248 Instmct. 



ciples of action of as wide a range as any animal 

 has, — and more still remain to be considered. We 

 find, as yet, nothing to direct and limit these 

 impulses, to secure the highest good of man. We 

 can hardly think of a worse condition for man, than 

 to supply him with every thing needful for him, 

 and then for him to give himself up, as animals 

 may, to every impulse. The voice of the whole 

 thinking world is, that there must be in man a 

 power of self-control, — something outside of these 

 activities, of which we have been speaking, — some- 

 thing that experiments w^ith them, observes their 

 action and determines their proper sphere of ac- 

 tion, allowing one to act, and keeping another in 

 abeyance, in spite of its clamors ; in fact, ruling 

 them, and making them its servants. This higher 

 power seeks for, and determines the Law of Lim- 

 itation, so fully explained by President HOPKINS. 

 This law is, that every power in man miLst be used so 

 far, and only so far, as it is a condition of activity 

 for the next higher power. This limit of action for 

 each power, the man must himself determine. And 

 when that has once been determined, the high, rid- 

 ing pozver within him, confines each of these ser- 

 vants to its own place, and exacts of it the la- 

 bor required for the good of the whole. — It may 

 learn much from these servants skilled in their own 

 departments of labor, but it never should lose con- 

 trol of them. In that man, where this ruler is 

 well informed, and uses the power which rightful- 

 ly belongs to him, there is the order, harmony, 

 happiness and progress of a well-ordered king- 



