The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-01 00:00:00

MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

This periodical would be far more popular
Clan it is, were it not for the frequency of its
essays on subjects so vague and mystical, as to
keep the reader in a constant state of perplexity.
In the present Number, for instance, we find an
article entitled " Foreign. Aids to Self-Intelli-
gence, designed for an Historical Introduction
to the study of Ontological Science, preparatory
to a Critique of Pure Being." We have read
this article with some attention, but candidly
confess that we can make little or nothing of it.
There is, here and there, some acute reasoning
ia it, but sense is so mixed up with jargon, and
there is such an obvious want of a lucid arrange-
ment of ideas throughout it, that we are com-
pelled to abandon in despoil- the task of getting
at-tite writer's meaning. "On the Date of the
Introduction of Painted Glass," informS us—and
this is its only nietit—that the " use of painted
glass for the ornament of churches Was estab-
lished in the fifth century," which is a much
earlier date than we should have thought of as-
signing to this ornamental experiment. The
" Diplomacy of Society" is an ingenious es-
say, not wanting in a certain free and
easy play of arch humour. " English Wits" is
a memoir of Congreve, accompanied by a brief
criticism on the works of this witty comic dra-
matist, which still continue to charm us, de-
spite the clumsiness of their plots, and the glar-
ing improbability of all their chief personages.
The critic is right when he observes that Sheri-
dan was a close imitator of Congreve. Had the
one never written the " Double Dealer," the
other would never have written " The School for
Scandal." On the •" Christ Rejected, of West,"
is a graceful poem by the Rev. Robert Oxlad—a
somewhat unmusical name for a singing bird cf
Parnassus. "Leaves from the Fragment of a
Life" is a prose tale of average merit.

THE POLYTECHNIC JOURNAL.
The first article of F. Winslow, Esq., " Author
of the Anatomy of Suicide," &c., contains some
singular facts, illustrating the wonderful changes
produced on the animal frame by cold. Indeed,
so singular are they, that but for the respectable
names by which they are attested, we should
have classed them with the tales and lies of the.
Munchausen school; and, notwithstanding the
authorities, we believe many readers will still be
sceptical, so contrary are many of them to the
ordinary laws of nature. In short the treatise is
interesting, not only in this respect, but for the
sound practical advice it affords to persons who,
from necessity or choice, remove from one tem-
perature to another. " The popular practice,"
says the writer, " of waiting till a degree of cool-
ness has taken place before quitting a hot room,
or before going into a cold bath, is dangerous in
the extreme. It is questionable whether any
person ever re2eived an injury from cold after
leaving a heated assembly, if he left while he
continued warm, and either by exercise in the
air, or by a warm covering, kept up that warmth
in some degree till he arrived at home." On the
authority of Dr. Currie, nothing can be more
dangerous for persons in a state of perspiration,
who wish to bathe, than waiting on the edge of
the bath, or at the water side till, they are per-
fectly cooled. They ought to plunge in at once, to
avoid sudden chillness, often of the most ul..lng.e-
-rous character. The following are a few of tiie
most remarkable instances given of the effect of
cold: Bomare affirms that on the Andes there
are found some of the bodies of the first conque-
rors of South America, arrested by cold on their
passage to Peru in quest of gold. They are still
piieserved with all they carried with them, and
in the various attitudes in which they were frozen
and surprised by death some 300 years ago.
Izaak. Walton, on the authority of Gesner, gives
an account of some large breams being put into
a pond which was frozen next winter into one
mass of ice, so that not one could be found, yet
they were all swimming about in spring as lively
as ever. Captain Franklin saw a carp leap about
with great vigour after it had been frozen for
thirty-six hours, with others that had been split
open with a hatchet like a piece of wood. And,
according to Gangiu, quoted by Fletcher in his
Physiology, there is a people in Moscovy who
die every year, about the 27th of November, and
are not restored to life till towards the end of April !
There is a curious article also on the duration of

coal in the TJnited Kingdom, from which it ap-
pears, that in the northern districts of England
and in Scotland, there is coal sufficient to supply
the current annual draught for a period of 1,727
years, independent of the vast beds in Wales,
which would supply all England for 2,000 years
more. The present generation may, therefore,
rest satisfied that they shall have coal fires at
least for the dura`ion of their lives.