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peated, it was impossible for the ingenuity holier than thou." The paths of the of the present age to divine. It could not scholar have led far away from the beaten have been removed by instruments alone, track of common life. He has conceived though in the case of the former mummy a himself to have little to do with the world small artificial aperture had been disco- at large; he has had few sympathies with vered near the crista galli leading through it; he has felt little interest in it. He has the nose; it was plain that a membrane compared science, indeed, to the light of could not be removed in that wav, and if a heaven; he has talked eloquently about corrosive injection had been employed, it its properties; but he has talked in would have destroyed all the membranes figures; he has not actually felt that it is as well as the substance of the brain. Yet one of the lights which men may daily walk in this instance the dura mater was quite by. But it is the strong tendency of all perfect, a process of it called the tentorium liberal thought and feeling, at this day, to cerebelli, which separated the cerebrum (the bring every human acquisition to a practiupper portion of the brain) from the lower cal account; to call down knowledge, portion called cerebellum, was in excellent from its proud and inaccessible heights, to preservation, and that process called the be the companion and cheerer of the lowliest falx cerebelli could also be demonstrated. toil and of the humblest fireside. DiffuIn the abdominal cavity the various organssion is the watchword of the age. had been destroyed, evidently by the introduction of a corrosive mixture. The diaphragm, however the muscle which separates the cavity of the abdomen from the chest-was almost perfect. Dr. Granville removed portions of the lungs, which were reserved for future experiments. The height of the subject was ascertained to be five feet five inches and a fraction. By boiling a portion of the muscles, wax was found to exist on its surface. After some further experiments, the body was reserved for future inquiry and examination, and Dr. Granville terminated this curious and scientific demonstration amidst the applause of a very crowded meeting.

DIFFUSION OF KNOWLEDGE.†

It is certainly an interesting question, whether this tendency of things on so large a scale, and whether the professed undertaking to further it, in the department of the sciences particularly, promises to be either successful or useful. Is not the project to diffuse a knowledge of the sciences, visionary, impracticable? Or, if it is not, if it can succeed, is there a prospect of much good to be effected by it? These are the questions before us. And there is the more occasion to discuss them, because this practical character of the age, of which we have spoken, is sometimes falsely considered in such a light as to furnish specious, but unsound objections to our views; and because there is, in many minds, a peculiar skepticism about the practicability and expediency of diffusing generally a knowledge of the sci

ences.

The first feeling, in many persons, to whom this sort of knowledge is proposed for their acquisition, is a vague feeling of utter incompetency to the undertaking, or of the absolute impossibility or impropriety of the thing-a feeling, as if it were proposed to them literally to scale the heights of heaven; or, at any rate, to put themselves altogether out of their place We cannot know anyand sphere.

THE noble project of bringing down high philosophy and holy science to the mass of the people, has been reserved for this age. It is a novel enterprise among mankind. It is an unwritten page in the history of the world. It is a project, we do not think it too much to say, which never before entered into the conceptions of men; for it is an attempt to pluck from the sun, "in the highest heaven of phi-thing about these matters. They are for scholars to understand. They are to be losophy," the Promethean fire, to burn on the common hearth-stone in the hum- learnt in colleges. If you attempt to teach blest abodes of mortals. us things of this sort," say many with an incredulous air," you must take patience with you at any rate." It takes some patience to listen to the objection, we confess. For why cannot men, and all men, know? And why should they not? The objects of this kind of study are God's works, works which were expressly designed to be studied and admired by all his rational creatures; and, as religions reasoners, so far from admitting these things to be out of the province of the mass of

The error of past ages has been, to accumulate power, wealth, learning, and even religious responsibilities and trusts, in a few hands. Monopolies have not been confined to property; they have extended to knowledge too. Science, as well as religion, has said to the mass of mankind, "Stand by thyself, for I am

Abridged from the North American Review. No. LXVII.

mankind, we should say, that the world is not, and never will be, right, till they are generally understood. But we have occasion, at present, only to urge the general propriety of these pursuits. If the object of God's works on earth had been mere temporary accommodation and comfort, less than all the infinite wisdom displayed in them would have sufficed. Plants, for instance, could have been caused to grow without their present curious structure and beautiful appearance. It is as evident that the world was made to display to its inhabitants the wisdom, as the goodness of its Creator. It is reasonable, therefore, they should study it. No inquiry could be more proper for men, and for all

men.

