THE STUDY OF NATURE. 279 



themselves — -whence are derived the necessaries, the 

 comforts, the elegancies of life, by which they are 

 surrounded ? We hear some one say that the innate 

 reason with which man is gifted, even in his rudest 

 and incohate state of existence, would prompt him 

 to convert the materials around him into these same 

 essentials and luxuries. No such thing : let us ra- 

 ther reply, on their behalf, that although man, in his 

 primitive and natural state, would assuredly find the 

 world as it now exists adapted to all his wants as a 

 mere animal (just as former epochs were suited ex- 

 clusively to animals of certain forms and habits, and 

 would not have afibrded the means of subsistence to 

 creatures of the preceding and subsequent seras),and 

 although there exists in him the love of society and 

 the impulse to subdue to his purposes certain pro- 

 ductions which might minister to his convenience. 

 Yet this same unpolished monarch of the creation 

 was destined for a civilized condition, he had origin- 

 ally given him the divine form, bodily endowments, 

 and a mind by which he might appropriate any of 

 the works of the creation, and assume an undisputed 

 sway over them — but he had likewise a divine mind, 

 his rude and unpolished state, therefore, was not 

 suited to his intellectual and divine nature, and we 

 find the course of things so ordered, that he is 

 gradually assuming; the highest condition of mental 

 refinement and elevation, and that whilst he has 

 laid aside the extended use of those senses and en- 

 dowments by which he enjoyed his animal existence, 

 he has substituted those moral powers by which he 

 can moie thon ever exercise his controul over nature, 

 and can also perceive with concern, and yet with 

 gratitude, the reasons for w^hich he has been called 

 to this state, the relation which he bears to God, 

 and the destiny of his soul hereafter ; how one of 

 the first fruits of mental refinement and civilization 

 in a well-ordered mind, is the contemplation of 

 nature ; the most natural consideration which v.e 

 are capable of in our youth, is as to tlie uses of 



