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his purpose which he could possibly have selected, this proposition seems to me altogether unfounded. We cannot, indeed, decompose them in a crucible, in the literal sense of these words; but is there no possibility of decomposing them by such experimenprocesses as are suited to the nature of the subject? Of this no better proof can be given than Berkeley's Theory of Vision, more particularly his analysis of the means by which experience enables us to judge of the distances and magnitudes of objects. It is, at least, an attempt towards an experimental decomposition of our perceptions; and, in my opinion (although I have always thought that much is still wanting to render the theory completely satisfactory), a most successful, as well as original attempt, so far as it goes. Numberless illustrations of the same thing might be produced from the subsequent speculations of Smith, Jurin, Porterfield, Reid, and others, with respect to those phenomena of vision which are immediately connected with the Philosophy of the Mind. Nor is it to this class of our perceptions alone, that the experimental researches of our predecessors have been confined. To draw the line between the original and acquired perceptions which we receive by some of our other senses, more especially by those of Hearing and of Feeling, is a problem equally difficult and interesting; and of which no pretended solution would, in the present times, attract one moment's notice, which rested on any other basis than that of experi

ment.

I have confined myself, in what I have now said,

to the researches of inductive philosophy concerning our Perceptions; because this is the instance upon which the critic himself has thought proper to fix. The extensive province, however, of experiment in the science of mind, will appear in an incomparably stronger light to those who follow out the subject, by observing the use which has been made of this organ of investigation, in analyzing the phenomena connected with some of our other intellectual powers; the phenomena, for example, of Attention, of Association, of Habit in general, of Memory, of Imagination; and, above all, those which are connected with the use of Language, considered as an instrument of thought and of reasoning.

The whole of a Philosopher's life, indeed, if he spends it to any purpose, is one continued series of experiments on his own faculties and powers; and the superiority he possesses over others, arises chiefly from the general rules (never, perhaps, expressed verbally even to himself) which he has deduced from these experiments ;-experiments, it must be granted, not carried on by such instruments as prisms or crucibles, but by an apparatus better suited to the intellectual laboratory which furnishes their materials. Of this remark I hope to be able to produce some new illustrations, in that part of the following volume in which I propose to examine the process by which the acquired power of Taste is gradually formed.

As to the minds of others, it is undoubtedly but seldom that we have the means of subjecting them to formal and premeditated experiments. But even

here, many exceptions occur to the general assertion which I am now combating. What is the whole business of Education, when systematically and judiciously conducted, but a practical application of rules deduced from our own experiments, or from those of others, on the most effectual modes of developing and of cultivating the intellectual faculties and the moral principles? I lay but little stress, comparatively, on those rare, though inestimable opportunities of gratifying an experimental curiosity, which are presented by the Blind and the Deaf, when they are qualified to give a distinct account of their peculiar perceptions, feelings, and habits of thought; nor on such extraordinary cases as that of the young man couched by Cheselden, whose simple and intelligent statement of what he experienced on his first introduction to the visible world, discovers powers of observation and of reflection, as well as of clear description, which do not appear to have been equalled in any of the similar instances which have since occurred.

To counterbalance the disadvantages which the Philosophy of Mind lies under, in consequence of its slender stock of experiments, made directly and intentionally on the minds of our fellow-creatures, Human Life exhibits to our observation a boundless variety, both of intellectual and moral phenomena; by a diligent study of which, we may ascertain almost every point that we could wish to investigate, if we had experiments at our command. The difference between observation and experiment, in this instance, considered as sources of knowledge, is

merely nominal; amounting to nothing more than this, that the former presents spontaneously to a comprehensive and combining understanding, results exactly similar to those, which the latter would attempt to ascertain by a more easy and rapid process, if it possessed the opportunity. Hardly, indeed, can any experiment be imagined, which has not already been tried by the hand of Nature; displaying, in the infinite varieties of human genius and pursuits, the astonishingly diversified effects, resulting from the possible combinations of those elementary faculties and principles, of which every man is conscious in himself. Savage society, and all the different modes of civilization;-the different callings and professions of individuals, whether liberal or mechanical;—the prejudiced clown ;—the factitious man of fashion ;-the varying phases of character from infancy to old age;-the prodigies effected by human art in all the objects around us ;-laws,-government,―commerce,-religion;—but, above all, the records of thought, preserved in those volumes which fill our libraries; what are they but experiments, by which Nature illustrates, for our instruction, on her own grand scale, the varied range of Man's intellectual faculties, and the omnipotence of Education in fashioning his Mind?

As to the remark, that "no metaphysician ex"pects, by analysis, to discover a new power, or to "excite a new sensation in the mind, as the che"mist discovers a new earth or a new metal," it is abundantly obvious, that it is no more applicable to the anatomy of the mind, than to the anatomy of

the body.

After all the researches of physiologists on this last subject, both in the way of observation and of experiment, no discovery has yet been made of a new organ, either of power or of pleasure, or even of the means of adding a cubit to the human stature; but it does not therefore follow that these researches are useless. By enlarging his knowledge of his own internal structure, they increase the power of man in that way in which alone they profess to increase it. They furnish him with resources for remedying many of the accidents to which his health and his life are liable; for recovering, in some cases, those active powers which disease has destroyed or impaired; and, in others, by giving sight to the blind, and hearing to the deaf, for awakening powers of perception which were dormant before. Nor must we overlook what they have contributed, in conjunction with the arts of the optician and of the mechanist, to extend the sphere of those senses, and to prolong their duration.

If we consider, in like manner, the practical purposes to which the anatomy of the Mind is subservient, we shall find the parallel infinitely to its advantage. What has Medicine yet effected in increasing the bodily powers of man, in remedying his diseases, or in lengthening life, which can bear a moment's comparison with the prodigies effected by Education, in invigorating his intellectual capacities; in forming his moral habits; in developing his sensitive principles; and in unlocking all the hidden sources of internal enjoyment? Nor let it be objected, that education is not a branch of the Philoso