And why, we repeat, can they not know? The objects to be examined are all around them; the subjects of study are the very elements with which they are every moment conversant; the instruments are their senses: to see, to hear, is to know. The times for study are all times that are not necessarily engrossed with other pursuits; when they take a walk, when they look around them upon the works of nature, especially when they are at leisure. Why cannot a man, who sits down before his evening fire, spend an hour in reading a few paragraplis that will teach him the curious and beautiful theory of combustion? Why cannot any man read enough upon the nature and changes of the atmosphere, the clouds, and the seasons, to be in the habit of reflecting philosophically on what is passing around him, instead of receiving, as passively, in this respect, as the post before his door, the visitation of the elements? And, as to time," the time that makes a wise man is the time that makes a fool; and the counters, with which the untaught lose the game, are the same with which the skilful win it" says, or should say, some proverb of the east or the west. The thing to be learned is "not in heaven, nor beyond the sea, but it is nigh us." It is said, that Linnæus, when abroad one day in the fields with his pupils, laid his hand upon the green turf, saying," he had that under his hand, whose consideration might justly occupy all of them for a consider able portion of their lives. He verified this assertion, by showing, that within that space, there were thirty-four different species, either of grass or moss, or insects, or animalcules, or varieties of minerals."

"Yes, but all this is nothing," say our objectors. "Science is what we are talking about." Nay, but this is the very thing. The foundation of the sciences is observation. The business of philosophy

is not to construct theories, but to statë facts; not to deal with mysteries in mysterious language, but to deal with plain matters in intelligible language. Science, instead of being a high and abstruse mys tery, is a clearer up of the mysteries that lie in our daily path. We have no doubt, that the casual observations of matiy practical and plain men, if they had been properly and philosophically noted down in their own minds, would have laid the foundation for much useful philosophy. The judgment, for instance, which sea-faring persons form of the weather, which seems at once as sure and as mysterions as instinct, is no doubt founded on actual and careful observation. If the observer had been, in this respect, a philosopher; if he had been able fully to state the grounds of his almost unerring predictions, he might have furnished far more valuable aid to the science of meteorology, than is now given in dry tables of temperature, wind, rain and sunshine. And if the same observations were made on the land, it would not be difficult to form a Farmer's Manual, or a Traveller's Directory, which, in many cases, would be of great convenience and utility,

When science is mentioned, the minds of many persons are at once carried away from what is around them, to strange diagrams and curious and costly apparatus. These things have their place and use, it is true. Diagrams are essential in the mathematics; and apparatus is a needful auxiliary to scientific observation. But observation need not wait for them. The inquirer may begin his researches without stirring from the spot where he stands. He has only to revive the curiosity of childhood, a curiosity unhappily dulled by repeated disappointment: he has only to ask, What is this, and why is that? and he has begun the work of scientific philosophy. If he has any zeal in these inquiries, he will procure or invent some simple apparatus to aid hin.

It was thus, and without these resources of modern enterprise,that our Franklin and Rittenhouse advanced through the first steps that led to their distinction as philosophers. We do not expect that many among us will rise to the same eminence; but we do say, that, with only a moderate portion of the same inquisitiveness, many may attain to a degree and kind of knowledge, that will give a new character to their minds and a new complexion to their lives, that will open treasures in nature, more truly valuable than the most fertile soil or the wealthiest mine.

