which he is surrounded; the medium in which he moves, the atmosphere he breathes, and the chemistry of the food on which he subsists. As an intelligent exposition of the symptoms of disease requires an intimate knowledge of the nervous system, the students of the Medical Department of the University have been required, in order to ensure familarity with the separate and related functions of the ⚫erebrum, cerebellum, medulla oblongata, medulla spinalis, the par vagum, external respiratory or nerves of respiration, the offices of the different branches of the fifth pair, and the distinction between the afferent and efferent nerves. to study the works of such men as Bell, Hall, Lolly, Flourens, Majendie, Todd, Bowman, Bischoff, Philip and Lassaigne. To learn the properties of the gastric juice, they are referred to the experiments and writings of Spallanzani, Beaumont, Blondlot and Ch. Bernard. In order to be able to comprehend the consequences of the act of respiration, they are required to investigate the writings of Müller, Magnus, Bischoff, Edwards, La Grange, Hassenfratz, Collard de Martigny, Leibig, Crawford, Reid and Davy; and in order to a right understanding of the changes wrought by disease, and the proper use of remedies for morbid action, they are directed to study such post mortem explorations as were commenced by Bailey, and have been continued by Martinet, Hodgkin, Williams, Prout and Bright. With all becoming regard for the opinions of such of our fellow eitizens as have been led, by a belief in a dogma of the day, to petition the Legislature for the repeal of the statute regulating the practice of medicine and for the abolition of this department of the University, we would ask, in the name of the Board of Regents, what there remains to be taught the medical student to fit him for the discharge of the duties of his profession, which they have not made provision for? Is there any other way for the medical neophyte to acquire such knowledge as will admit him to a seat in the temple of the Coan sage than that pointed out, rugged though it be, in the University course? Or Shall the accumulated results of three thousand years of experience be laid aside, because there has arisen in the world a sect which, by engrafiing a medical dogma upon a spurious theology, have built up a system (so-called) and baptized it Homeopathy? Shall the High Priests of this spiritual school be specially commissioned by the Regents of the University of Michigan, to teach the grown up men of this age that the decillionth of a grain of sulphur will, if administered homoeopathically, cure seventenths of their diseases, whilst in every mouthful of albuminous food they swallow, every hair upon their heads, and every drop of urine distilled from the kidneys, carries into or out of their system as much of that article as would make a body, if incorporated with the required amount of sugar, as large as the planet Saturn? Shall they be appointed by this Board to tell men, whose skeletons contain twenty per centum of phosphorus, that this article, when its "spiritually dynamic power" is developed by trituration, will cure disease, if the patient inhale the aura from the pellets over a paralyzed surface, or apply them to the membrane of the intestinum rectum, at the same time that every kernel of wheat which goes to make up his daily food, if exalted by dynamic division, would furnish poison enough to destroy the Chinese Empire?* So of lime, which furnishes the foundation of his bony system; and so of carbon (charcoal) which constitutes a large proportion of the softer solids of his body. Now, as this Board have been taught that man is a material reality, originally formed of the dust of the earth, that he possesses the faculty of assimilating materials necessary to his growth, that he is liable to disease when operated upon by causes which disturb the laws of his being, that his body is the subject of death and will be of a resurrection, that as it is developed and sustained by the incorporation of material elements introduced from without, so its abnormal condition is to be removed by agents having physical properties capable of exalting the vital actions when depressed, and of repressing their force when unduly excited. Respectfully submitted. Ann Arbor, July 15, 1851. *NOTE. Z. PITCHER. In order that the foregoing may not appear to be merely a figure of speech, I have copied the following mathematical view of the results of homeopathic, trituration and solution, from Professor Lee's edition of Paris' Pharmacologia. The reader will please to recol lect that only one grain of medicine is employed for all the dilutions, no matter how inert the substance may be, as sponge, sulphur, charcoal and lime, and that the higher the dilution, the more potent the article becomes. Cubic feet of water, weight 62.5 lbs. to the foot. (Decimals rejected.) DILUTIONS. 5th. 22.587. 10th. 15th. 20th. 228,571,428.571,428. 2,285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714. 22,857,142,857,142,857,142,857,142,857,142.857. 25th. 228,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428, 571,428. 30th. 2.285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714,285, 714,285,714,285,714. Cubic feet of sugar-specific gravity, 1.6. (Decimals rejected.) DILUTIONS. 5th. 14,285. 10th. 15th. 20th. 25th. 857,142. 142,857,142,857,142. 