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cised as to improve them only as duty is accepted and prac tically performed. Therefore we say that the man whose moral faculties have been dwarfed by disuse, or perverted by abuse, would not be well qualified to investigate the science of morals. The phenomena, it is to be remembered, are those of mind. While there is, therefore, in all a common basis for the science, yet both the seeing eye and the thing seen may be modified by custom and habits. If there be little moral culture, the moral phenomena will either be obscure, or will consist in a decided wickedness which is blinding and hardening, while, at the same time, the power of moral discrimination will be diminished. It may be said that it is the intellect that constructs science. But it must construct it out of the materials given, which will be different in a vicious mind; and it must also have clearness and power in the particular field in which it works. But no fact can be better established than that wickedness, in every form and degree, not only blunts the moral feelings, but weakens the power of moral discrimination. A perfect mental science would require, first, the normal action of the faculties to give the phenomena, and then an accurate observation of those phenomena. A perfect moral science would require the normal action of the moral powers, either in ourselves or another, and an accurate observation of the results; but by the prevalence of vice the facts are both distorted and obscured.

What has now been said of morals is equally applicable to taste. A man whose sense of beauty should be either uncultivated or perverted would be the less capable of apprehending and presenting perfectly the science of æsthetics. But there is in morals a special difficulty. A vicious man is strongly tempted either to deceive or to bribe his conscience, and can hardly be expected to judge

PROGRESS MUST BE SLOW.

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fairly of any system that would either justify or condemn himself. In all moral and religious truth there is this difficulty. It is not that we have lost the power to judge, but that we will not use it. It is the old difficulty of the influence of the desires and affections and of our supposed interest on our judgment. We all know how passion and interest pervert the judgment, and what discordant opinions there are wherever men are under their influence.

If, therefore, there had been no incapacity from vice, and no wrong bias, or passion, or want of candor, we cannot but suppose that moral science would have been much more advanced than it now is.

In thus answering the natural inquiry respecting the relative progress of these sciences, I have desired also to do something in the way of caution and guidance for ourselves. What has been is now, and will continue to be. The same obstacles that have been encountered by others we shall encounter; and some of them are such that if we are forewarned we may be forearmed against them.

Against the first difficulty mentioned we can do nothing directly; but it is a satisfaction, and may be of some aid, to know the precise 'mode in which our observations are to be made. But we may gain definite views of the sphere and objects of the science; we may seek to simplify it; we may make independent search into the depths of our own consciousness; we may be careful in the use of words, conforming at least to our own definitions; and, above all, we may either enter upon, or become more earnest in, a course of practical virtue, and so both prevent the imbecility of vice, and disperse the blinding mists that always arise from a corrupt heart.

The difficulties just considered are such as to preclude the hope of any great and sudden advance in this science

of any, at least, which shall be at once recognized and incorporated into the public mind. Even if completed in thought and expression by one man,-if it should have its Newton, yet its full acceptance by the public mind and assimilation with it would necessarily be slow. In astronomy, the true system was opposed to the popular conceptions and forms of speech, and more than one generation was required for it to permeate the masses and thoroughly control the habits of thought. But in that the proofs were open to popular apprehension, and, for the most part, there were no desires and passions to obstruct conviction. But of all the changes in society, none are so slow as those which are conditioned upon changes in language and character. Even Christianity itself, with its wonderful evidence and its divine power, is far from having taken full possession of the public mind in any community, and simply because it had these obstacles to encounter. But, as we have seen, perfection in moral science, to say nothing of other obstacles, can be reached only through changes both in language and in character. If terms absolutely new would not be demanded, yet some, like the heathen words for God, would require to be expanded and ennobled, while others would require to have their elasticity and capacity reduced; and then, the delicacy of moral feeling and accuracy of perception to be attained only through virtuous habits, would be indispensable.

It follows from this that, in our cultivation of this field, we are not to be disappointed if we see no immediate or startling results. The changes to be anticipated are like those of geology in the formation of strata, sometimes more and sometimes less rapid, but always relatively slow.

But since the progress of the science is so slow, and its

TWO CLASSES OF SCIENCES.

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completion has been so long delayed, it may be asked whether it is of any use. Are there not, it may be inquired, in our nature practical principles, which do and will control the course of human affairs with something like the certainty of instinct, and quite independent of scientific speculation? Within the memory of many this question has been put respecting various branches of physical science. It would not be put now. But respecting metaphysical and moral science there are those who put it with sincerity and earnestness.

On this point, and as they are related to practical arts, there are two classes of sciences. In the one the science is wholly at the basis of the art, and is requisite to its results in any degree. The art of photography could not have been without chemistry, nor surgery without anatomy, nor the art of protecting buildings from lightning without the science of electricity. In such cases, and they are numerous, the science is first, and the practical results follow. The processes start from the sciences. In these cases no one questions the utility of science. In the other class the practical results are first and the sciences follow. The sciences start from the processes, which they simply recapitulate. Here science consists in the statement of the properties, the relations in space, and the successions in time of those things which our will cannot reach, or, if it can, cannot improve. Science may predict the place of a star; but the color of its light or the rapidity of its motion it cannot affect. God gives light and the eye, and we see; but we see no better after knowing the structure of the eye and the science of optics than before. Here the result is first, as perfect as it can be made, and the science is just a statement of the process by which the result was reached. It is in this class that the science of

the mind belongs. Like the eye, its faculties are given, and act by their own law without reference to science, which can merely trace back and state such results as are common to all minds. It is solely with reference to these sciences that the question arises.

To this question, What is the use? there are two replies. The first is, that, even in the sense of the word as used by the objector, these sciences are of use. The processes may be perfect; we may not be able to affect the results, and yet the sciences may be of use indirectly. We cannot change the number or movements of Jupiter's satellites; but by means of their eclipses we can calculate the longitude. Entomology will not enable us to change the structure or habits of an insect; but it may suggest a mode of saving our trees. The laws of the winds are not subject to our control; but by a knowledge of them we may shorten our voyage.

Again, this class of sciences becomes greatly useful when the structures and processes of nature become, deranged. When the eyes become flattened by age, science can remedy the defect, and when

"A drop serene hath quenched their orb,
Or dim suffusion veiled,"

it is by science alone that it can be removed. And so it is in most cases of displacement and derangement in the physical system. The science of anatomy, which is almost wholly at the basis of the art of surgery, would be of no practical use if nothing ever went wrong in the body.

A second reply to the objection urged is, that while we do not repudiate the conception of utility involved in what has just been said, we yet do not need it for the vindication of these sciences. We are capable of an inter

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