Some will say, "but all this requires a great deal of thinking; and our business is to labour." But why not join them? Need

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a man stop turaing over the furrow of his field, because he observes the chemical properties of the soil? Mast the builder pause in his work, because he proceeds upon a full understanding of the principles of mensuration and architecture? Does any artist labour less assiduously or effectually, because he understands not only the practice, but the philosophy of his art? Does the merchant lay his plans less wisely, because he brings into his contemplation a sagacious and comprehensive view of the principles of trade? The truth is, that in all these cases knowledge does not hinder, but helps a man. Precisely as the philosophical, we had almost said, the imaginative system of the double entry helps the accountant, or as the science of geometry aids the surveyor, or of navigation, the mariner. Aud, in a simple journey upon the land, may not the traveller, without any interruption, take a philosophical survey of the country he is passing through, notice its soil, its productions, its capabilities, its mineralogical character? Even in judging of its scenery, and no man would be thought so negligent as not to know whether he had passed through a fine or a dull tract of country; even here, there is use enough, if he understood it, for the philosophy of taste. And with a mind thus employed, he would not only not be retarded, but he would find many sources of pleasurable interest; he would be saved from some portion of the tedium of a journey; and he would not need such frequent resort to the coarser stimulants which the tavern furnishes.

"Ay," says some skeptical observer of this undertaking, “you may address whom you will; you may say and do what you can; but you will never accomplish much. It is all a Utopian scheme; one of the forms of modern extravagance; an attempt to carry people out of their condition, to make philosophers out of ploughmen, and lecturers out of labourers. Let us rear up a community of plain, industrious men, who understand their business; and let those who please, dream of a nation of dreamers like themselves."

There are some predictions which have no other chance of accomplishment; than their own credit yields. If the spirit of society falls in with language of this sort; if it is the tendency of the times to doubt or to contemn all projects for intellectual improvement; if skepticism is stronger than conviction, and ridicule is more weighty than men's interests, then we admit that this great and noble undertaking of the age may fail. But even then we shall not admit, that it is at all necessary it should fail. We maintain, that, if society would serionsly and earnestly set VOL. VI.

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about the work of self-improvement, there are intellect and ability of every sort enough, and a hundred times more than enough, to accomplish all that we desire. If we could promise that every leaf of scientific knowledge should turn to a bank note, though of the humblest denomination, the work would be secure of the desired fulfilment. If men would seek knowledge, not as they seek silver, but with a hundredth part of the same zeal, we should not fear for the result. If, for opening the sources of innocent and elevated enjoyment, society would expend the tenth part of what it now pays for excess, vice, disease, ruin, and death, it would be enough.'

The substance of the objections we are now considering is, that the undertaking to disseminate scientific knowledge among the mass of the people, is visionary, that it is unsuitable to the state and objects of society. But let us consider what it is in this matter that is visionary. Not the knowledge proposed to be gained; not the treasured wisdom of nature; not the pleasure of contemplating it; not the aptitude of the human mind for such an employment; not the capacity of common minds to receive the elementary truths of science, for they are very simple. What then is visionary in this project? That, undoubtedly, which has caused every im provement that has been projected in the world to be denominated visionary. It is the novelty of the undertaking. It is this, that marks it as chimerical. Unless, indeed, it may be said that one part of mankind were made to be ignorant and to work; and another part made to be wise and to rule them. On this summary classifi cation and appointment, it is true, we easily comprehend what is meant by

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rearing up a community of plain and industrious men, who understand their business." But, we trust, it is not visionary for men also to understand their own nature, to reverence their Creator, and to look, with earnest inquiry, into those proofs of power, wisdom, and benevolence, which he has spread be fore them. There cannot be a steam-boat, a power-loom, a fire-engine, the model of a carriage for a rail-way, or a newly invented machine of any valuable description, presented for inspection, but it is thought a mark of reasonable curiosity and enlightened judgment to examine and understand it. And shall we pass through this crowded world of skill, contrivance, wisdom, and beauty, and scarcely bestow upon it a casual thought?

Science, it has been often said, is man's empire over nature. It is this that makes a large part of the difference between the

barbarian, who is subject to the elements, and of the civilized man, who commands them. It is this, that in civilized countries, is, every day more and more, rendering nature subservient to man's use, for food, medicine, clothing, habitation, fuel, convenience, comfort.

