The curiosity with which we revert to this subject can, unfortunately, be but very partially gratified, from the obscurity which envelopes it. Thales taught little in public, and wrote less. Occupied with the important affairs of the government of his own country (Miletus), he studied from taste, and contented himself with communicating his discoveries to his immediate friends. We have, however, some authentic records of opinio is attributed to him which are sufficient to explain the nature of the revolution he originated in the kingdom of philosophy.

Thales was a mathematician and astronomer. He predicted an eclipse of the sun, and had tolerably correct notions of the figure of the earth and the planetary motions. He travelled for the improvement of his knowledge, and visited Crete and Egypt, where he displayed his superiority of learning over the priests, and taught them to measure the pyramids by the shadows they cast. Instead of blindly following the doctrines communicated by these sages, he threw aside all supernatural methods of accounting for the origin of existing matter; he endeavoured to deduce its previous nature from its present state hence the title of physical (pvois nature) applied to the disciples of the Ionian school.

This is the distinguishing merit of Thales. He separated physics from the metaphysics, and so made the first step towards the distinct division which has since been made between these branches of science.

To Thales is universally attributed the doctrine that "water is the universal principle." It is but just to give his own explanation of his dogma. He did not assign to it the dignity of a cause, but considered it the primitive source from which all other forms of matter were organized.

We must not criticise too closely this conceit, which is not altogether unfounded on fact, but recollect that in a species of research entirely novel he gave in three respects a good example. Firstly, not satisfied, like his predecessors, with gratuitous affirmations, he endeavoured to prove the truth of his assertions. Secondly, he adduced from experience the analogy in which he sought for his proofs. Lastly, instead of treating natural phenomena as isolated, he supposed them to be links of a great, chain which united them, being the first promulgator of the ideas of general laws in nature. With him too originated the doctrine that nature abhors a vacuum. Of his notions on psychology we know but little. One apophthegm remains: "The essence of soul is spontaneous movement." has been accused of atheism, on the ground that he admitted none but material causes. His best vindication, perhaps, is the opinion expressed by Cicero:-Aquam dixit rerum initium,-Deum autem, eam mentem quæ ex ea omnia fingeret. "He considered water the origin of all things, and the Deity as that intelligence which could give figure and solidity to this primitive matter."

Thales

In summing up the few facts which we know concerning the father of the Ionic school, we obtain nevertheless some important conclusions. We see that he dared to think for himself, and was the founder of physical science; separating it from the heterogeneous mixture from which were derived cosmogonies and theogonies. He was the first

creator of a complete and regular system, in which he adopted hypotheses derived by induction from the experience of facts, and in this light capable of being applied to more profound researches. If he instituted no precise method for the use of others, he was at least the first who knew how to prepare one for his own.

Anaximander, his friend rather than his disciple, profited by his example, and advanced some steps in the career of science. He wrote a book on Nature. Thales had given the first example of a demonstrated principle; Anaximander endeavoured to render his demonstration more vigorous, and in this endeavour he arrived at a purely metaphysical syllogism-" Nothing comes of nothing." Thus originated the celebrated axiom on which all the philosophy of the Greeks for many years turned as one proof. It contains the most extended possible generalization of the principle of reproduction.

Commencing from this fundamental proposition, he arrived at a conclusion which astonishes by its boldness-"Infinity is the beginning of all things." Nothing which admitted of change or confinement appeared to him sufficiently great for the universal and perpetual generation of beings.

Like Thales, he confounded the idea of a producing cause with elements on which the effect was produced by the agency of the

cause.

Anaximander, as well as Thales, endeavoured to establish some general laws of nature; such as the constant and mutual attraction of the homogeneous particles of matter to one another. By the effects of this attraction the forms of material bodies are produced, and motion as well as reproduction are eternal. Bodies like worlds are subject to continual revolution, and the destruction of one only takes place in order to the formation of another. Heat and cold are the two instruments of composition and decomposition.

Anaximenes, a man of less originality and boldness of thought than his two predecessors, admitting the doctrine of Anaximander with respect to the infinite substance, which was the first principle, sought for the seat of this principle in space. He considered the air which fills space and so rapidly takes any form which is attempted to be given to it to have the properties most appropriate for the universal element. To the air he attributed life, the power of motion—even thought.

