In farther prosecution of the argument against the importance of the science of Mind, it has been observed, that, "from the very nature of the sub"ject, it seems necessarily to follow, that all men "must be practically familiar with all the functions "and qualities of their minds, and with almost all "the laws by which they appear to be governed. Every one knows exactly what it is to perceive and "to feel, to remember, imagine, and believe; and though he may not always apply the words that "denote these operations with perfect propriety, it "is not possible to suppose that any one is ignorant "of the things. Even those laws of thought or "connections of mental operations that are not so "commonly stated in words, appear to be universal

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ly known, and are found to regulate the practice "of those who never thought of announcing them "in an abstract proposition. A man who never "heard it asserted, that memory depends upon at"tention, yet attends with uncommon care to any

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thing that he wishes to remember; and accounts "for his forgetfulness, by acknowledging that he "had paid no attention. A groom who never "heard of the association of ideas, feeds the young "war-horse to the sound of the drum; and the "unphilosophical artists that tame elephants and dancing-dogs, proceed upon the same obvious and "admitted principle."

This argument, I suspect, leads a little too far

6C nos connoissances. Entr'elles est un monde immense, l'abîme "des incertitudes et le théatre des découvertes."-Disc. Prelim, à l'Encyclop.

for the purpose of its author, inasmuch as it concludes still more forcibly (in consequence of the greater familiarity of the subject) against Physics, strictly so called, than against the science of Mind. The savage, who never heard of the accelerating force of gravity, yet knows how to add to the momentum of his missile weapons, by gaining an eminence :-though a stranger to Newton's third law of motion, he applies it to its practical use, when he sets his canoe afloat, by pushing with a pole against the shore-in the use of his sling, he illustrates, with equal success, the doctrine of centrifugal forces, as he exemplifies (without any knowledge of the experiments of Robins) the principle of the riflebarrel in feathering his arrow. The same groom who," in feeding his young war-horse to the sound "of the drum," has nothing to learn from Locke or from Hume concerning the laws of association, might boast, with far greater reason, that, without having looked into Borelli, he can train that animal to his various paces; and that, when he exercises him with the longe, he exhibits an experimental illustration of the centrifugal force, and of the centre of gravity, which was known in the riding-school long before their theories were unfolded in the Principia of Newton. Even the operations of the animal which is the subject of his discipline, seem to involve an acquaintance with the same physical laws, when we attend to the mathematical accuracy with which he adapts the obliquity of his body to the rate of his circular speed. In both cases (in that of man as well as of the brute), this practical knowledge is

obtruded on the organs of external sense by the hand of Nature herself; but it is not on that account the less useful to evolve the general theorems which are thus embodied with their particular applications; and to combine them in a systematical and scientific form, for our own instruction and that of others. Does it detract from the value of the theory of pneumatics to remark, that the same effects of a vacuum, and of the elasticity and pressure of the air, which afford an explanation of its most curious phenomena, are recognized in an instinctive process coeval with the first breath which we draw; and exemplified in the mouth of every babe and suckling?

When one of the unphilosophical artists of the Circus gallops his round, standing or dancing upon his horse's back, and tosses up an orange, which he is afterwards to receive on the point of a sword, he presents to us an exemplification of some physical truths, connected with the most refined conclusions of science. To say nothing of the centrifugal power, or of the centre of gravity, the single experiment of the orange affords an illustration of the composition of forces, so apposite and so palpable, that it would have furnished Copernicus with a triumphant reply to the cavils of his adversaries against the motion of the earth.

What an immense stock of scientific principles lie buried amid the details of manufactures and of arts! We may judge of this from an acknowledgment of Mr Boyle, that he had learned more by frequenting the shops of tradesmen than from all the volumes he had read.

How many beautiful exemplifications of the most sublime mechanical truths are every day exhibited by the most illiterate of the people! Nay, how great is the superiority, in point of promptitude and address, which some of these unphilosophical artists display, in circumstances where the most profound mechanician would be totally at a loss how to avail himself of his knowledge! The philosopher himself, the first time he is at sea, cannot cease to wonder, when he observes the theorems hitherto associated in his mind with mathematical diagrams, exemplified by every ship-boy on board; nor need he be ashamed to acknowledge his own incompetency to apply these theorems to their practical use, while he attempts to handle the ropes, or to steer the vessel. Still less, however, would he have reason, on this account, to conclude, that, in studying the composition and resolution of forces, he had made an acquisition of no intrinsic value.

The proper inference to be drawn from these and similar considerations, is so admirably expressed in the following passage, that I shall transcribe it without any comment. It is quoted from an obscure author by Sir Joshua Reynolds, and placed by him. in the front of his academical discourses, as an apology for his own disquisitions concerning some of the principles of painting.

"Omnia fere quæ præceptis continentur ab inge"niosis hominibus fiunt; sed casu quodam magis

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quam scientia. Ideoque doctrina et animadversio “adhibenda est, ut ea quæ interdum sine ratione "nobis occurrunt, semper in nostrâ potestate sint;

"et quoties res postulaverit, a nobis ex præparato "adhibeantur."

It is hardly necessary to remark how applicable this observation is to those very doctrines of the science of Mind which have given rise to this discussion. They who consider how much of the business of education resolves into a skilful management of attention and of association, will not be disposed to deny, that something might still be done, by a wakening the vigilance of parents and preceptors to these important principles of our frame, to render this task more systematical in its aim, and less doubtful in its success. Have no conclusions with respect to them been yet ascertained, of which a better practical use might be made to develope or to increase the mental energies of man; to promote his moral improvement; and to shed on his understanding that pure and steady light, without which reason itself can do but little, either to exalt his views, or to secure his happiness? Even the very curious facts here appealed to, with respect to the education of the war-horse and of the elephant, only afford additional proofs of the universality of the proposition, "that knowledge is power." They demonstrate, that the empire of man over the brute force of the lower animals is proportioned, not to his physical strength, but to the knowledge he possesses of their respective constitutions. They form, indeed, a most beautiful and instructive comment on Bacon's maxim, that "nature is to be subdued only by obeying her "laws;" and might almost be quoted as apologues