294 THE HUMAN FORM. 



field, that there are not two kinds of connections, one physiological, 

 the other human, but the connections that we form in our daily walks 

 are the types of those of the sciences. 



The question may be divided for convenience sake into two heads; 

 namely, 1. Why is the connection between the soul and the body 

 effected? And 2. How does it take place? 



First, for the Why? We answer to this, that the soul is con- 

 nected with the body for the same reason as we are connected with 

 the persons, objects, and circumstances that surround us, and which 

 answer to our wants and interests. In a similar manner the body 

 answers to the wants of the soul (p. 242 — 244), being the soul's 

 wife, the soul's friend, the soul's house, the soul's office, the soul's 

 universe. It is engaged to the service of the soul ; shapen into use- 

 fulness by the soul's ministrations. As the hand shapes the pen, 

 and then writes with it, so the soul forms the body, and then makes 

 use of the properties resulting from the form. The connection be- 

 tween the soul and the body is not more mysterious than the con- 

 nection between the pen-maker and the pen, excepting that our know- 

 ledge of the pen is so much more complete than our knowledge of 

 the body. A science of the body, had we such, that displayed its 

 uses, or its specific fitness to serve the soul, would as evidently give 

 the motives of the attachment of the soul to the body, as the capa- 

 bilities of the pen account for its connection with the fingers of the 

 ready writer. In both cases it is the bond of service, of liking, of 

 utility; for to intelligent life what other connecting principle is pos- 

 sible? If this is too simple for philosophers, still it is the ground 

 of every connection they themselves form with man or thing. 



For the purpose of breaking abstruseness from the argument, let 

 us look upon the natural body as the well furnished house, the ad- 

 mirable circumstance and worldly fortune of the soul. Then, steadily 

 regarding the soul as the man, something like the following analo- 

 gical discourse may result from this point of view, in which we take 

 our stand inwards, to gain distance for the object. 



The soul being the man or real body, the natural body represents 

 the appliances and arts of life, whether economic or Aesthetic. The 

 eye is its window, telescope, microscope, and answers to the series 

 of means that transparent substance lends to vision, and which arc 



