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Farmer O'Leary of Elkton, Minnesota, is over 112. Noah Raby of Plainfield, New Jersey, is in his 115th year. He supports himself by his work in the summer, and looks like a man of 80.

Of very recent deaths we have: Amos Hunt of Barnesville, Georgia, who died at 105, leaving twenty-three of his twenty-eight children. Mrs. Raymond of Wilton, Connecticut, was still living recently in her 106th year. Ben Evans, part Indian, part negro, a great hunter of Wilkes County, Georgia, died at 107; baptized after he was 100. Mrs. Betsy L. Moody died on the 4th of July in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, aged 104. Wm. Henry Williams of Cincinnati, died a few months ago at 102. James Fitzgerald of Prince Edwards Island, over a hundred years old, is still able to work. Mrs. Lydia Van Ranst lately died on East 16th Street, New York, aged 100 years and ten months; and Mrs. Johanna O'Sullivan in Boston in her 103d year. Mrs. Betsy Perkins of Rome, N. Y., was apparently in excellent health when she died suddenly at the breakfast table in her 101st year. Rev. Hugh Call died in Wayne County, Indiana, at 104. After his hundredth year he once fancied death was near, and sent for his family to see him die; but when they arrived in midwinter, they found the old man busy cutting wood to make a fire for his visitors.

Many of these examples show that the faculties of both soul and body ought to be maintained in good condition to the last, as fruit falls from the trees ripe and perfect. When we leave our earthly tenement, we ought to leave it in a respectable condition, and not carry any infirmities from it to the better world.

Kemarkable Fasting.

"SIGNOR Merlatti, a young Italian, completed in Desember his. fifty days' fast, at the Grand Hotel, Paris, in time to enjoy the festivities of the holidays. Unlike his rival, Succi, he partook of no mysterious elixir, but existed on water alone. At the conclusion of his feat, he was so nearly dead that the surgeons were anticipating by way of dissection more light on the effects of privation from food. He was barely able to move about without help. His stomach was unable to hold any solids, and at the big banquet over which he presided he could not have had a very convivial time, as he was unable to take a mouthful of food. He has since gradually recovered. Succi, meanwhile, is engaged in another fast. He fences and takes any amount of exercise, to show that his mysterious liquid is what does it. "

This is a little over the record of Dr. Tanner, but the result is very different. Dr. Tanner came out in good condition, with a splendid and healthy appetite. In the first twenty-four hours he ate something every hour or two, indulging largely in watermelons, milk, apples, beefsteak, potatoes, English ale, and Hungarian wine. He gained eight and a half pounds weight in thirty hours. Everybody was astonished, and the doctors were confounded; the crowd.

cheered, and the music resounded as the fast was finished and the feasting began in Clarendon Hall, the doctor being in as good health and spirits as when he began, except as to physical strength. Now it is proper to mention what I believe has not before been published, having been carefully concealed by Dr. Tanner As he was encountering the whole force of a brutal prejudice in the medical profession, and trickery and falsehood were used to defeat him by Dr. Hammond and Dr. Landon C. Gray, (a shabby story indeed, if the whole truth is ever told,) Dr. Tanner did not think it safe to elicit any additional hostility by confessing his mediumship.

The whole performance was a triumph of spiritual power! Dr. Tanner came to me in New York to aid him in giving a demonstration of his fasting power, which had been denied in an insolent and scurrilous manner by Dr. Hammond and others. Dr. Hammond, with a great deal of duplicity and unfairness, evaded the test, and it was carried out with the aid of other parties in a very satisfactory

manner.

The organization of Dr. Tanner was not such as I would have selected for a fasting performance, and he did not undertake it on his own resources alone. He was thoroughly a medium, and, when in my parlor, Indian spirits would take control of him, and carry him through a lively performance, speaking through his lips, and promising to sustain him through the fast; and they did. I have no doubt that with a suitable organization, such as is more frequently found in India than in America, a fast could be sustained by spirit power for six or twelve months. Indeed, there are records of such fasts in the old medical authors, which are omitted in all recent works. The spirit of dogmatic scepticism had carried the medical profession generally into such a depth of ignorance on these subjects that Dr. Landon C. Gray declared that a forty days' fast had never occurred, and that if Dr. Tanner attempted it, it must be assumed "that he will cheat at every turn.

