338 THE HUMAN FORM. 



no communion with the soul of things, just as without power and 

 sight the eye and arm do not partake of the animation of the body. 

 Philosophy therefore has hard work, and a glorious mission before it, 

 in hearing what all forms say ; so much indeed to do, that we fore- 

 see a good time coming, when it will throw down its luggage of 

 classified faculties, empty its pockets of its bad money of " objective 

 and subjective cognitions," and anxious for labor, like blind Barti- 

 masus, cry out exceedingly, " Lord, that I might receive my sight." 

 Then will it find that there are not only more things in heaven and 

 earth than it dreamt of; but that there are also more heavens and 

 earths. For if there is an inner man, there is also his experimental 

 circumstance, his comparative anatomy, botany, mineralogy, cosmolo- 

 gy ; in short, an inner world like this world in its form, though built 

 of spirit and life : and to learn about this will be the last privilege of 

 philosophy, when it becomes teachable, as a little child. 



Having indicated that the symbolism of things is the soul of the 

 comparative scale of nature, and that the knowledge of correspondence 

 is the punctum saliens of the sciences, and if we may be pardoned 

 the thought, a stream from that divine expression, the creative Word, 

 we pass on to one or two other points connected with our subject. 

 And first let us glance at the application of the human form to 

 the doctrine of history. 



In this field the idea has been steadily but tacitly growing up, 

 that there is an organic connection of races and affiliation of ages, 

 so that what seems to be a world of men, is also but One Man. 

 The doctrine of association, admitted of the mind on the one hand, 

 and of social interchange on the other, helps us to conceive that we 

 are all members of one body. The method of thought which runs 

 from the great to the small, and magnifies our parts into humanities, 

 in its other curve from the small to the great, brings mankind to- 

 gether in a single human body. What may be the ultimate tri- 

 umphs of this idea — what sciences may come out of its mighty loins, 

 we dare not venture to predict ; but one thing is clear, that it will 

 purge history of much occasional matter, and aim constantly at that 

 which is the sublime part of all annals, the history of Providence in 

 the world. For though we may think that we shape our own courses 

 as isolated parts, yet if an architectonic whole be admitted, the 



