over-exercise the brain, and to give rise to convulsive and nervous diseases, hypochondriasis, and mania. From leaving the thorax and abdomen, naturally feeble, unexcited by a sufficient supply of nervous energy, the encephalic is subject also to asthma, bad digestion, and its numerous train of concomitant evils. The marked thoracic, on the other hand, is subject to all the diseases of excited circulation, such as inflammation and rheumatism. The abdominal enjoys, on the whole, good health and vegetative existence, and his diseases are slow and of long duration.

"A knowledge of the constitutions or temperaments of individuals is exceedingly advantageous in regulating the choice of their profession, manner of living, and general conduct. A due degree of exercise favors the nutrition of an organ, and increases its power and facility of function; while deficient exercise leads to imperfect nutrition and debility of function, and too much leads to an irritable and unsteady action, speedily degenerating into disease. To preserve the advantages conferred by a mixed temperament, therefore, a due balance must be preserved in the exercise and repose of all parts of the system, and none must be left to languish in inaction.

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The cranial or encephalic temperament is one of the most disposed to excess and to disease; and when very marked, it is almost always accompanied by discontent, melancholy, and sleeplessness. To obviate those inconveniences, we must moderate the exercise of the brain, in never allowing study or thinking to continue to fatigue, in removing all the exciting causes of great passions, and in employing, on the other hand, the muscles in walking, running, mechanics, hunting, gardening, etc. A cheerful residence in a pleasant country, and avoiding solitude, heat, and cold, are very effectual with the same view. The tepid bath is most useful in moderating the dryness and inaction of the skin, and thus diminishing cerebral excitement. Vegetables, fruits, animal jellies, eggs, and all easily digestible substances which furnish much chyle and develop the abdominal organs, are advantageous; and tea, coffee, and other stimulants are hurtful. Wine ought to be sparingly used, and always diluted. The meals ought to be small and frequent, and followed by repose and rest, as thinking in the encephalic impedes digestion. Sleep is of great consequence to preserve the health of the encephalic.

“The thoracic temperament, although less liable to diseases, requires to avoid excesses as well as the encephalic; for although the individual can undergo great physical labor, yet, if he goes beyond his strength, the effects are proportionally severe and speedy in their progress. He thinks with difficulty, and when circumstances excite and keep up in him strong and violent passions, his brain is very apt to become affected. The thoracic development ought in general to be encouraged by a proper attention to exercise and diet; when in excess it may be gradually moderated by repose, by forcing study for a short time, and gradually extending it; by exciting the brain and abdomen, in short, at the expense of the thorax. It is the thoracic constitution that is peculiarly subject to inflammation, to rheumatism, etc., and that bears blood-letting without injury.

“The abdominal temperament is the most unfavorable, and its subjects are generally mactive and feeble minded. When it is perceived in early life, it may be diminished or remedied by removing abdominal and employing thoracic and cerebral stimuli. Frugality, slender repasts, fibrinous meats, drinks which excite the brain, especially active physical exercises, short sleep, and forced study, properly managed, produce the best effects. Every disease in this temperament is complicated with abdominal disturbance. The other compound temperaments may be estimated and regulated from the preceding observations. "1. The change of temperament is most easily obtained at the time when the period of life naturally modifies it. In man, the cranio-abdominal child easily becomes cranial between 7 and 14, or cranio-thoracic between 15 and 25, or mixed or thoracic between 25 and 35, or thoracico-abdominal between 35 and 45.

"2. The development of a particular temperament is obtained with a facility proportioned to the natural proximity of the one sought for to that already existing. It is difficult for us to make an abdominal become encephalic; but it is not so difficult to convert a mixed into a decidedly thoracic.

“3. The organs to be developed must be exercised gradually, and in proportion to their natural force. If too little or too much exercised, they become

diseased, languid, or exhausted.

"4. That one organ may be developed by exercise, all the rest must be as much as possible in a state of repose. There are even some organs that cannot be exercised freely if the others are not in repose; the activity of the encephalon, for instance, deranges speedily and powerfully the digestive organs, when both are exercised at the same time, and if persevered in soon induces disease.. "5. The more numerous and powerful the causes which favor or determine the exercise or repose of an organ, the more will that organ be disposed to exertion or repose, and consequently to develop itself or to diminish.

