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mind to another by the eye; this seems really beyond the reach of humanity left to itself. To imagine, for example, the first of mankind capable of inventing any set of sounds, which should be fit to communicate to

another the idea of what is meant by the words virtue or rectitude, or any other idea wholly unconnected with any kind of sound whatever, and afterwards of inventing a set of signs, which should give the mind by the eye, an idea of what is properly an object of the sense of hearing; (as a word when expressed with the voice, represents an idea, which is the mere object of the understanding) to imagine mankind, in the first ages of the world, without any hint from superior beings, capable of this, seems doing too great honour to our nature. Be that as it will; that one man should, by uttering a set of sounds no way connected with, or naturally representative of one set of ideas more than another; that one man should, by such seemingly unfit means, enlighten the understanding, rouse the passions, delight or terrify the imagination of another; and that he should not only be able to do this when present, viva voce; but that he should produce the same effect by a set of figures no way naturally fit to represent either the ideas he would communicate, or (less still) the articulate sounds, which are themselves but representa tives of ideas; and that he should affect another person at pleasure, at the distance of five thousand miles, and with as much precision and accuracy as if he were upon the spot, nay, as if he could open to him his mind, and give him to apprehend the ideas as they lie there in their origi nal state, is truly admirable. The translating (so to speak) ideas into sounds, the translating those sounds into visible objects, the translating one set of those visible objects into another, or turning one language into another, as Hebrew, Greek, or Latin, into English; all this, if we were not familiar with it, would appear a sort of magic; but our being accustomed to it, does not lessen its real excellence.

Again, if we consider what strange things are commonly done by every novice in numbers, we cannot help admiring the excellence of knowledge. To tell an Indian, that a boy of twelve years of age, could by making a few scrawls upon paper, determine the number of barley

corns, which would go round the globe of the earth; would strangely startle him! To talk to one unacquainted with the first principles of arithmetic, of adding together a set of numbers, as five thousand five hundred and fiftyfive, six thousand six hundred and sixty-six, seven thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven, and so on; to the number of twenty or thirty lines of figures, especially, if those lines consisted of a great many places of figures, going on to hundreds of thousands, millions, billions, trillions, and so on, to tell such a person, that it was not only possible, but even that nothing was more easy or trifling, than to determine the whole amount of such a set of numbers, and that without mistaking a single unit; all this would seem to the untutored Indian utterly incredible and impossible! To tell a Barbarian, that nothing was more common, than for traders in this part of the world, to buy in goods to the value of many thousand pounds, to sell them out again in parcels, not exceeding the value of ten or twenty shil lings each, to receive in their money only once a year, and yet they committed no considerable mistake, nor suffered any material loss in the dealings of many years together, through error or miscalculation; he would conclude, that either those traders had memories above the usual rate of human nature, or that they had supernatural assistance! Yet all that has been hitherto mentioned, and a thousand times more, is what we find persons of the meanest natural endowments, and the narrowest educations, capable of acquiring! That by observing with so simple an instru ment as a quadrant, the apparent altitude of the pole at one place, and travelling on, till we find it elevated a degree, that from thence we should determine with undoubted certainty, the real circuit of the whole globe of the earth, and consequently its diameter and semidiameter! That by an observation of the parallax of the moon, which is not difficult to take, with a few deductions and calculations, we should, by knowing the proportion between the unknown sides and angles of a triangle and those which are known, and by forming a triangle according to observation, the base of which to represent the earth's semidiameter, be as sure of the distance from the earth to the moon, as we are of the distance and height of a tower, viewed at two stations! That astronomers should

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thence proceed through all their wonderful discoveries and calculations: the consideration of these things gives no contemptible idea of human knowledge. If we proceed to the calculation of eclipses, determining the revolutions and paths of comets, and so forth, we cannot help looking upon the degree of knowledge we are capable of attaining, as highly worthy our attention, and viewing our own nature, as truly great and sublime, and the Divine Goodness as highly adorable, which has endowed our minds with abilities in themselves so wonderful, and promising of endless improvements and enlargements!

In what light then ought we to view those groveling and meanspirited mortals, who make a pride of declaring their contempt of knowledge? Did one hear a vicious person expressing his contempt of honesty and virtue, should we think the more meanly of them, or of him? In the same manner, when a shallow fop sneers at what he does not understand, his low raillery ought to cast no reflection upon learning; but he is to be considered as sunk from the dignity of reason, and so far degenerated as to make his ignorance his pride, which ought to be his shame.

