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the first time that the too common practice of training children up as slaves of our notions, our feelings, our habits and customs, our institutions and our purposes, has been objected to. There have been some, though not many, who have acknowledged and urged the necessity of an education, independent of the individual's station in society. Rousseau, among others, has made this point very prominent in his theory of education; instead of training man for the present state of society, he proposes educating him for a state of nature; but Rousseau, who, on all occasions, evinced more penetration in laying bare that which is wrong, than in pointing out what is right, discovers, on this head also, more negative than positive truth. His supposed state of nature is far more unnatural, than even the most artificial state of society for it is neither the state in which man was intended to be, nor that in which he actually is, or ever was. It is a fancied state, for ever unattainable, because founded on an erroneous view of human nature, as well as of man's position in the world. But what renders

Rousseau's plan far more exceptionable, is the object which he is avowedly aiming at, viz., to educate the child with regard to his insulated self, for the purpose of insuring to him as much as possible, of independent happiness. This is a human, and, even in a human point of view, a selfish purpose, and an education founded upon it, must, therefore, under all circumstances, be a false education. It is wrong to educate man for other men, or, as is often the case, for the imaginations of other men; but it is no less wrong to educate him for himself. It is not right to educate him for an artificial state of society, but it is no improvement upon this, to educate him for a supposititious state of nature. The only true education is that which educates man for God, and for that state, for which God has destined him; an education for the purpose of God, and by the means of God.

It is this education, and no other, which is to be given

to every individual, without distinction or exception, because God is not a respecter of persons; it is this and no other, to which I wish to call your attention. Concerning the purpose, which is the restoration of man, I have already explained myself, I trust, explicitly enough to prevent all misunderstanding; and I have likewise, at the beginning of the present lecture, clearly stated what I consider to be the chief means, appointed by God for the attainment of it, that means, in which all other means must concentrate, from which they must all receive their life, in order to become truly efficient. It then remains for us to examine, what those subordinate means are, or, in other words, we must ask :-" what is there in man, capable of receiving that life and light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world?"

In order to answer this question, it will be necessary to enter somewhat more deeply into the constitution of man's soul; or, if the term may be allowed, his psychical† organization, the knowledge of which is,―next to the faith in the indwelling of the true life and light, and the union with that power in perfect love-the most essential requisite in those who wish successfully to cultivate the field of education. Unfortunately, that knowledge has hitherto been but little cultivated; a few vague notions, which, upon close examination, are found to be, most of them, contradictory with each other, arranged in the shape of a system,

• From the Greek word Psyche, soul. We have from the word cúis the words physical, physiology, physiological, and there seems no reason why there should not be analogous derivatives from 4vx, psychical, belonging or referring to the soul, psychology, the science of the soul (so inadequately and clumsily called "philosophy of the human mind”) and psychological, belonging or referring to that science. The entire absence of these, or any other terms of the same import, is, no doubt, owing to the want of the thing itself, for which the name psychology is here proposed. For the science styled "philosophy of the human mind," is but a very small portion of the science of the whole soul of man, and that small portion has hitherto not had justice done to it. But it seems that more attention begins to be paid to that important branch of knowledge, and I trust, the terms proposed will soon become indispensable in the English language.

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and supported by the enumeration of a variety of facts, many of which might as well serve to prove the reverse of what they are adduced for, this is the thing honoured with the name philosophy of the human mind. No wonder, then, that metaphysics have fallen into such general discredit, and that the study of them is considered either useless or dangerous. The objection, that men of eminent talent, nay, men of decided piety, have been engaged in the inquiry, cannot avail, either to set aside the popular prejudice, or to refute the accusation, that the science of the human mind is in a most deplorable condition. If the inquiry be undertaken on a false ground, talent can only serve to make error more complicated, and therefore the confusion greater; although, perhaps, outwardly less apparent. It is not sufficient, that a man should have collected a number of phenomena of the mind, and offered an explanation of them, which, by its acuteness, excites our admiration. His explanations may be exceedingly clever, and yet, on this very account, perhaps, far from correct : his view of human nature may be nothing but a system of errors, and yet it may be a highly ingenious production of the mind. But the very fact that our philosophies of the human mind are productions of the human mind, is the reason why we are yet so backward in the knowledge of human nature; it is not an ingenious explanation of the most striking or the most puzzling phenomena, we want, but a simple statement of the causes from which those phenomena proceed; and this is not a matter of invention, but a matter of discovery and acknowledgment. Hitherto, however, the conceit of the sufficiency of the rational powers of man for the establishment of truth, has been so universal,—even among the religious world, who entertain it with reference to every branch of human knowledge, religion alone excepted,—that the lawfulness of forming hypotheses in matters of science, provided they be supported by a number of facts, sufficient to make them appear probable, has never been called in question. Hypothesis,

