medy the defect, or allow it to continue; an alternative, between which there can be no hesitation--no difficulty of selection.

Thus then, each one of the senses is devoted to its peculiar function; these produce impressions only, and are subordinate to the intellect; it is the mind alone, which consecutively to these impressions forms ideas, or those notices by which objects are represented to us. The impressions of the senses, are only the exciting causes of, the materials for intellectual operation; they are subordinate instruments; they often require to be guided; they are necessary to the development of some of the faculties of mind, but in no degree determine its power; and deprived of them all, the man may still retain the vigour of his spiritual (spiritual as precisely opposed to material) faculties, and be the same thinking, reasoning, ever-living soul.

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CHAP. XVI.

EXERCISE OF THE FACULTY OF SPEECH-ARTICULATE LANGUAGE — LANGUAGE OF ANIMALS THAT OF FEELING-LANGUAGE dependS ON THE FACULTY OF IMITATION-THE ORGAN OF VOICE-ART OF MODULATING SOUNDS-DISTINCTIVE PECULIARITIES -NOT OFTEN FOUND PERFECT AS A GIFT OF NATURE-INFLUENCE OF EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING THE POWERS OF THE CHEST AND LARYNX, AND CAUTIONS RESPECTING THEIR EXERCISE-DEFECTIVE PRONUNCIATION IS OFTEN THE RESULT OF WANT OF ATTENTION-HOW REMEDIED-VARIOUS IMPERFECTIONS OF SPEECH, WITH THEIR CAUSES, AND METHODS OF TREATMENT, AS WELL AS THEIR EXTENSIVE AND INJURIOUS INFLUENCE WHEN UNCONTROULED-A VERY FEW IMPERFECTIONS ONLY ARE BEYOND THE REACH OF REMEDY-PRINCIPLES UPON WHICH THIS PART OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION SHOULD BE CONDUCTED-CONCLUSION.

FROM the exercise of the senses, we advance to that of the faculty of speech; another step towards intellectual exertion, another link in the chain which inseparably unites physical with moral education. We have already seen, that these are mutually dependent; but we have yet to trace the degree of that dependence, and the intimacy of that connexion, in consequence of

which, the one separated from the other will ever prove abortive of good, if not the immediate parent of evil.

We have already noticed the language of expression, as it is attached to the development of the muscular system; and it is now the language of articulation, the distinctive accompaniment of reason, and the exclusive attribute of man, which claims our attention. It is indeed probable, that animals possess the power of communicating their impressions to each other, by a mode of language peculiar to themselves, and the attentive observer of nature will have remarked this in numberless instances; but the various expressions employed are not comprehended by other tribes of animals, nor by

these are necessarily limited to the explanation of their wants and desires, their joys and apprehensions, the immediate care of their young, or the supply of their necessities; they are the result of instinct-the product of passionthe offspring of present want;-they are not susceptible of education, or applicable to the purposes of reason, but merely characteristic of powerful, natural, unconstrained, unsophisticated emotion.

It is probable that man possesses the power of accommodating this language of feeling in a degree very inferior to that enjoyed by many of the animals around him. We trace its influence in the first cry of infancy; and the well prac

tised ear of the parent, will readily distinguish between the expression of pain, or discomfort, or want, or passion: we observe it in the early indication of the delight, and a variety of other little circumstances in the helpless existence of the young. This may be considered as the only natural, and absolutely physical expression of feeling. Language, properly so called, depends upon the exclusive privilege of man, viz. the faculty of imitating the sounds which he hears, and of modulating the tones which he produces. The development of this power is the office of physical education, proceeding from the simplest sounds, to those which by the common consent of mankind, have been determined upon, as representative signs of certain things, and states, and modes of existence, which by various combination, become the elements of language, and embrace at once the simplest, as well as the most complex ideas.

The organ of voice, that which is concerned in this astonishing combination of wonders, consists of the entire mechanism employed for the purposes of respiration; but the principal means of forming articulate sounds, are to be found in the throat and mouth. Thus the air contained in the lungs, is driven through the trachea, or air-tube, in expiration; and as it passes through its superior aperture, it is divided and modified, by that beautiful arrangement of moveable cartilages, ligaments, muscles, and nerves,

which compose what are termed the larynx and glottis; but it receives its final and distinctive impression-its character of articulation in the cavity of the mouth, where it is variously influenced by the structure of the soft arch of the palate, and the sinuosities of the nose; by the roof of the bony palate, the arrangement of the teeth, and above all, by the muscles of the throat and tongue, assisted by a similar accessory structure of the lips and jaws. It would have afforded pleasure to the author to have dwelt at some length upon the mechanism here employed, and upon the relative influence of each of its parts; but it would be to deviate too far from the course he has prescribed for himself, which compels him to say only just so much as may be necessary to render the rules of physical education comprehensible.

Thus then it should seem, that the contraction and dilatation of the glottis, its elevation and depression, constitute the chief art of modulating sounds; while the last and final character of articulation, and distinct pronunciation, is given by the other parts of this exquisite arrangement of structure, the function of which it has baffled the highest efforts of human ingenuity to imitate. Attempts of this kind have not been wanting, and various hypotheses have been invented to account for the phenomena of the human voice; but a moment's reflection will convince the inquirer, that no comparison can