34 OBSERVATION IS NATURAL. 



we no more doubt that that song is the song of the 

 birds than we can doubt that we are hearing a song. 



So also, if we lay our hand upon any substance, as 

 a piece of woollen cloth or a piece of iron, or taste 

 any substance, as a bit of bread or of sugar, if we 

 have been formerly acquainted with that substance, 

 and have been accustomed to call it by that name, 

 we can no more deny that it is the substance than 

 we can deny our own existence. 



These matters may seem to be so simple, and so 

 self-evident, that it is a waste of time to write them 

 down, or to read them after they are written. But 

 that is an error ; and it is the error which keeps very 

 many of us in ignorance, and makes us listless, and 

 even vicious, when we otherwise might be occupied, 

 happy, and doing right. That which we already 

 know is the instrument, and the only instrument, with 

 which we can " work out" more knowledge, and turn 

 it to account ; and our senses, or organs of OBSERVA- 

 TION, are the only means through which that instru- 

 ment can work. >' . 



Those organs of observation will not cease from 

 making their revelations to us, if the circumstances 

 under which we are placed will at all admit of their 

 acting. We cannot mark their beginnings ; and, as 

 we have no positive knowledge but where we have 

 had experience, we cannot even imagine what our 

 knowledge or our enjoyment may be when we are 

 " out of the body ;" but what we receive through 

 them, and the arrangement of it after it has been 

 received, are all our occupation and all our enjoyment 

 in this world, and the immediate purpose of these 

 remarks extends no further. 



To observe is, indeed, the very constitution of our 

 nature ; and though our own memories do not reach 

 back to that period, and those who are very near it 

 cannot inform us, yet we have every reason to be- 

 lieve that life and observation begin at the same in- 

 stant, and hold on their course, and close together; 