"Dr. Thomas's principle is simply, that as size is a measure of power, and as the whole system is made up of the nervous, the sanguineous, and the digestive apparatuses, contained respectively in the head, the thorax, and the abdomen, so will the natural constitution differ in proportion to the relative equality or predominance of all or any of these three great divisions. Thus, a great size of brain and head, with small thorax and abdomen, will give a constitution characterized by a necessary predominance of the cerebral over the thoracic and abdominal functions, viz., great nervous energy, activity, and force of mind, with little aptitude for muscular efforts, and rather weak digestion; and a large and capacious thorax, with small head and small abdomen, will give a constitution characterized by abundant sanguification, powerful respiration, and vigorous propulsion of the blood to the extreme points, and consequently, by an aptitude for muscular efforts and active exercise, much more than for mental activity or active digestion. And again, a capacious abdomen, with small head and narrow thorax, will give a constitution characterized by great powers of nutrition, plumpness, and sloth, much more than by mental or bodily energy, or vivacity of motion. And the other combinations of them will produce constitutions participating in the qualities of their constituent elements: such as the cranio-thoracic, with large head and thorax and small abdomen; the thoracico-abdominal, with large thorax and abdomen, and small head; and the cranio-abdominal, with large head and abdomen, and small thorax, etc., as already fully explained in our former paper."

DANGER ATTENDING PRECOCIOUS DEVELOPMENT.-There can be no doubt that many a child has been sacrificed in early youth to the pride of parents, who, delighted with the intellectual activity of their children, have striven to make them prodigies of learning. But in these cases of early and undue employment of the brain, inflammation of the hemispherical ganglion, or of the lining membrane of the ventricles, with serious effusion, has usually been the cause of either a fatal issue, or of subsequent mental imbecility. The late Mr. Deville related to me an interesting case of this kind.

An extremely interesting boy, of about twelve years of age, was brought to him for phrenological examination by a parent who was very proud of the intellectual endowments of his child. Mr. Deville gave his opinion of the boy's character, at the same time cautioning the father of the dangerous course he was pursuing. But the father's reply was, "All that the other boys considered labor and hard study, are mere child's play to him; that his studies could not be hurting him, he enjoyed them so much." Again Mr. Deville endeavored to save the child, but the father would not attend to the warning. Two years from that time the father again called on Mr. Deville, and in reply to his inquiries after his child, the father burst into tears-his child was an idiot.-SOLLY.

ARTICLE LXVII.

LECTURES TO YOUNG MEN ON INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS. BY HENRY WARD BEECHER. *

THE following, from our able and excellent friend, HENRY WARD BEECHER, will give our numerous readers as good an idea of INDUSTRY and IDLENESS as can be found in our language. Every line is to the point. The entire work abounds with rich illustrations of character, which cannot fail to make a favorable impression on all who read it:

As industry is habitual activity in some useful pursuit, so, not only inactivity, but also all efforts without the design of usefulness, are of the nature of idleness. The supine sluggard is no more indolent than the bustling do-nothing. Men may walk much, and read much, and talk much, and pass the day without an unoccupied moment, and yet be substantially idle; because industry requires, at least, the intention of usefulness. But gadding, gazing, lounging, mere pleasure-mongering, reading for the relief of ENNUI-these are as useless as sleeping, or dozing, or the stupidity of a surfeit.

There are many grades of idleness; and veins of it run through the most industrious life. We shall indulge in some descriptions of the various classes of idlers, and leave the reader to judge, if he be an indolent man, to which class he belongs.