1,428,571,428.571,428,571,428,571. 14,285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714,285,714,285. 142, 57,142,857,142,857,142,857,142,857,142,857,142, 30th. 1,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571,428,571 428,571,428,571. Diameter in feet and miles of a sphere of sugar whose solid contents are equal to the quantity in the preced ing calculations. (Decimals rejected.) Miles. Longest diameter of the orbit of the comet of 1680..13,000,000,000 Halley's comet...3,420,000,000,000 do do do Miles. Distance of the nearest fixed star... Greatest distance of the earth from the sun. 20,140,000,000,000 .97.118,53g do do do do Herschel.......1,918,059,022 Thus it appears that the 20th dilution would require a sphere of sugar more than half the diameter of the Sun's distance from the Earth, and a sphere of water about equal in diameter to the same distance; while the 30th would require a sphere of sugar in comparison with the diameter of which, the distance of Herschel from the earth would form but an infinitely small fraction! Hahnemann, however, recommends that the dilution in certain cases be carried as high as the 1500th, and remarks, "experience has proved that it is impossible to attenuate the dose of a perfectly homeopathic remedy to such a degree that it will not produce a decided amelioration of the disease." (Stratten's Trans. of Organon, p. 274.) Again, all the fresh water lakes in North America, including the great lakes at the North, are estimated to contain fourteen thousand cubic miles of water; but the eleventh dilution would require more than ten times this quantity of fluid. A grain of antimony dropped into Lake Superior, would therefore suf fice for centuries to medicate its waters; so that a teaspoonful, taken at the Falls of Niagara, would constitute a much stronger dose than the homoeopathists usually administer. It is demonstrable that a single rose. growing on the surface of the earth, or even on the planet Herschel, would be likely to effect each inhabitant on our globe, by its aroma, more powerfully than any homoeopathic medicine whatever, at the 30th dilution. (Am. Ed.) The composition of bone, urine, &c., having been referred to, I give the results below, for the information of the non-professional reader: Carbonate of lime, Oxide of iron & magonese, 1.05 Iron abounds in the red blood of animals. Phosphorus exists in the white and yolk of eggs, and in milk, and also in the seeds of grasses, as wheat, rye, oats, &c. Sulphur is found in flesh, in eggs and milk, and in small quantities in potatoes, cabbage, peas and cucumbers. Lime is universally diffused, and exists largely in the seeds of grasses, especially wheat flour. MEMORIAL OF ALVAH BRADISH. To the Hon. the Board of Regents of the University of Michigan: I beg to offer for the consideration of the Reg nts, some observations on the principles of the fine a ts and on taste; showing the advantages that would accrue to the University by the early introduction of their culture into that institution. In our country the fine arts are already acknowledged to be an important branch of education, though they have not been so geuerally adopted in our seminaries as educated men feel to be desirable. For the short period of our political existence, we have made very great progress in the production of fine works of art; and the estimate of the value of art has been greatly extended; while the love and respect for the labors of the pencil and chisel have taken a strong hold on popular favor. At an early period in our history, we were not deficient in distinguished names in art, such as West, Trumbull, Copley and others. These names commanded a respect wherever high art was reverenced, and in Europe, long before our literature and public men found favor, our distinguished artists and their productions were the medium of begetting for us among their philosophers and patriots a kindly and respectful consideration. In the mean time this talent has been enhanced among us in proportion to the growth of other elements of prosperity, till our artists are now known to every metropolis of the old world, and their productions will vie with the greatest that have been produced in modern times. This has been brought about, too, without the aid of princely patronage, without governmental protection, without State grants. American artists acknowledge the sound doctrine that the direct patronage of the State is not so safe a dependence as a popular love, founded on knowledge and general enlightened taste. We do not seek State patronage, but we are persuaded that art should be taught in our schools and seminaries, that the public may be provided with the means, and possess the previous training to build up in the mind intellectual taste, and a sound judgment in works of art as well as in poetry and literature. It cannot be doubted that a wide diffusion of good works of art will promote the cause of morals, religion and manners; nor will it be necessary for me to offer to your body the names of distinguished writers who have cordially commended a cultivation of the arts, and enforced a consideration for them by showing their adaptation to our natural and virtuous impulses, and their high value to the well being of society. Indeed, a cultivation of a pure taste has so direct and invariable a tendency to render persons more happy and better members of so |