(From wind or spirit). The mind.

The body and the mind reciprocally affect each other; whatever invigorates the body, renders the faculties of the soul proportionably active and strong: what depresses the strength lessens the spirit, the resolution, and the more active intellectual faculties.

The circulation of the blood not only unites the soul with the body, but also governs and directs its operations; with the circulation of the blood, the animal and-vital functions continue: they vary, and cease to be, according as the circulation varies or ceases. To preserve, then, the faculties of each, we must attend to the health of both.

The regulation of the mind is consequently a subject of the highest importance, and must be considered at some length; both as it affects individuals adapted for different employments, as necessary to the preservation of health, and as a means of alleviating disease, and assisting the powers of medicine. The medicina mentis has not, perhaps, obtained a sufficient share of attention; and the few dissertations by Hoffman, Boerhaave, and Gaubius, have scarcely elucidated so intricate a subject,

It has been long since observed, that the most furious and courageous animals possessed strong fibres, a rich glutinous blood, and solids remarkably firm. The bones of the lion are said to be capable of striking fire with steel. These corresponding states of mind and body are supported by large supplies of animal food; and we animate the spirit of cocks fed for combat, of horses for speed, and of pugilists, by food of a nourishing power beyond the usual standard, which will afford strength, without overfilling the vessels.

A more calm and steady exertion of mind, a collected coolness, and an accurate discrimination of circumstances, in general similar, are connected with a very different state of body. The fever, excited by high diet, will not fit a person for duties of this kind. The sleep must be calm and undisturbed; the stomach not oppressed with crudities; the vessels not overfilled; the secretions neither obstructed nor preternaturally propelled. It is the state in which the student will best succeed; it is that to which the gamester, with unremitted attention, brings his constitution; and it is that perhaps most consistent with the best state of the intellectual faculties. Yet a habit of study cannot be long indulged with perfect impunity. This regular co-operation of body and mind is disturbed by the late hours which sometimes study demands; by the inactivity which persevering attention occasions. To the regular, calm performance of the functions succeeds from these causes a mind agitated and irritable; a stomach loaded with flatulence; bowels oppressed by accumulations. The powers of the mind are heightened to unusual quickness, and the body seems to want the activity thus diverted to other purposes. Yet the mind is a considerable gainer by the exchange. Fancy is -more alive; analogies, remote and in general unperceived, become obvious; the imagination active, embodies airy nothings, and gives form, shape, and semblance, with hues more vivid than nature would own. The body, however, sinks under the exertion; and the irritable, sleepless, jaundiced, student, is the prey to the natural ills in consequence of his own irregularities, and to those which his imagination, thus exalted, portrays; happy to lose them in insensibility, or to exhibit an example how low human intellect can sink, as well as to what a height it can soar.

Indolence, combined with free luxurious living, gives another turn to the intellectual faculties. The vessels overloaded, produce languor, an incapacity for exertion, and at last a real, unconquerable debility. In this state, too, the mind equally suffers. Listlessness, inactivity, and lethargy, come on; the mind and body, equally torpid, sink together, and no cause of debility produces effects so difficultly subdued. Abstinence, even conducted with caution, occasions fainting; exercise is attended with the most distressing fatigue; and the abridgment of the long protracted slumbers induces even a worse languor than it was intended to relieve. An entire loss of sleep and of appetite, as well as of memory, and sometimes of reason, are the consequences.

Great exertions of mind and body are not attended with effects so fatal. If united, they seem scarcely injurious. Exertions of body alone, if regular occasional sleep is allowed, do little harm; and exertions of mind, though strong and long continued, with moderate attention to hours of relaxation and rest, are not very injurious. The sailor and the mathematician are, perhaps, the persons who afford the strongest examples of each, and both have been remarkable for longevity.

The indulgence of passions, in every instance, undermines the constitution. The present subject con-tines us to mental passions. Anger, in excess, is a short madness, and unfits every man for careful enquiry and examination. Fear deprives us of our resources, and grief depresses every bodily function. Even joy, by extreme animation, has been fatal; and love, absorbing every other feeling, has, even when successful, been little less injurious. In short, every passion should be kept in due subordination, and regulated by reason and judgment.

We are thus brought to the next part of our enquiry - the regulation of the mind, as necessary to the preservation of health. The Almighty, when he gave us passions, bestowed also reason and judgment. By the due subordination of the former to the latter we obtain the chief good, mens sana in corpore sano. Yet it is with passions as with other causes of disease; they are hurtful only in excess. They are given to vary the dull uniformity which, without them, would ensue; to agitate the stagnant lake, which might otherwise become putrid and injurious. Our hopes, our fears, our joys, and sorrows, become useful stimuli to the intellectual system, as wine, and sometimes high foods, to the material. The torpid misanthrope, and the most strictly temperate men, are seldom healthy or long lived. The principle within us, which regulates our systems, which corrects our deviations, and urges us to the supply of our wants, languishes for want of action, as the muscle no longer exercised loses its power. In short, our frame is adapted for action: let the causes of activity cease, and we can no longer exist. Let not this be considered as the language of Brunoniasm, or the apology for excess. We disapprove of each: but a man may.vary his habits without becoming a glutton or a drunkard; and may speak the language of common observation, without being wedded to a sect.