be found, in fact, to be not far from the type constituted in nature as the model after which objects are formed. With this generalized representation in our minds, we are the better prepared at once to refer the individual before us to its genus or species, and at the same time to notice the specialties of the new individuals which may come before us. There are thus preparations made, in the very structure of the mind, for the contemplation and recognition of natural substances and beings. The very mind and memory supplies a series of typical models, and he who has his mind furnished with such images, is like one walking in a museum filled with specimens to illustrate the natural orders. The mind is disposed, on the one hand, to give to every object a typical form in its representations; and on the other hand, it finds, in its actual experience, that types run through nature. We might almost say, that there are types in nature and types in the mind corresponding to each other, as an object does to its image in a mirror.

SECT. II.-THE FACULTIES WHICH DISCOVER RELATIONS

(CORRELATIVE.)

The soul is endowed with powers called sense-perception and self-consciousness, by which it is enabled to know the material objects presented to it through the senses, and also, to know self in its shifting moods and states. These simple cognitive powers supply us with the raw elements of our knowledge. The mind has also a set of powers which enable it to retain and reproduce the past. To this class belong the memory, which retains and recalls the past in the form which it assumed when it was previously before the mind; and the imagin ation, which brings up the past in new shapes and com

binations. Both of these are reflective of objects; but the one may be compared to the mirror which reflects whatever has been before it, in its proper form and colour; the other may be likened to the kaleidoscope, which reflects what is before it in an infinite variety of new forms and dispositions. The knowledge thus acquired and reproduced, though furnishing the materials of all that follows, would, however, be very valueless unless there were a higher set of faculties to work upon it. But the mind has a class of powers which elaborate the materials thus acquired, by discovering relations among the objects which have become known to it. By these faculties, the materials, all but useless in themselves, are turned into an infinite variety of cognitions and judgments. Nor is there a greater difference between the wool when stript from the sheep, and the beautiful garment into which it is woven; between the flax in its raw state, and the fine linen of exquisite pattern constructed from it; between the stone when taken from the quarry, and the marble statue into which it is wrought-than there is between man's primary knowledge through the senses and the consciousness, and those lofty comparisons, and refined abstractions, and linked ratiocinations, which he is able to construct by his higher intellectual faculties. There must be a correspondence between our simplest knowing powers and the objects known; but these other, as the scientific faculties, are the powers which fall more especially under our notice in tracing the correspondence between the laws of the external world and the laws of human intelligence.

The relations which the human mind is capable of discovering are very many and very varied; Locke describes them as infinite-they are certainly innumerable. It is necessary, in consequence, to classify them. We

are far from thinking that the arrangement which we are about to submit is perfect. It is possible that a better division might be made; but it is sufficient for our purpose that the powers of which we are to treat, by whatever name they may be called, and however they may he arranged, have actually a place in the mind. The mind is able and disposed to discover at least three distinct classes of relations :-First, that of Whole and Parts; secondly, that of Resemblance and Difference; thirdly, that of Cause and Effect. Every one who has ever seriously reflected on the operations of his own mind, will be prepared to acknowledge that it has the power and the inclination to notice these various relations. We could show that the faculties which discover them may be found, under one name or other, in almost every treatise on mental science written in modern times. By the first class of faculties we are able to separate the complex objects which fall under our notice into parts; by the second, we discover the varied points in respect of which the objects around us correspond; by the third, we can connect the present with the past and the future. By the first, we can, in some measure, penetrate into the composition of the objects by which we are surrounded; by the second, we see how objects are related to others existing at the same time-how plant, for example, is related to plant, and animal to animal; by the third, how the past has produced the present, and how the present will produce the future. By the first we have our abstract notions; by the second, our general notions; by the third, our notions of causal relations.

Before proceeding to illustrate them individually, we would have it observed regarding them generally, that each has an aptitude and a tendency to seek and to find the relations which it is its function to discover. We

believe that there is a tendency in every faculty, with which man is endowed, to operate, and that there is a pleasure attached to the exercise of it. The eye having the power to see, delights to be employed in seeing, and light is pleasant to the eyes. There is a similar enjoyment felt in the action of all the mental powers. In particular, there is a tendency on the part of all the faculties under consideration, to exercise themselves, and an enjoyment in their exercise. We have not only a desire to know individual things as they present themselves, we have a propensity to discover relations subsisting between them. When any new object falls under our view, the question forthwith presents itself, How is it related to other objects known to us? On noticing any concrete or complex object, there is a strong intellectual tendency in our minds to analyze it, to take it to pieces. If it be a city or island that is brought under our notice, we immediately ask in what part of the world, in what country or ocean it is situated. If it be a new plant or animal that is submitted to us, we ask what is its genus or species. As strong as any of these, is that which we feel on witnessing a strange phenomenon, to ascertain its cause. Let us look at these faculties with the view of ascertaining how far they are fitted to enable us to comprehend the laws of nature.

I. THE FACULTY WHICH DISCOVERS THE RELATION OF WHOLE AND PARTS; in other words, the Faculty of Abstraction and Analysis.

When we look abroad on this world, we find it, as a whole, presenting a very complicated appearance; it is a mighty maze, though not without a plan. When we inspect individual objects, we find them all more or less complex. Almost all the natural substances we meet

with in the world are compound. Air, water, earth, and fire, which were regarded by the ancients as elements, have been shown to be composites. This piece of magnetized iron has a magnetic property, hence it will turn to the pole; it has a gravitating power, hence it falls to the ground if unsupported; it reflects certain rays of light, hence its colour; it has certain chemical properties, and hence it will chemically combine with one substance and not with another. What a vast number of powers of attraction, of chemical affinity, of electricity and vitality, are in action in every organism that falls under our eye!

As the objects which thus press themselves upon our observation are so complex, we see how needful it is to have a power of separating a part from a whole in mental contemplation. But this is a power possessed in a lower or a higher degree by every human being. On a complex whole being brought before the mind, it feels a pleasure in dividing it into its parts, and tracing the relation of the parts to the whole. It is to this principle, in part, that we must refer the tendency of children to take their toys to pieces; it is in order to discover all the parts, and how they are connected with one another. On seeing an ingenious machine, we have a strong inclination all our lives to have its parts taken asunder, that we may see how they co-operate. We feel it to be painful to stop in the midst of an important problem, or theorem, or discussion, or process; we are anxious to know how it may issue. We feel, indeed, as if our knowledge of objects must be very obscure till we have taken it down and resolved it into its elements, till we have logically divided it, or physically partitioned it. We feel as if we required to count over our wealth in order to estimate its value aright, to travel over our pro