Every age, accordingly, has testified that it was not in possession of contentment; and the question presents itself, If human nature has received a definite constitution, and if one arrangement of external circumstances be more suited to yield it gratification than another,-what are that constitution and that arrangement? No one can tell. And in what respects have we in times past departed, and do we now depart, from them? The answer is involved in equal obscurity. How has it happened that, in all their various changes, the British have never succeeded in satisfying themselves with their condition? Why did they institute the savage state? It was not fixed by the Creator as the permanent condition of man, otherwise they could not have escaped from it. The bear and the wolf, the ox and the camel, do not change their states and avocations as men have done. What prompted them to betake themselves to war as their most honorable employment? Again we say that that condition was not the ultimate lot of man, because it also has changed. And what has led us now to spin and weave, to hammer and construct, for all the nations of the globe? We answer, that this state may also disappear, and then it will not be regarded as the ne plus ultra of human enjoyment. Farther, if we have not reached the limits of attainable perfection, what are we next to attempt? Are we and our posterity to spin and weave, build ships, and speculate in commerce, as the highest occupations to which human nature can aspire, and persevere in these labors till the end of time? Or if changes are to follow, we may ask, who instituted the changes which history records? On what principles were they regulated? And who shall guide the helm in our future voyage on the ocean of existence? The British are here cited as a type of mankind at large; for in every age and every clime similar races have been run, and with similar conclusions. Only one answer can be returned to these inquiries. Man is evidently a progressive being; and the Creator having designed a higher path for him

than for the lower creatures, has given him intellect to discover his own nature and that of external objects, and left him, by the exercise of it and his other powers, to find out for himself the method of placing his faculties in harmony among themselves, and in accordance with the external world. Time and experience are necessary to accomplish these ends, and history exhibits the human race only in a state of progress towards the full development of their powers, and the attainment of rational enjoyment.

As long as man remained ignorant of his own nature, he could not of design form his institutions in accordance with it. Until his own faculties became the subjects of his observation, and their relations the objects of his reflection, they operated as mere instincts. He adopted savage habits, because his animal propensities were not at first directed by moral sentiment or enlightened by reflection. He next adopted the condition of the barbarian, because his higher powers had made some advances, but had not yet attained supremacy; and he now manufactures because his constructive faculties and intellect have given him power over physical nature, while his Acquisitiveness and Ambition are predominant, and are gratified by these avocations. Not one of these changes, however, has been adopted from design, or from perception of its suitableness to the nature of man. He has been ill at ease in them all; but it does not follow that he shall continue for ever equally ignorant of his nature, and equally incapable of framing institutions to harmonize with it. The simple facts, that the Creator has bestowed on man reason capable of discovering his own nature, and its relations to external objects; that He has left him to apply it in framing suitable institutions to ensure his happiness; that, nevertheless, man has hitherto been ignorant of his nature and of its relations, and that, in consequence, his modes of life have never been adopted from enlightened views of his whole capacities and qualities, but sprung up from the

instinctive ascendency of one blind propensity or another, -warrant us in saying, that a new era will begin when man shall be enabled to study his own nature and its relations with success; and that the future may exhibit him assuming his station as a rational creature, pursuing his own happiness with intelligence and design, and at length attaining higher gratification to his whole faculties than he has hitherto enjoyed.

The inquiry next naturally presents itself, What has been the cause of the human race remaining for so many ages unacquainted with their own nature and its relations? The answer is, that, before the discovery of the functions of the brain, they did not know how to study these subjects in a manner calculated to attain to true principles and practical results. The philosophy of man was conducted as a speculative, and not as an inductive science; and even when attempts were made at induction, the manner in which they were conducted was at variance with the fundamental requisites of a sound philosophy.* In consequence, even the most enlightened nations have never possessed any practical philosophy of mind, but have been bewildered amidst countless contradictory theories.

In our own country two views of the constitution of the world and of human nature have long been prevalent, differing widely from each other, and which, if legitimately followed out, would lead to distinct practical results. The one is, that the world contains the elements of improvement within itself, which time will evolve and bring to maturity; it having been constituted by the Creator on the principle of a progressive system, like the acorn in reference to the oak. This hypothesis ascribes to the power and wisdom of the Divine Being the whole phenomena which nature, animate and inanimate, exhibits; because, in conferring on each part the specific qualities, and constitution which belong to it, and in placing it in the circum

* See System of Phrenology, Third Edition, p. 40.

stances in which it is found, He is assumed to have designed, from the first, the whole results which these qualities, constitution, and circumstances, are calculated in time to produce. There is no countenance given to atheism by this system. On the contrary, it affords the richest and most comprehensive field imaginable, for tracing the evidence of Divine power, wisdom, and goodness in creation.

The other hypothesis is, that the world was perfect at the first, but fell into derangement, continues in disorder, and does not contain within itself the elements of its own rectification.

If the former view be sound, the first object of man, as an intelligent being in quest of happiness, must be to study the elements of external nature and their capabilities; the elementary qualities of his own nature, and their applications; and the relationship between these. His second object will be to discover and carry into effect the conditions, physical, moral, and intellectual, which, in virtue of this constitution, require to be realized before the fullest enjoyment of which he is capable can be attained.

According to the second view of creation, nothing of good can be expected from the evolution of nature's element, these being all essentially disordered; and human improvement and enjoyment must be derived chiefly from spiritual influences. If the one hypothesis be sound, man must fulfil the natural conditions requisite to the existence of religion, morality, and happiness, before he can reap full benefit from religious truth: according to the other, he must believe aright in religion, and be the subject of spiritual influences independent of natural causes, before he can become capable of any virtue or enjoyment; in short, according to the latter hypothesis, sciences, philosophy, and all arrangements of the physical, moral, and intellectual elements of nature, are subordinate in their effects on human happiness on earth, to religious faith.

It appears to me extremely difficult to reconcile these conflicting views.

The theologians who condemned the natural world, lived in an age when there was no sound philosophy, and almost no knowledge of physical science; they were unavoidably ignorant of the elementary qualities of human nature, and of the influence of organization on the mental powers; the great link which connects the moral and physical worlds. They were unacquainted with the relations subsisting between the mind and external nature, and could not by possibility divine to what extent individuals and society were capable of being improved by natural means. In the history of man, they had read chiefly of misery and crime, and had in their own age beheld much of both. They were, therefore, naturally led to form a low estimate of human nature, and to expect little good from the cultivation of its inherent capabilities. These views appear to me to have influenced their interpretations of scripture; and having once been entwined with religious sentiments, they have descended from generation to generation: In consequence, persons of sincere piety have, for several centuries, been induced to look down on this world as a wilderness abounding with briars, weeds, and noxious things, and to direct their chief attention, not to the study of its elements and their relations, in the hope of reducing them to order, but to enduring the disorder with patience and resignation, and to securing, by faith and penitence, salvation in a future life. It has never been with them a practical principle, that human nature itself may be vastly improved in its moral and intellectual capacities, by those means which Physiology and Phrenology have recently opened up to us; nor that human nature and the external world are adjusted on the principle of favoring the development of the higher powers of our minds; nor that the study of the constitution of nature is indispensable to human improvement; nor that this world and its professions and pursuits might be rendered favorable to virtue by searching out the natural qualities of its elements, their relationship, and the moral plan on which God has consti