It was requisite that that from which all beings emanated should itself contain the qualities essential to these beings; hence he considered the soul as an aerial being, if by air he means the substance vulgarly so called, the atmosphere which we breathe. At all events the merit of recognizing the notion of intelligence and volition as indigenous in the first cause belongs to him. Of the many moral axioms of Anaximenes preserved by Stobaeus, the most remarkable is perhaps this "Poverty teaches wisdom, for she is the mother of industry."

:

At length comes the name of the illustrious Anaxagoras. His existence deservedly makes an epoch in the history of philosophy. He was the first philosopher who taught within the walls of Athens, and his doctrines contained a sublime theory on the first cause. With him

philosophy abandoned the Ionian colonies of Greece. The tyranny of the Satraps expelled it from these fair countries to seek a refuge among the free nations of Europe.

The doctrine on the nature of a first cause propagated by Anaxagoras had this object in view ;—the setting the sublime idea of a divinity in the true light with respect to its relations with the laws of the universe. It is distinguished by two essential characters.

First, The system of emanations and those of pantheism derived from it; nay, even the opinion of the earlier Ionian philosophers associated the idea of elementary matter with the first cause of production, and conceived the world itself to be an animated whole to which the Divinity stood in the relation of a soul, the producer being as it were identified with the produced.

Anaxagoras was the first who distinctly separated these notions from their mutual confusion. In his eyes the universe was perfectly distinct from the cause of its production; this cause had nothing in common with other beings; its nature was exclusively its own; it was one as it was eternal; it acted on the world as the workman on the materials supplied him. Thus the first cause, which had hitherto been considered to consist essentially in "power," was now distinguished by the attribute of "intelligence."

Secondly,-Up to this time the truth the most splendid, the most precious to humanity, had not been developed by an explicit demonstration. The multitude believed it from the instinct of nature and religion; the few who thought profoundly felt that the chain of effects must return to some first active cause in which there existed volition and thought, but they had not reduced this opinion to a methodical system or a harmony with the general laws of nature. Anaxagoras was the first who expressly announced the connexion of the phenomenon of nature; their intimate union; that they formed part of a great whole, governed by a supreme law, and that this unity consists in an intelligence omnipotent, omniscient, and uncontrollable.

It is remarkable that no such demonstration as this was possible until the ideas of magic, genii, and all supernatural agents were banished from the creeds of wise men. But the history of the human intellect is replete with examples of the obstacles thrown in the way of healthy notions of religion by the trammels of superstition.

When Anaxagoras proclaimed this great revelation of reason, he was accused of impiety, prosecuted, and thrown into prison, and flight alone saved him from the vengeance of the priesthood and the blind fury of the rabble. His crime was the having said the stars were not gods, and astrology a fable.

As the day-star at its first rising is confounded with the mists of the horizon, so imperfect were the earlier views on the subject of a first cause. As the day-star in its progress becomes the isolated monarch of the heavens, so was the idea of a first cause exalted in the doctrines of Anaxagoras.

We must not, however, suppose this great man to have been exempt from errors. But a short view of the opinions attributed to him will better enable us to appreciate the march of his intellect.

Devoted by inclination to the study of physical science, he brought to it a spirit of observation which made him suspect the truth of many

modern discoveries; as for instance, the weight of the atmosphere. Following the traces of his precursors in science, he began with the axiom-"Nothing comes of nothing." Hence he deduced that all which is results from that which has been; that there were certain immutable, indivisible, eternal elements; that these elements are of various natures, and contain in themselves the germ of what appertains afterwards to their compounds.

All these elements mixed and confounded formed chaos. This chaos was motionless, dead as it were, and enveloped in a boundless ether, so that there existed no void.

It was necessary then that there should exist some cause independent of this chaos which might give its elements form and motion. This cause is the supreme intelligence; for intelligence alone can be a principle of order, and all that is good and fitting emanates from it alone.

This intelligence must embrace all; the past, the present, and the future. Its power is immeasurable; its activity spontaneous. It is pure and free from all mixture, therefore it is independent of all subjection or influence, therefore it is infinite and eternal.