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The kind of sentiment cultivated by colleges in the medical profession was shown by the deportment of the medical visitors. The report of the fast says:

"The most curious episodes, probably, on the whole, were afforded by the appearance of sceptics, and members of the medical profession from the country. Many of the latter came long distances to satisfy their respective curiosity, or vent their scepticism, as the case might be. As a rule they were long-visaged, not a few were unkempt, and many were downright seedy in wearing apparel. Almost invariably they insisted upon boring the doctor with numberless questions, many of which were idle. The majority displayed ignorance, and it might truthfully be said, they were rude almost without exception. One man insisted upon feeling Dr. Tanner's arms and legs; another wanted to feel his pulse; a third demanded a view of his tongue; a fourth declared food must be given to him surreptitiously, else he would be dead; a fifth wanted to search his pockets; the sixth asserted his professional reputation (sic) that there was fraud about the whole business; the seventh had some

patent surgical, or other appliance, which he wished to test upon the patient; and yet another wanted to analyze even the water he used, before the faster drank it.

"The effect of these boors in their constant inroads upon a fasting man, whose surroundings and conditions were not of the best, to say the least, may be easily imagined. When these fanatics were prevented by the watchers from extracting what little of life was left in the object of their devotions, their indignation took various forms of expression. As a rule they denounced the whole thing as a humbug, and every one participating as frauds. Now and then it became positively necessary, in common decency and self-respect, to show these charlatans the way to the door, notwithstanding their protests that they had paid twenty-five cents for the purpose of ventilating their empty heads. As a general thing, by Dr. Tanner's direction, the admission fee was returned to these people. Even on the thirtyninth day, when the doctor desired all the quiet he could obtain, one of these gentry, who said he was a physician from Long Island, talked so loudly that he had to be called to order, and then nothing daunted, he asked the faster to go in his enfeebled condition to the south gallery, where his writing materials were, to prepare an autograph for the applicant. The Herald reporter on watch at the time, through whom the request was made for the autograph, gave the fellow a settler by remarking, that he, as a layman, thought the first rudiments taught in the medical profession, were those of feelings of humanity.

"Then the wits had their time of it. They showered in caricatures and dogge by the barrel. None enjoyed these more than the doctor himself. By his direction the funniest of the cartoons were pasted against the wall of the gallery in which the doctor slept and the watchers sat. Above the whole was the legend in German text, Tanner Art Gallery,' and during the closing days and hours of the fast it was a source of much attraction and a great deal of merriment to the thousands of visitors who sought the place.

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Before the fasting began I witnessed an amusing specimen of the medical scepticism. One of the medical visitors inspected the hall closely, and finding in the back part that a piece of nearly worn out carpet remained on the floor, proceeded to rip it up and tear it away, as if he suspected there might be a trap door concealed.

Medical education has been miserably cramped and benighted by the total ignoring of the nobler element of the human constitution.

Cerebral Psychology.

THE Comprehensive system of science developed by experiment on the brain, perfected by psychometric exploration, demonstrated by pathognomy, corroborated by personal experiences and the sensations of the head, enforced and illustrated by the study of comparative development throughout the animal kingdom, based upon anat

omy, illustrated by pathology, and proven by every examination of a living head, as well as every scientific experiment upon the brain in sensitive and intelligent persons, has now been for forty years in the hot crucible of experimental physiological investigation by vivisection, ablation, autopsy, and electricity, and still remains as the solid gold of eternal science.