These, it may be said, are the labours of the learned. But Arkwright and Fulton were not learned. Besides, why should that which, in the hands of the studious, is so powerful an instrument, be so useless in the hands of the active and labori ons? We know that it is not, And it is demonstrable, as a matter of the plainest inference, that he, who works not as a senseless machine, but as an intelligent handicraftsman, who understands the powers he wields, and the elements and materials he works upon, will have a great advantage in his knowledge. The artisan, with this qualification, will be constantly improving his tools and the productions of his skill, and shortening the processes of his labour. The farm will be certain, other things being equal, to be better cultivated, and to be made more productive, by a scientific agriculturist. He will turn the stock, as well as the soil, of his farm to greater account, with the knowledge that books of science will give him. How many horses have been ruined by ignorance in the farrier of the part he operates upon, The foot of the horse is connected with the leg by muscles and ligaments, which answer the purpose of a fine elastic spring, that saves the animal from the shock, which every step would otherwise give him. This effect is aided by the expansion of the hoof, and by the descent, between the two parts of it, of a soft, muscular substance, technically called the frog. Now, if the shoe, be placed too far back, or be formed so as to contract the foot, it will interfere with this admirable provision of nature; and lameness will ensue. In the building of houses, again, scientific principles are mdispensable, and undoubtedly a thorough understanding of them would enable the ca penter to im-. prove his plans, and to facilitate the execution of lus task. But there is one evil that especially calls for a scientific remedy, and that is, the evil of smoky houses." There are principles, if we are rightly informed, on which every chimney may be constructed, so as certainly to draw smoke; and any one may convince him self of this by the fact, that a Franklin stove is an invariable remedy for a smoking chimney. And yet, in many places, if not generally, more than half of the chimneys are so built, as to inflict this lasting evil, this century's calamity, upon a whole household. The fuel, that is ex

pended, either to make a stronger draught by increasing the fire, or to heat rooms with half-open doo.s; the colds, rheu matisms, and various diseases induced in this way; the irritation, the actual ill temper occasioned by such circumstances, constitute, all together, uo small item in the troubles and afflictions of domestic life! And all this, because one class of our artisans do not understand, in this particular, the philosophy of their business!

Let us now consider the question of utility in another point of light. That, emphatically, is useful which contributes to the happiness of the mind. And if this is true, then ideas, reflections, thoughts are to be set down on the scale of utility, and are to be set highest on that scale. Though not reckoned in the ledger, though not gathered into the granary, nor de posited in the warehouse; though neithet manufactured, nor bought, nor sold—yet thoughts are useful. Nothing is so much to a man as what he thinks. "As a man thinketh so is he," and, especially, so is he happy or miserable. And yet there is, with many, a kind of regular and set exclusion of the mind itself from the estimate of human welfare, and an exclusion, by the same rule, of knowledge from the objects that are worthy of a distinct, professed, and practical attention among the mass of mankind. Knowledge, indeed, is allowed to be useful, but it is useful as being auxiliary to some more valuable, some visible acquisition. Thus the knowledge of the lawyer, of the physician, of the merchant, is acknowledged to be useful; but useful, all the while, as a commodity in the market. That is the only popular view of it: And there is no doubt that the very words, utility, advantage, good, always, in popular use, relate to outward possessions. And, of course, with this state of mind, all efforts and combinations to obtain such possessions, all banking associations, insurance companies, fur companies, copartnerships in trade, compacts of all sorts to lay a grasp on the "main chance," are the most reasonable things in the world. Nothing is visionary here but what fails; not the South Sea Company, till the bubble bursts; not the cotton or woollen factory, till the stock falls fifty per cent. But a combination among the people to obtain knowledge, and especially scientific knowledge, a knowledge of such things as the air, and the light, and the stars, an ideal good, a bubble at the outset, a thing that cannot be put on the file of bonds and deeds, nor served up in the feast, nor made anything of in any way-why, says our wise man. the project is chimerical! And forthwith ke begins to talk about Utopia,

and Oceana, and Arcadia, and sundry other things that have no real existence.