Some doubts have arisen as to whether he established an absolute distinction between matter and spirit; it being supposed by some that the substance of his divinity was the ether. But there seems to be no good foundation for these misgivings, as he expressly places the air and ether under the agency of the supreme intelligence. And his not using the word God to name his first cause, is sufficiently explained by the base purposes to which that sacred word was then prostituted.

The following trite sentences will end our sketch of Anaxagoras's system of philosophy. "Three principal acts show the power of the first cause-First, it impresses motion; Secondly, it collects the elements proper for co-organization; Thirdly, it decomposes existing bodies, in order to form new ones from their wrecks. This intelligence penetrates all, governs all, presents itself in all things. It is itself the principle of life." We have no account of the moral doctrines of Anaxagoras, but the course of his life affords examples superior to any maxims in their utility. Possessed of a competent fortune, he preferred the study of science to the enjoyment of it, and courageously endured the persecutions of fanaticism which attended the continuance of his favourite pursuits.

After Anaxagoras, the names of two more Ionian philosophers occur; Diogenes, of Apollonia, and Archelaus, of Miletum, both of whom taught at Athens. But as they rather confused than refined on the doctrines he had disseminated, it is not necessary to enter into any further detail of them or their opinions, the more particularly as they seem not to have been men of any very remarkable ability. We shall here then take leave of the Ionian school of philosophy, making this remark to conclude, That the first ideas of the formation of the universe were derived from the analogy of the industrious arts, with this exception, the workman and the matter he laboured on were supposed to be co-existent, that the latter was inherent in the former. Thales, the Ionian, was the first who expressly separated these ideas, and to him is due all the honour of founding the new school.

THE THEATRE OF SAN CARLO, AT NAPLES, AND MADAME MALIBRAN.

"Oui, Monsieur, certainement: les lois, l'eglise, le gouvernement, l'etat, sont quelque chose,-mais, Monsieur, les acteurs, et les actrices!"

WHENEVER Our community shall be smitten with a universal monomania, it will be upon the subject of the necessaries of life. The necessaries of life! We English are constantly talking of the neces saries of life! What are they? Is there actually such a class of things in existence? or is it only necessary that the human imagination should always have something to pine and to pant after? The latter hypothesis strikes me as being by far the most probable; otherwise we should find the different nations of the earth, much better agreed than they really are, in deciding what is the summum bonum, the TO Kaλov which is to furnish the material substance of their chiefest happiness.

Deprive an Esquimaux of his oil and seal's flesh, and you instantly convert him into a miserable man. What is a Scotsman,without "the dew of his native hills?" What is he, but a miserable man? What is an Englishman, cut off from his hot joint and bottle of port? What is a German, if you pull the pipe from his mouth, and withhold the beer-jug from his lips? What is the Frenchman, without vanity? What is the Irishman, without a row? What are they all, but iniserable men? But what is their misery, compared with that of the Neapolitan, if you shut up his theatre? His misery is comparable to no other state of mortal torture, that can be imagined. He is, like Satan, supreme in misery.

The Neapolitan careth not for train-oil or seal's flesh, as doth the Esquimaux. He would as soon swallow a lump of lava, hot from Vesuvius, as drink a glass of "whusky" with the canny Scotchman. He would much sooner commit murder, than dine, with the Englishman, off an underdone leg of mutton. Beer he loveth not much; and tobacco he detests; vanity he hath none; nor doth the bump of pugnaciousness appear upon his cranium :-but the theatre! 'the theatre is his necessary of life, his heart's delight, his soul's darling! Shut that, and you either crush his spirit, or rouse it to desperation, according to the peculiar disposition of the unfortunate individual. The latter event is much the more likely to happen. San Carlo was burnt down :-within three hundred days after the fire was quenched, it was rebuilt by the government with increased splendour. The liberality and magnificence of the monarch were lauded to the skies: but some praise is due to his wisdom; since, next to a rise in the price of ice, no other national misfortune would be so sure to create a revolution.

In short-what meat, drink, air, and clothing are to another man, the stage (including all its varieties, from San Carlo, down to the puppet show of the Creation of the World, in three acts) is to the Neapolitan. Turn him out of house and home, he would not much