436 KISE AND PROGRESS OF MECHANICAL PHILOSOPHY. 



pure and disinterested enjoyments which the philosophic mind 

 derives from its exalted speculations are these unreal ? or are 

 they inferior to those which minister to the animal part of our 

 being ? But I will quit this high vantage ground, and descend 

 into the field which the utilitarian has chosen for himself. I will 

 assume that the objects of his desire are, and should be, those of all 

 mankind ; and I will tell him that science true science alone 

 can point out the road to their full attainment. In fact, the 

 objection betrays an ignorance of the real character of inductive 

 philosophy, and of the spirit of its votaries. The true philosophy 

 of nature is founded upon facts, and it is its very essence to admit 

 of practical application : It takes its rise from particulars, and to 

 particulars it is in fine applied. But, unlike that with which it is 

 contrasted, it embraces phenomena not in their accidental charac- 

 ters but in their generic and essential ones. It rises from tho 

 maze of individual cases, with which alone the man of mere 

 practical detail is conversant, but it rises that it may enlarge its 

 view that it may trace (to use the expressive words of a favourite 

 writer) the spirit of the laws of nature from the letter; and then, 

 and then alone, is it in an attitude to descend, and with all its 

 acquired lights to advance the physical condition of man. 



There are some, indeed, whose habits of generalization, and 

 love for the pure abstractions of science, lead them to fix the abode 

 of their thoughts wholly in its loftiest regions while others ascend 

 into its pure atmosphere, only that they may " steal the fire," and 

 apply it to their earthly uses. It is wisely ordered that it is so ; 

 for each of these has his proper part to fill, and both conspire for 

 the good of mankind. Each, too, has his own peculiar pleasures. 

 Those of the former, perhaps, are more remote from sense more 

 exalted more near to what we may conceive to be the enjoy- 

 ments of a purely intellectual being; while those of the latter, 

 on the other hand, are more adapted to our mixed and com- 

 pound nature. In both, the social and benevolent affections have 

 full room for exercise. But it is from a higher source that the 

 true philosopher to whichsoever class he belongs draws his 

 deepest and most exalted pleasures. In the events which pass 

 each moment before the uninstructed eye, and pass unheeded 

 or unseen, he discerns the hand of Infinite Power, guided by Infi- 

 nite Skill and surrounded by wonders here, he is brought into 

 close and multiplied contact with the wisdom of God. 



