f elder brethren,
found herself at the head of a mansion in Belgravia, and of an ancient
family. This lady's pride of place, and contempt for all beneath her,
exceeds any thing I have ever yet seen or heard of; and, one evening,
when she was canvassing the claims of a few _parvenu_ families in her
usual _tranchant_ and haughty manner, an impulse urged me to cry, at the
top of my voice: "Madam, your father was a little pork-butcher--you know
he was!"

In vain I tried to forget the fact; in vain I held my hands over my
mouth to prevent my shouting out these words. The more I struggled
against it, the more powerful was the impulse; and I only escaped it by
rushing headlong from the room and from the house. When I gained my own
chambers, I was so thankful that I had avoided this gross impertinence
that I could not sleep.

This strange thralldom to a morbid prompting not unfrequently has its
outlet in crimes of the deepest dye. When Lord Byron was sailing from
Greece to Constantinople, he was observed to stand over the sleeping
body of an Albanian, with a poniard in his hand; and, after a little
time, to turn away muttering, "I should like to know how a man feels who
has committed a murder!" There can be no doubt that Lord Byron, urged by
a morbid impulse, was on the very eve of knowing what he desired; and
not a few crimes have their origin in a similar manner. The facts exist;
the evidence is here in superabundance; but what to do with it? Can a
_theory_ be made out? I sit and reflect.

There are two contending parties in our constitution--mind and matter,
spirit and body--which in their conflicts produce nearly all the ills
that flesh is heir to. The body is the chief assailant, and generally
gains the victory. Look how our writers are influenced by bile, by
spleen, by indigestion; how families are ruined by a bodily ailment
sapping the mental energy of their heads. But the spirit takes its
revenge in a guerilla war, which is incessantly kept up by these morbid
impulses--an ambuscade of them is ever lurking to betray the
too-confident body. Let the body be unguarded for an instant, and the
spirit shoots forth its morbid impulse; and if the body be not very
alert, over it goes into the sea, into the house-tops, or into the
streets and jails. In most wars the country where the fighting takes
place suffers most: in this case man is the battle-ground; and he must
and will suffer so long as mind and matter, spirit and body,