are they a subject for
scientific controversy or disputation. A knowledge of the truth is not
produced by disputations and quarrels, but only by direct perception,
experience, and understanding. The conclusions which man arrives at by
logic are merely productive of certain opinions, and these opinions
are liable to be changed again as soon as the basis from which his
logic started, changes. A real knowledge of spiritual truths requires
a power of spiritual perception, which few men possess. Nevertheless,
even our logical deductions, taking as a starting point that which we
know to be true, will help us to arrive at the same conclusions at
which the Hermetic philosophers arrived by the power of spiritual
perception.

[In the foregoing passage, Dr. H. professes to state doctrines
derived from intuition or spiritual perception by the ancients,
and also recognized to-day by spiritual perception. To me they
appear as the results only of that sort of ancient SPECULATION,
which recognized earth, air, fire, and water as the four
chemical elements of all things. I do not find them sustained by
the spiritual perception of those who have the intuitive powers
to-day, nor by scientific investigation. The substance of the
heart is _not the seat of life_. It is a merely muscular
substance, and ceases all action when separated from its
controlling ganglia. The vitality of the heart lies in its
ganglia--in other words, in the nervous system, _in which alone
is life_, and of which the brain is the commanding centre. That
life resides exclusively in the nervous system is one of the
established principles of physiology, which cannot be disturbed
by any theories descending from antiquity, before the dawn of
positive science. That the will resides in the blood and the
heart, is about as near the truth as Plato's doctrine that the
prophetic power belonged to the liver. If the region of Firmness
in the brain be large, it will be strongly manifested, even
though the heart be feeble, and as easily arrested as Col.
Townsend's. But if the upper surface of the brain be diseased,
or sensibly softened, the will power is almost destroyed, even
if the plethoric, hypertrophied heart is shaking the head with
its power. Many an individual of a delicate frame, has
overpowered by firmness and courage stout, muscular men of far
larger hearts. That th