1. The lazy-man. He is of a very ancient pedigree; for his family is minutely described by Solomon: "How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou awake out of sleep?" This is the language of impatience; the speaker has been trying to awaken him-pulling, pushing, rolling him over, and shouting in his ear; but all to no purpose. He soliloquizes, whether it is possible for the man ever to wake up! At length, the sleeper drawls out a dozing petition to be let alone: "Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep;" and the last words confusedly break into a snore-that somnolent lullaby of repose. Long ago the birds have finished their matins, the sun has advanced full high, the dew has gone from the grass, and the labors of industry are far in progress, when our sluggard, awakened by his very efforts to maintain sleep, slowly emerges to perform life's great duty of FEEDING-With him, second only in importance to sleep. And now, well rested, and suitably nourished, surely he will abound in labor. Nay, "the sluggard will not plough by reason of the cold." It is yet early spring; there is ice in the north; and the winds are hearty: his tender skin shrinks from exposure, and he waits for milder days-envying the residents of tropical climates, where cold never comes, and harvests wave spontaneously. He is valiant at sleeping and at the trencher; but for other courage, "the slothful man saith, there is a lion without; I shall be slain in the street." He has not been out to see; but he heard a noise, and resolutely betakes himself to prudence. Under so thriving a manager, so alert in the morning, so busy through the day, and so enterprising, we might anticipate the thrift of his husbandry. I went by the field of the slothful and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding; and lo! it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face of it, and its stone wall was broken down." To complete the picture, only one thing more is wanted-a description of his house-and then we should have, at one view, the lazy man, his farm, and house. Solomon has given us that also: By much slothfulness

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* LECTURES TO YOUNG MEN, on Various Important Subjects. By HENRY WARD BEECHER, of Indianapolis, Ind., now of Brooklyn, N. Y. Price 62 cents. For sale by Fowlers & Wells, 131 Nassau street, New York.

the building decayeth; and through idleness of the hands the house droppeth through." Let all this be put together, and possibly some reader may find an 'unpleasant resemblance to his own affairs.

He sleeps long and late, he wakes to stupidity, with indolent eyes sleepily rolling over neglected work; neglected because it is too cold in spring, and too hot in summer, and too laborious at all times-a great coward in danger, and therefore very blustering in safety. His lands run to waste, his fences are dilapidated, his crops chiefly of weeds and brambles; a shattered house, the side leaning over as if wishing, like its owner, to lie down to sleep; the chimney tumbling down, the roof breaking in, with moss and grass sprouting in its crevices; the well without pump or windlass, a trap for their children. This is the very castle of indolence.

2. Another idler as useless, but vastly more active than the last, attends closely to every one's business except his own. His wife earns the children's bread, and his; procures her own raiment and his; she procures the wood; she procures the water; while he, with hands in his pocket, is busy watching the building of a neighbor's barn; or advising another how to trim and train his vines; or he has heard of sickness in a friend's family, and is there, to suggest a hundred cures, and to do every thing but to help; he is a spectator of shooting-matches, a stickler for a ring and fair play at every fight. He knows all the stories of all the families that live in the town. If he can catch a stranger at the tavern in a rainy day, he pours out a strain of information, a pattering of words, as thick as the rain-drops out of doors. He has good advice to every body, how to save, how to make money, how to do every thing; he can tell the saddler about his trade, he gives advice to the smith about his work, and goes over with him when it is forged to see the carriage maker put it on, suggests improvements, advises this paint or that varnish, criticises the finish, or praises the trimmings. He is a violent reader of newspapers, almanacs, and receipt books; and with scraps of history and mutilated anecdotes, he faces the very schoolmaster, and gives up only to the volubility of the oily village lawyer-few have the hardihood to match HIM.

And thus every day he bustles through his multifarious idleness, and completes his circle of visits, as regularly as the pointers of a clock visit each figure on the dial plate; but alas! the clock forever tells man the useful lesson of time passing steadily away, and returning never; but what useful thing do these busy buzzing idlers perform?

3. We introduce another idler. He follows no vocation; he only follows those who do. Sometimes he sweeps along the streets, with consequential gait; sometimes perfumes it with wasted odors of tobacco. He also haunts sunny benches or breezy piazzas. His business is TO SEE-his desire, to be seen; and no one fails to see him-so gaudily dressed, his hat sitting aslant upon a wilderness of hair, like a bird half startled from its nest, and every thread arranged to provoke attention. He is a man of honor; not that he keeps his word or shrinks from meanness. He defrauds his laundress, his tailor, and his landlord. He drinks and smokes at other men's expense. He gambles, and swears, and fights-when he is too drunk to be afraid; but still he is a man of honor, for he has whiskers and looks fierce, wears mustaches and says, "upon my HONOR, sir;" "do you doubt my HONOR, sir?"

