The pathology of the human mind is a wonderful and intricate study, and it is a remarkable fact, with all our spread of knowledge and science, with the vast new fields of thought which are freshly opened every day in the educated world, what trifling advance we have made in the analysis of the mainspring and moving power that sets in motion the train of thought itself! Medical jurisprudence has only of late become a special study, and the psychology of the human mind, one of its most important branches--more than a mere ramification as it is often held-- is at best only a dead letter as yet to those who affect any acquaintance with the subject. Mental insanity is one of those topics, like the physiology of dreams, which embraces a large area for research and investigation; and even the best and latest of the physicians who have made this division of medical knowledge their especial field for enquiry, confess to what a very short distance their knowledge carries them. Hence, until very lately, not only was there no remedial treatment pursued, but arbitrary incarceration, strait-waistcoats, and chains, comprised all medical procedure towards our lunatics. Thank goodness, however, the broad light of science, reason, and common sense, has tended to dispel the black ignorance displayed by our forefathers towards our mental as well as bodily ills. Formerly drastics and phlebotomy, adopted alternately, were supposed to cure every disease and ailment of the human body, but that day is past now; and, so as in surgery and physic, a new path has been opened for the treatment of insanity. It is yet in its infancy; but many species of mania now deemed hopeless will before long, probably, succumb before judicious and efficacious ministering. One of the most hopeless forms of insanity, according to eminent authorities on the subject, is melancholia, but even this gives way under proper treatment. In cases of this kind, patients are but too often neglected, and the cure is left, ignorantly, to work out itself, which generally ends unsuccessfully; whereas, if the patient under treatment were led out of themselves as it were, their affliction ignored, and treated to just the company and influences which appear to affect them most, I believe in nine cases out of ten of so called settled melancholia, the unfortunate sufferer would be turned out cured after a time.