TURNING to the bodily symptoms of simple melancholia, I need scarcely tell you that these are infinitely varied. As the despondency may be but the outgrowth of some visceral or constitutional disease, it may have corresponding with it any of those groups of bodily symp. toms which attend upon the visceral or constitutional diseases out of which it may arise. Thus in Emma B., in Ward 28, the bodily symptoms of simple melancholia are those which are recognised as characteristic of morbus

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... ; while in Anne C., Ward 25, they are those of chronic rheumatism and valvular disease of the heart. The symptoms of cancer of the stomach, chronic diarrhcea, tumours of the uterus, hepatic degenerations, and a multiplicity of other maladies, may be those of simple melancholia. There are, however, certain departures from physical health, which are present in so great a proportion of cases of the disorder which we are discussing, that they may be considered as having a more special relation to it, and may, therefore, be enumerated here. I. There are frequently painful feelings, such as a sense of weight, or vacancy, or throbbing, or actual pain in the head. These feelings may occupy the forehead or the coronal region-most frequently the latter-and are usually accompanied by giddiness, especially when any rapid movement is attempted, and by great insomnia. 2. There are frequently impairments of the special senses, which never, however, amount to hallucinations. The eyesight is dim; there are soundings in the ears; a constant bad taste is felt in the mouth; a numbness or hyperaesthesia is experienced in the hands and feet, or in some tract of skin. 3. There is frequently impairment of general nutrition, with impoverishment of the blood; the body becomes thin and wasted; the skin loses its softness, and is pale or of a dirty colour; and the muscles are feeble and relaxed. The pupils are dilated; the mucous membranes are exsanguine; and all the indications of anaemia are obvious. In extreme cases, a degree of leucocythoemia may be present, so that the blood under the microscope exhibits a distinct increase in the proportion of white cells. 4. There are frequently disturbances in the circulatory and respiratory systems ; the heart's action is irregular or tumultuous; attacks of palpitation come on from time to time, especially at night; there is a soft blowing cardiac murmur, ldudest at the base, and propagated along the great vessels; the pulse is feeble and compressible; the extremities are cold; the breathing is sighing in character. 5. The temperature is below the normal standard; it frequently falls as low as 96.8 deg., and rarely rises to 98.4 deg. 6. The digestive functions are frequently disordered; the tongue is loaded with a dirty white fur, or is red and irritable. There is complete anorexia, or a capricious appetite. There is vomiting, pyrosis, painful digestion, or dyspepsia, in some form; and the bowels are almost invariably constipated. 7. There is frequently derangement of the menstrual function, amenorrhcea, menorrhagia, or leucorrhoea. With reference to the causes of simple melancholia, I may be very brief, as we have quite recently, in our systematic lectures, considered the etiology of insanity in general, and have dwelt at length upon those moral causes which are so productive of mental depression. Only upon one or two points is it desirable that I should make a few remarks. Hereditary tendency to insanity of course plays an influential part in t-he causation of melancholia, and so do diathetic tendencies. Persons of a melancholic or bilious temperament are apt to become morbidly depressed by a mere aggravation of their native disposition, and persons of nervous temperament by the irritation and exhaustion which their vivacity and susceptibility engender. A certain mental weakness or intense sensitiveness is perhaps necessary for development of melancholia, even when it is induced by moral causes. A truly courageous t man will not become melancholic, for a substratum of fear is an essent tial condition of the disorder. A truly strong nature will never flinch, even when. assailed by the fiercest calamities. We cannot imagine c Jeanie Deans, even in the depth of her misfortune, wavering or sink-I ing under despair. John Knox was never cast down when toiling as I a galley-slave. Convicts go mad by dozens, but no martyr has ever been reprieved on the ground of insanity. But this mental weakness or sensitiveness, which is the condition of melancholia, is very prevalent amongst us, and is fostered by many of the circumstances of our modern life. In our haste to grow rich, we overstrain our strength and exhaust our energies. We rise up early and late take rest, and disquiet ourselves with doubts and rivalries and ambitions. There is none of the severe husbanding of strength, that nice adaptation of exerted energy to the thing to be accomplished, which genuine education ought above all things to teach. We do our best to induce a nervous habit and to sap our physical vigour. In our rich and complicated civilisation, we are constantly imposing new burdens upon, and calling for fresh efforts from, our minds and brains, and it is no wonder that the nervous centres become disordered and unhinged. And loaded as we are, in our breadwinning and social intercourse, with anxieties and perturbations formerly unknown, we are at the same time deprived of those supports which might have rendered such anxieties endurable. "A believing love", says Emmerson, " will relieve us of a load of care"; and it is just this believing love that we have lost or cast from us. A want of reverence is abroad; all authority is questioned ; nothing exists but matter, force, and necessity; expediency is our only gtLide. At every step in life a man must ask himself not the simple question, whether the act is conformable to a known standard, but the ,infinitely complex and embarrassing question, which Omniscience alone can adequately answer, as to what will be its effects and results in a variety of contingent circumstances. At every bereavement in life a man is left desolate and inconsolable, and with no warm hope or spiritual comfort to which to turn. Doubt and infidelity have been sown everywhere. A dreary and appalling prospect has been spread out before our race. I have endeavoured to satisfy you, gentlemen, that insanity is increasing amongst us; and I have now to express to you my firm conviction, founded upon my professional experience, that much of that increase is to be attributed to the miserable materialistic philosophy which is now so assiduously disseminated. With just enough reason in it to captivate a shallow soul in the hour of its complacency and vanity, it cannot sustain it in the time of trial and adversity. He who has got rid of the supernatural has not cast out fear. Faith is necessary to mental health; and much of the mental infirmity and despondency which we see around us is due to a want of faith. Illustrations of what I have just said are of course most frequently found amongst the more refined and cultivated classes; but even in pauper asylums they are to be met with. We have here now a youth named Addison B., 22 years of age, a coaldealer from Halifax, who is labouring under melancholia, which was undoubtedly brought on by the reading of atheistical books. He was converted to atheism, his mind became bewildered and oppressed, and he is now under treatment in this asylum. In no form of insanity will you find moral treatment more efficacious than in simple melancholia. Being but a functional derangement, it is accessible to functional modifications. Then the comparative integrity of the powers of the mind, which are not directly involved in the disorder, affords facilities for counteracting the predominant morbid feelings. The great object is to break up the monopoly of grief and fear which has obtained possession of the mind; and if a new interest can be awakened, or a hope insinuated, this object is in great part attained. If we can once fix the attention upon any relief or happiness which is capable of attainment, we have made much way towards recovery. If we can inspire, by our assurances, any uncertain glimmering hope of restoration, we have ministered powerfully to composure and serenity of mind. Thus it is that the words and bearing of a physician are sometimes more consoling and healing than the medicines which he prescribes. If, however, confidence cannot be communicated, atter.-