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The knowledge that comes under the denomination of scientific, it is true, must, at least a portion of it, be sought for its own sake; and the defence of it is, therefore, to be put on that ground. We say, then, that the knowledge of nature, in those respects which have the least to do with men's business, is of itself a most delightful acquisition. To stand amidst the works of the wonderful Architect, as their admiring interpreter; to look around, not with the dull, unconscious gaze of mere animal sensations, but to comprehend, in their qualities and uses, the things that we benold, the air, the sunshine, the storm, the lightning; to see all things rising in their order, and moving in their har mony; to stand, as did the first man, and “call by their names" all things that 66 pass before us," ,” is to take one of the noblest and happiest positions on earth; and fittest, too, for the lord of this lower creation. The bare classification of outward objects is of itself a great pleasure. It is this, in part, that accounts for the enthusiasm of the mineralogist. Mineralogy, at first view certainly, is a very dull science. And yet its votaries take journeys on foot; endure storms, cold, hunger, and weariness; traverse extensive districts; scale lofty mountains with an eagerness that seems almost like mania; and all this they do, not to put gold in their purse, but to put a few useless stones in their cabinet, Now, whatever be the cause, here is undoubtedly a great deal of pleasure. The huntsman has not a keener; no, nor the miser, nor the voluptuary. And the objects which yield this satisfaction are abundant, are common, are everywhere to be found. The stones in the street, the dull walls by the wayside, present to the eye of the mineralogist well-known and interesting forms and qualities.

But if the dullest things in nature yield this pleasure, what must its brighter, its more beautiful, its living forms? its plants of every shape and structure, and birds of every plumage, and animals that sport in all its elements and regions? Let our Wilson tell—for our country was his by adoption—who lived among the birds, made them, as it were, his companions, and understood their notes, as if they had been the voices of his children. Let the venerable Blumenbach of Germany tell, who has pursued the study of natural history till the period of eighty, with undiminished enthusiasm and delight. Or, to take singly the phenomena of vegetation -what a secret world of wonders is there in every plant? It seems unfortunate that any man should pass through one spring

season, and understand nothing of these most curious and beautiful processes, that are going on all around him. Growth, vegetable growth, which, to the ignorant, is a bare and naked fact, to the scientific eye is a history, a whole history of things, the most interesting to every intelligent mind? Survey it throughout, from its foundation silently and mysteriously wrought in the dark and senseless earth, till it rises up to the stately plant, or the towering forest tree; examine its interior structure: trace the firm and tongh fibres ́ that give it strength to resist the storms amidst which it flourishes; observe the ducts and channels carefully laid in it, to convey streams from the rich fountains of life below; mark its numerons cells, those secret laboratories of nature; and then, consider the liquid sustenance, carried to its topmost bough and its uttermost leaf, with no forcing pump to raise it, and conveying each particle to the exact place and position where it is needed, by à process of secretion that seems like mystery, and mystery it is;—survey this exquisite and wonderful workmanship, and who, we ask, would not know something of all this? Who would not give a little time to procure so great a satisfaction? Who can be content to pass through the world in ig. norance of these works of his Creator?

If all that has been done, and expended, and lost, by the abuse of nature to purposes of gluttony, intemperance, luxury, vanity, and vitiating entertainment, had been devoted to the knowledge and cultivation of nature; and then, if all the boundless sum of treasure, toil, and life, that has been sacrificed in bloody and barbarons wars, had been converted to the same rational and beneficent use, it is impossible to describe or imagine the im proved and happy condition in which the world would now be found. If all human power, wealth, activity, zeal, and ingenuity had been fairly brought to bear upon the world's improvement and welfare, a scene would have been presented, to which the fabled Arcadia of the poets would be as the simple field to the well cultivated garden. The earth would indeed have been as "the gården of God." Means of communication, means of comfort might have been provided; broad and beaten pathways might have been opened through mountains and forests, to convey the blessings of civilization and the greetings of affection, to the uttermost regions; fair cities and marble palaces and temples might have risen in every wilderness ; rich groves and bowers of peace and contentment might have covered every plain, now barren and desolate, and oftentimes stained with blood. There need have

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