Thus he appears by day; by night he does not appear; he may be dimly seen flitting; his voice may be heard in the carousal of some refection cellar, or above the songs and uproar of a midnight return, and home staggering.

4. The next of this brotherhood excites our pity. He began life most thriftily; for his rising family he was gathering an ample subsistence; but, involved in other men's affairs, he went down in their ruin. Late in life he begins once more, and at length, just secure of an easy competence, his ruin is compassed again. He sits down quietly under it, complains of no one, envies no one, refuseth the cup, and is even more pure in morals than in better days. He moves on from day to day, as one who walks under a spell-it is the spell of despond

ency, which nothing can disenchant or arouse. He neither seeks work nor refuses it. He wanders among men a dreaming gazer, poorly clad, always kind, always irresolute, able to plan nothing for himself, nor to execute what others have planned for him. He lives and he dies a discouraged man, and the most harmless and excusable of all idlers.

5. I have not mentioned the fashionable idler, whose riches defeat every object for which God gave him birth. He has a fine form, and manly beauty, and the chief end of life is to display them. With notable diligence he ransacks the market for rare and curious fabrics, for costly seals, and chains, and rings. A coat poorly fitted is the unpardonable sin of his creed. He meditates upon cravats, employs a profound discrimination in selecting a hat, or a vest, and adopts his conclusions upon the tastefulness of a button or a collar, with the deliberation of a statesman. Thus caparisoned, he saunters in fashionable galleries, or flaunts in stylish equipage, or parades the streets with simpering belles, or delights their itching ears with compliments of flattery, or with choicely culled scandal. He is a reader of fictions, if they be not too substantial; a writer of cards and billet-doux, and is especially conspicuous in albums. Gay and frivolous, rich and useless, polished till the enamel is worn off, his whole life serves only to make him an animated puppet of pleasure. He is as corrupt in imagination as he is refined in manners; he is as selfish in private as he is generous in public; and even what he gives to another, is given for his own sake. He worships where fashion worships, to-day at the theatre, tomorrow at the church, as either exhibits the whitest hand, or the most polished actor. A gaudy, active, and indolent butterfly, he flutters without industry from flower to flower, until summer closes, and frosts sting him, and he sinks down and dies, unthought of and unremembered.

6. One other portrait should be drawn of a business man, who wishes to subsist by his occupation, while he attends to every thing else. If a sporting club goes to the woods, he must go. He has set his line in every hole in the river, and dozed in a summer day under every tree along its bank. He rejoices in a riding party-a sleigh-ride-a summer frolic-a winter's glee. He is every body's friend-universally good-natured-forever busy where it will do him no good, and remiss where his interests require activity. He takes amusement for his main business, which other men employ as a relaxation; and the serious labor of life, which other men are mainly employed in, he knows only as a relaxation. After a few years he fails, his good nature is something clouded, and as age sobers his buoyancy, without repairing his profitless habits, he soon sinks to a lower grade of laziness, and to ruin.

It would be endless to describe the wiles of idleness-how it creeps upon men, how secretly it mingles with their pursuits, how much time it purloins from the scholar, from the professional man, and from the artisan. It steals minutes, it clips off the edges of hours, and at length takes possession of days. Where it has its will, it sinks and drowns employment; but where necessity, or ambition, or duty, resists such violence, then indolence makes labor heavy; scatters the attention; puts us to our tasks with wandering thoughts, with irresolute purpose, and with dreamy visions. Thus when it may, it plucks out hours and rules over them; and where this may not be, it lurks around them to impede the sway of industry, and turn her seeming toils to subtle idleness. Against so mischievous an enchantress, we should be duly armed. I shall, therefore, describe the advantages of industry, and the evils of indolence.

1. A hearty industry promotes happiness. Some men of the greatest industry are unhappy from infelicity of disposition; they are morose, or suspicious, or envious. Such qualities make happiness impossible, under any circumstances. Health is the platform on which all happiness must be built. Good appetite, good digestion, and good sleep, are the elements of health, and industry confers them. As use polishes metals, so labor the faculties, until the body performs its unimpeded functions with elastic cheerfulness and hearty enjoyment.

Buoyant spirits are an element of happiness, and activity produces them;