youthful-intellect with pernicious fictions, not to confound it with abstractions, nor to cram it with more ideas than the conception can receive.

Of such early instruction, many a one, through the progress of life, can testify to the benefit. Instead of having the mind filled with the puerile and ridiculous images of a disordered fancy, it is, even in infancy, taught to reflect, to search for truth, to delight only in what is beautiful and good. Such a mind will, it is probable, forever reject coarseness, folly and falsehood.

Let none of you engaged in the delightful duty of communicating instruction to the young, be discouraged with the unaptness of a pupil. That pupil may, while silently listening, be employed in grasping with all his mental energy the truths imparted. Silence is not always a symptom of vacuity of mind, it sometimes marks intense application, and this very application will often accomplish more than readiness. Some who commence study late in life are so discouraged with the slowness of their understandings, that they are ready to abandon it at the onset. Let none of you be thus discouraged. The world of intellect, full of wonders and of beauty is still hidden from you; open the eye of your mind while the curtain is lifted that conceals it from your view. The effort may cost you much, but your reward

will be ample. What would not the blind give for sight? Witness the amazing difficulties, which, by patience, they overcome to obtain a little knowledge. A small part of the like perseverance in study and reflection, would enable you to appropriate to yourselves the delightful truths of nature, of history and of morals. The one talent is yours, labour diligently, that at the return of your Lord, you may render Him that with interest.

CHAPTER III.

CONSCIOUSNESS.

Not to trouble you, my young friends, with the opinions of the metaphysical schools, we shall keep in view the most simple facts of this science, and proceed to the investigation, as far as we can comprehend it, of the manner in which the mind acquires and uses knowledge. Knowledge is the result of the mind's own operations, and these operations, that we may understand them more clearly, will be considered under the names by which they are usually designated. Consciousness, Sensation, Attention, Conception, Memory, Association, Abstraction, Reason, Judgment and Imagination.

We commence with Consciousness, not because it is the first mental operation, but because it seems to stand first in order. To know ourselves, is our first duty; it is the preparation for all other knowledge. Whatever else we regard is external or foreign; in looking at ourselves we are at home. This indeed is the very foundation of our study, for when we assert that we think, we feel, we will, it is consciousness alone that dictates the assertion; for it alone gives us the knowledge of these mental operations. Consciousness exhibits to the reason that something within, which thinks, feels, and wills. It is consciousness that shews to the mind its own existence. It gives the knowledge of the me, as Cousin expresses it; the knowledge of the not me is derived from sensation. These two kinds of knowledge bound or limit each other, for whatever is perceived by Consciousness is me, all else is not me.

We have a knowledge, it is true, of our own persons, from sensation; we touch, we see our form, we hear our voice; but the body itself is not the me, for the hand is not conscious of any power to move, neither is the foot, but there is some active principle within the frame that feels the ability and the will to perform motion, and by it, is the hand or foot, like a piece of machinery, put in operation.

This moving power is the mind, and the knowledge that the mind has of its own existence is derived from consciousness. Each one for himself knows that he has thoughts, that he feels certain emotions of pleasure or of pain, that he has desires, strong or feeble, after particular objects, that he wills to perform certain actions. This is Consciousness, and Reason immediately perceives that these thoughts, feelings and volitions must belong to some being or subject, and calls this being I or me. The knowledge of self-existence is a perception of the Reason, this the brute has not, for he has no knowledge except from sensation.* Reason deducing from Consciousness the knowledge of self, will also arrive at the knowledge of a First Cause, the Origin of me, and of all other effects that are not me.

These facts may be perceived by the mind without sensation; first, my own existence, which is me, second the place in which I exist, which is not me, third the Cause of my existence, and of the existence of the space I occupy, as well as of the relation we hold to each other. Hence we perceive that consciousness is independent of all other operations of mind, and gives knowledge and evidence distinct from that which is furnished by the senses.

* Note D.

By the external signs of countenance, language and actions, we become acquainted with the-minds of others; by consciousness, with our own. We know that we think, that we love, hate and desire. Should the question be asked how we know this, we could give a reply, not mòre satisfactory, than we could to the question, how we know that we perceive an object or a sound, or how we could prove ourselves to be sensible of cold or heat? yet no one doubts his power to think, to remember, to associate ideas, to judge, to reason, to desire, to feel aversion, love, joy and fear. "The phenomenon of Consciousness, says Cousin, is given by an immediate apperception which obtains it and knows it directly." He also calls Consciousness, “internal intuition, immediate vision and perception."

External perception assures us of the existence of body or matter; consciousness convinces us of the existence of something independent of the body to which we give the name of mind or soul. No one in his senses can doubt that the objects he perceives are real, so no one doubts that he thinks and feels. Consciousness is a simple state of the mind, it requires no external objects for its exercise, the reflective powers are alone concerned in it; a full proof that the part called myself, the soul,