If we cast our eyes backward upon past times, or if we take a view of the present state of the world, if we consider whole nations, or single persons, nothing so fills the imagination, or engages the attention, as the conspicuous and illustrious honours of knowledge and learning. The ancient Egyptians, the fathers of wisdom; studious Athenians, the cultivators of every elegant art; the wise Romans, the zealous imitators of learned Greece; how come these nations to shine, like constellations, through the deeps of that universal mist which involves the rest of antiquity? How come the Pythagoras', the Aristotles, the Tullys, the Livys to appear, even to us at this distance, as stars of the first magnitude in the vast fields of æther? How comes it that Africa, since the setting of learning in that quarter of the world, has been the habitation of obscurity and cruelty? What is the disgrace of wild Indians, and swinish Hottentots? Is it not their brutish ignorance? What makes our island to differ so much from the aspect it had when Julius Cæsar landed on our coast, and found us a flock of painted savages, scampering naked through the

woods? What nation makes such an appearance now, as England, wherever knowledge is valued? What names of ancient warriors make so great a figure on the roll of fame, or shine so bright in wisdom's eye, as those of the improvers of arts and sciences, who have risen in our island? Who would not rather, in our times, who know, to despise romantic heroism, choose to have his name enroled with those of a Bacon, a Boyle, a Clarke, or a Newton, the friends of mankind, the guides to truth, the improvers of the human mind, the honours of our nature and our world; than to have a place among the Alexanders, the Cesars, the Lewis', or the Charles', the scourges and butchers of their fellow-creatures?

SECTION I.

Of Education from Infancy. Absolute Necessity,and proper Method, of laying a Foundation of Moral Knowledge.

HAVING already treated in part, of so much of the education of young children as falls under the care of the parents, I will now, for the sake of exhibiting at once a comprehensive view of the whole improvement of the mind, begin from infancy itself; and lay down a general plan of knowledge, and the method of acquiring it.

And

I doubt not but the reader will own, that a genius naturally good, and which has been cultivated in the manner here to be described, may be said to have had most of the advantages necessary for attaining the highest perfection of human nature, of which this state is capable.

First, and above all things, it is to be remembered, and cannot be too often inculcated, that, from the time a child can speak, throughout the whole course of education, the forming of the temper to meekness and obedience, regulaung the passions and appetites and habituating the mind to the love and practice of virtue, is the great, the constant, and growing labour, without which all other culture is absolute trifling. Nor is this to be done by fits and starts, nor this most important of all knowledge to be superficially or partially communicated. Every obligation of mo

↑ And Burgh, had he lived, might have added, the Bonapartes.—Publisher

rality; every duty of life; every beauty of virtue, and deformity of vice, is to be particularly set forth, and represented in every different light. It is not a few scraps of good things got by memory, nor a few particular lessons given from time to time, that can be called a religious education. Without laying before the young mind a rational, a complete and perfect system of morals, and of Christianity, the work will be defective and unfinished. These important lessons must be begun early; constantly inculcated; never lost sight of; raised from every occasion and opportu nity; improved and enlarged as reason opens; worked into every faculty of the soul; begun by parents; carried on by the master or tutor; established by the man himself, when of age to inquire and to act for himself; studied every day and every hour while one faculty remains capable of exerting itself in the mind; and the man, when full of years, must still proceed, and at last go out of the world engaged in the important study of his duty, and means for attaining the happiness and perfection for which he was brought into being.

The knowledge of morality and Christianity is the absolutely indispensable part of education. For what avails it how knowing a person is in speculative science, if he knows not how to be useful and happy? If this work be neglected in the earlier part of life it must be owing to some very favourable circumstances, if the person turns out well afterwards. For the human mind resembles a piece of ground, which will by no means lie wholly bear; but will either bring forth weeds or fruits, according as it is cultivated or neglected. And according as the habits of vice and irreligion, or the contrary, get the first posses. sion of the mind, such is the future man like to be..

We see that the gross superstitions and monstrous absurdities of popery, by the mere circumstance of their being early planted in the mind, are not to be eradicated afterwards, though it is certain, that as reason opens, and the judgment matures, they must appear still more and more shocking. With how great advantage, then may we establish in the minds of young ones the principles of a religion strictly rational, and that will appear the more so, the more it is examined.

It is plain, that early youth is the fittest season of life

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