding part of it the Author announces his defign of exhibiting in the work a fpecification of the characteristic refinement and excellence

of

of the female conftitution and character;' anda refearch into the materiality of thofe occult powers and principles of activity, commonly called life, in the human frame.'-But before we proceed further in this high ftrain, it will be proper to leave the title-page, and feek in the body of the work for a comment.

Thele laft mentioned occult powers, we are there told, are the refult of material mechanifm; and man, as well as every other material being in the univerfe, is a compofition of terref trial and celeftial matter. The latter, our Author is elsewhere pleafed to call, the fidereal part of the conftitution of all terrene bodies, and of the human frame in particular.' By this diftribution of matter, we are faid to be put in poffeffion of the real key of all natural knowledge.' Further, this celeftial part in the human habit exifts not only in us, but in every other form in nature, in two modes; interftitially and organically.'

We have lately been teazing,' it feems, this celestial matter, with the varied experiments and tricks of electricity;' but no one has as yet afcertained that it is the one omnipresent animating principle of all natural things, upon which every property and phenomenon of material being, under all the metamorpholes and transfigurations that natural bodies undergo, depends; and-without which, all that we call body, would remain for ever an inactive, paffive, incoherent calx.'

The philofophical reader is undoubtedly impatient to learn the name of this fidereal part of our conftitution, and of that of all other bodies. At page 47 the fecret comes out.—It is no other than the fluid of light;' which, under different circumftances, has been likewife called Fire, Ether, electrical Aura, Materia fubtilis, Materia media, &c.;' and has at other times been ftripped of its materiality all together, or been treated merely as a principle, annexed to, or inherent in matter, under the terms of occult quality, nifus, attraction, gravitation, elective attraction, elafticity, irritability, fympathy, vital principle, life, &c.'

It is light then,-a substance possessed of natural omnipotence,' (which it derives however from the fun). It is this omniprefent and all-fufficient' fluid, that impreffes and feeds the diverfified fimilarities of the different parts of our compofition, and the characteriftic figns and marks of our individuality; while by a virtual concurrence and fubtilifation of all these in the feat of confcioufnefs, it (i. e. light) generates our fenfes, our paffions, our habits, our volitions, &c; in fhort, that whole focal concentration of life correfpondent with every part of our form, &c.'-Again, By the unremittent, reciprocal corrufcations of this vital principle in the fluids and folids upon one another, &c. is the whole fyftem of life difplayed and maintained in every individual.'-But enough of this unphilofophical and unintel

3

ligible

ligible bombaft. Those who can be amused by fuch rant-for instruction is out of the queftion-may meet with a full indulgence of their fancies, by having recourfe to the work itself.

Continuing however to follow the title-page, as our guide, only one step farther, we attend the Author next inquiring into the nature of generation; and propofing to our belief the real existence of an image of our whole organical frame, in the feat and fountain of its powers.' He undertakes to fhew the phyfical probability of there being a regeneration of that image,' in the organs formed for the multiplication of the fpecies; or, as he more quaintly expreffes it for the transfufion and multiplication of individual life. Much is faid-or rather fung-of this image of the whole frame, in the fountain of life, which fheds its irradiations into every part it is the reprefentative of.' Its action—to give a clearer and more diftinct idea of it,' by means of a fimilitude-may be compared to that of light in a focus.' It is not, however, literally, an image; that is, an optical image; but a fotential image-containing as diftinct a concentration of the powers of life, as there is of forms in the focus of a perfpective glafs.'

Such are, at leaft in part, the whimfical foundations on which the Author afterwards proceeds to inveftigate the true nature, fymptoms, and indications of cure of the hysterical difeafe;' which he affirms, diftinguithes itfelf from all other difeafes in this, that it is a difeafe of the principle of life itself.' But on this principle, and its fountain, its irradiations, concentrations, and other myftic or metaphoric qualities, we have already enlarged too much; and fhall only exprefs our concern that a writer who feems to be by no means deficient in knowledge and ingenuity, fhould mifapply the latter, particularly, fo very egregiously.

This Inquiry is followed by the Author's lecture on the natural Powers employed in the Circulation of the Blood,' formerly publifhed by itself; and on which [in our 51ft volume, November 1774, p. 399.] we have beftowed the praife it merits. The performance is terminated by Four Letters on the Subject of Light. In the introductory paragraph to the first of these letters, the Author again ftaggers the fober phyfical inquirer, by telling him that light conftitutes, both materially and virtually, the most important part of our compofition.' After this gratuitous and groundlefs affumption, he criticifes Newton, fo far as his doctrines are unfavourable to his own hypothesis of a plenum of light. Newton indeed purfued a very different method of philofophifing from that followed by our Author. There are no phyfical fubjects that are not clogged with difficulties; but the greater part of thofe which are here detailed as infurmountable, have been long ago furmounted by Mufchenbroek, Melvil, Canton, and others.

ART.

ART. X. An Fay on the Blood; in which the Objections to Mr. Hanter's Opinion concerning the Blood, are examined and removed. by G. Levelon, M. D ovo. 2 s. 6d. Davies. 1776.

THA

HAT the blood is alive ;'-and that we lofe, as it were, by the lofs of each ounce of blood, an ounce of life;' -and that a belief in the truth of this theory must be of the greatest utility to the Public;'-are the principal pofitions attempted to be effabl fhed in this Effay. The contrary doctrine of those who have laboured to destroy the life of the blood, and to agn life and action to the joids only-is calculated-fo at Icaft our Author affirms to encourage the abule of the lancet in this metropolis, in the hands of the ignorant.' He therefore obferves that the following fheets cannot be deemed a mere fpeculation and ufelets theory.'

The doctrine, that the blood is alive, firft occurs in the facred writings, particularly thofe of the Jewish lawgiver; fome paffages from which the Author quotes in proof, on this occafion, in the original Hebrew, with critical remarks on the text. But we queftion whether modern phyfiologifts will pay much regard to Mofes and the Prophets, on this or any other philofophical fubject. The Author with much greater propriety recites Mr. Hunter's various arguments, brought to prove that the blood poffeffes a principle of life; and endeavours to anfwer the late objections made to this doctrine by Dr. Hendy: but for thefe antwers we must refer fuch of our readers as poffels any curiofity with refpect to this controverfy, to the pamphlet itself.

After all, we can fe nothing in this doctrine of life, that can have that great influence on medical practice, which the Author afcribes to it: nor can we perceive that it tends to throw any more light on the functions of the animal ceonomy than we were before poffeffed of. That a living animal is endowed with properties not poffeffed by a dead one, was known long before the principle of life was introduced into phyfiology; nay long before phyfiology itfelf had a being. Is any light, for inftance, thrown on the process of digeftion, when the Author tells us that it is life that converts different fubftances of different properties into one and the fame nature-in the ftomach and inteftinal tube ?'-and that Mr. Hunter fed fome dogs upon vegetables, and others upon animal food only; the milk of both was analyfed by Dr. Fordyce, who found them the fame in their chemical properties.'-Had the dogs been dad, doubtless the refult of thefe experiments would have been different.—We will add only one inftance of the ridiculous application of this doctrine.

When we tie a ligature on both fides of an artery,' fays the Author, fo that the circulation fhall be ftopped, the blood

between