science assures you of judgment hereafter. Listen then to this voice within you and seek that Truth which alone can clear up the darkened light of nature; the light which "though sullied and dishonoured is still divine." Seek the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not." Human Reason cannot see Him, but Faith can, and faith is the gift of God. "Faith childlike and submissive sits at the feet of Him, who is the Life and the Light of the world. All beside is darkness. To this perfect Reason must we apply, bankrupt as we are; no one of us can supply his neighbour; but in God there is fullness of wisdom, and He giveth freely to all who ask, and upbraideth not.

CHAPTER XI.

JUDGMENT.

Reason is that attribute in the mind of man which distinguishes him from all the tribes of the animal creation. By it he knows his own existence and its continuance; also the necessary and essential relations of things, or causes and effects. He knows the First Cause of all

things, and his own relation to Him as a reasonable, immortal, and accountable being; and as a consequence of this, he knows there is a future state of existence, with reward and punishment annexed to present actions. This knowledge, or belief, if we may so call it, is intuitive in the human mind; it is the property, in degree, of the blind and the deaf, of the child and the savage, and thus it is that "man is equal to man ;" thus is he allied to high intelligences, and to God himself.

But besides being immaterial, immortal and accountable in his nature, man is earthly, sensitive and perishable. To fit him for his existence on earth, he is provided with senses which give to him a knowledge of the objects that surround him, and understanding whereby he may turn them to the best account in his own preservation and happiness. Before the mind is sufficiently developed to perform its office properly, this knowledge is instinctive, as in the infant. As this developement takes place the understanding makes him acquainted with whatever comes under the cognizance of the senses, and co-operating with reason, carries on its voluntary action, in attention, memory, conception, association, reflection. Thus does the mind encrease in knowledge as it advances in experience, and become prepared for the higher and

more delicate operations of abstraction, judgment and imagination.

Brutes have an instinct that amounts to something very like understanding in men. This has already been noticed, but as a consideration of the fact may assist in the explanation of this part of our subject, it will not be amiss here to introduce some particulars. Many animals, especially those that seem to be intended for domestic service, such as the horse, and the dog, often display in their actions something very like that act of the understanding, called judgment. A cow will learn to unlatch a gate, a dog to shut a door, or go on errands, Lord Brougham in his Dissertation on Science, mentions the instinct of wild horses in the forests of Tartary and South America, where they are in large herds. These animals seem to have an instinctive knowledge of their exposure to be taken, and that their only refuge is in flight. While they sleep, each one of the drove, in rotation, acts as sentinel; and if a man approaches, the sentinel walks towards him, as if to deter him; should the man advance, he neighs aloud, in a peculiar tone, which rouses the herd, and they all gallop off; the sentinel bringing up the rear. Dogs learn to distinguish time. One belonging to a farmer, was shut up at home on Sunday, while the family attended church at

some distance. When the morning came, the dog would leave the house at an early hour, and going through the wood, meet the family carriage at a cross-road. A dog in this village who had been trained to watch his master's garden on the Sabbath, on being transferred to another, regularly left his new habitation on Sunday morning, to watch in his accustomed manner, his former owner's garden.

In these instances, and in many others that might be produced, we see in brute animals something so very like understanding in man, that there are not wanting those who say, "if this be called instinct, then all the actions of human beings are impelled by instinct." I direct your attention to this, in order that we may make a proper discrimination between the operation of "judging according to sense," and reason, the attribute which distinguishes the human intellect from that of the mere sensitive animal. In all the works of nature, we find adaptation, that is a correspondence between the nature of the being and the state in which it is placed. Thus in common instances, the parts in different classes of animals are adapted to the elements in whlch they live. Birds have wings by which they raise and sustain themselves in the air, their proper element; fish have fins by which they propel themselves in the

water. Quadrupeds, which inhabit the earth, are fitted by their organs for their manner of life. They have limbs formed for flight and for pursuit; they have mouths adapted to browze the herbage, or teeth for tearing the prey. Those which live in colder climates have wool to keep them warm, those inhabiting warm latitudes are covered with a light coat of hair. The round silky form of the mole is adapted to the pathway he traces for himself under the ground; the stomach of the camel, provided with cavities to contain a large quantity of water, to living in the desert where he travels, often many days, without meeting with a spring at which to quench his thirst.

Animals are also adapted by their instinct for their different modes of existence. The oyster barely opens its shell to receive nourishment; the caterpiller crawls from plant to plant until it finds the one destined for its support; the bird of prey soars high in the air, watching the defenceless being that serves it for food, and then darts swiftly upon it. The bee, the ant and the beaver, with wonderful art, contrive their habitations and provide for their future wants; the ox and the horse accommodate themselves to the labours or to the pleasures of man, whose servants they are; while the dog destined to be his companion, seems by his superior intelli