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HYPOTHESIS AND TRUTH.

however, and truth are opposed in their very natures, for truth offers itself to the eye of the mind with a self-evidence and an absolute certainty, before which the idea of hypothetical admission or acknowledgment appears as a sacrilege; and hypothesis, on the other hand, courts attention by a display of dazzling and insinuating qualities, which truth ever scorns as utterly unworthy. Hypothesis is swelled up in the robes of argument, in order to astonish and thereby to impose upon us; whereas, truth appears with such simplicity, that the humble soul only can perceive, how infinitely it is above us. Hypothesis is a vile coquette, feigning attachment to all that flatter her, and condescending to the very basest means of increasing the host of her admirers. Truth is a heavenly maid, who shrinks from the profane eye of vanity, whose chaste looks

true love alone can attract.

This uncongeniality of hypothesis with truth, is the reason why our sciences depart from the way of truth, in the same proportion as they are mingled with, or founded upon, hypothesis; and as no science, perhaps, has been treated in a more hypothetical manner than the science of. the human mind, so, likewise, is there none in which we fall more short of the truth. Hence, as it is written, that the world by wisdom knew not God, so it may likewise be said, that man by wisdom knoweth not himself.

It is, of course, impossible for me to enter into a full and detailed discussion of so vast a subject: I must content myself with urging its great importance, in particular reference to the subject of education, from which it ought never to be separated. The miserable state in which education generally is, can only be accounted for by the general ignorance of teachers in this department of knowledge; and nothing, on the other hand, can be a more striking proof of the absolute darkness, in which the philosophy of the human mind is still involved, than the fact, that the different attempts of establishing that science, have been made with hardly any reference to the gradual develop

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ment of the powers of the soul in infancy, childhood, and youth, as if the nature of any thing could be understood, independently of the knowledge of its origin, and the history of its formation. No one will ever be able to form a correct estimate of man's nature, unless he watch it from the earliest dawn of life, through the various stages of its progress; nor will any one ever be able to nurture up the mind and heart of a child, without a general knowledge of human nature. This is so obvious, that it would seem superfluous to say it, were it not for the fact, that, in practical life, education, and the philosophy of the human mind, are as unconnected as two of the most heterogeneous trades. Nor shall we ever see this evil remedied, until the public at large free themselves from the bondage of some hacknied systems, handed down from generation to generation, and received with the same veneration and confidence,

as

the legends and traditions in the Romish church—such, for instance, as Locke's doctrine of the tabula rasa, or blank sheet, on which it is the teacher's task to scribble the necessary ideas. But if a salutary degree of diffidence should be exercised with reference to these hereditary systems, no less caution is required in the examination and adoption of some that have newly sprung up among us. As the very antipode of Locke, a system has recently been started, which not only recognizes the existence of a variety of faculties, but distinguishes and defines them with an accuracy hitherto unknown in the philosophy of the mind, and the more tempting, because supported by a host of facts-not speculative facts, but facts which admit of demonstration to the five senses. Between this topography of the soul, and Locke's terra incognita, there are an indefinite number of intermediate views, in which the balance is held more or less equally between the supposed primitive powers of the mind, and the presumed influence of education. But, widely as these various views and systems may differ, in their foundation and their superstructure, their value, when put to the test of truth, and applied