The labors of Ferrier, Fritsch, Hitzig, Schiff, Bastian, Charcot, and others, have added many valuable facts; but no new fact can contradict a fact previously well observed, and nothing has occurred to dethrone the founder of cerebral science, Dr. Gall, who ranks immeasurably beyond all his contemporaries, and who prepared the way for the full development of Cerebral Psychology, resulting from the discovery of the impressibility of the brain, which has opened the entire realm of cerebral psychology, and through that has given us access to every realm of wisdom.

The long expected and long promised work upon this subject cannot be published now, for it requires an amount of elaborate research and criticism to bring the new discoveries en rapport with the investigations of more than a hundred physiologists and anatomists, whose labors should not be overlooked in a complete or systematic work uniting anatomy to psychology.

Under these circumstances it is necessary and practicable, since my "System of Anthropology" has been entirely out of the market for thirty years, to present a concise exposition of cerebral psychology and physiology, to satisfy those who perceive the inadequacy of the Gallian system, and who are aware that my discoveries have thoroughly revolutionized as well as enlarged cerebral science, rendering the old term phrenology inadequate to express its present status.

I propose therefore to publish in the successive numbers of this Journal a concise "Synopsis of Cerebral Science," giving as concisely as possible the outlines of that vast theme, in so clear and practical a manner that each reader can test its truth in nature by examining character, correcting the errors of phrenology, demonstrating the science by his own experiments, and applying its principles in the treatment of disease, in experimental investigation, in education, self-culture, and elocution. This may satisfy the urgent present demand, until time shall permit a satisfactory work, containing the illustrations and proofs, the important modern discoveries in cerebral anatomy and vivisecting experiments, as well as the vast and interesting philosophy into which we are led by cerebral The March number will contain the first instalment, and its publication will be continued through the volume.

science.

Music.

THE claims of music were never so throughly presented as in the "New Education," in which it was shown that music was the most effective of all agents for the cultivation of man's higher nature, and the elevation of the world from its purgatory of selfishness, poverty,

and crime. This idea was most fully realized by MRS. ELIZABETH THOMPSON, who has spent a considerable amount in promoting the currency and use of music, especially of a religious character.

The idea that music should exercise a world redeeming power, and promote all social advancement, must appear strange, when first mentioned to those who are familiar only with fashionable operatic performances and the heartless style of vocal and instrumental music in vogue at the centres of musical education, which is robbed as thoroughly as possible of all ethical life, all soul inspiring power. There is music, however, which sways our noblest emotions. which can bring smiles to the face or tears to the eyes, hope to the dejected or courage to the timid, - which can rouse the strongest impulses of love and duty. The musical reformer who shall change the tide of popular music from its present low channels to that higher sphere of sweet and noble sentiments, will be far more than a Wa agner,-aye, more than a Luther.

Dr. Talcott, Superintendent of the Middleton, N. Y., State Asylum of the Insane, has introduced music into all of the wards of his institution with excellent results, judging from his last annual report, from which the following is extracted. "It is said, that before Moses dwelt upon the banks of the Nile, the Egyptians erected temples and altars for the treatment of the insane; and, among the most notable measures for the accomplishment of the cure of lunatics, music took an exalted rank. There can be no doubt that music exercises a potent influence in producing calm and restfulness in minds which are disturbed by cerebral diseases. Musical instruments have been provided in nearly every ward, and the results have been most favorable. Even turbulent patients will subside when the pleasures of music are afforded to them. One of the most effective attendants we ever had upon our disturbed wards was a good musician. After his work was done, he would sit down among his patients, and play upon the violin. Immediately the most excited persons in the ward would group themselves about him, and listen with profound attention so long as he continued to play for them. Where good music can be provided for the turbulent insane, there exists but little necessity for restraint of a physical nature."

Insanity.

THE tendency of modern civilization is toward insanity. It is increasing throughout christendom, and far more where the boasted influences of modern education and the so-called progress are most fully realized. The whole fabric of education and society is unsound, and this is proved by the results.

A true civilization advancing in wisdom must develop the ability to correct its own evils, but the civilization that we have is drifting on, downward and helpless.

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