MATERIALISM AND SPIRITUALISM. 



"we would point to an idea which all history throughout its 

 course discloses as ever establishing more firmly and extending 

 more widely its salutary empire, if there is one idea which 

 contributes more than any other to the of ten- contested, but still 

 more often misunderstood, perfectibility of the whole human 

 species, it is the idea of our common humanity tending to remove 

 the hostile barriers which prejudices and partial views of every 

 kind have raised between men ; and to cause all mankind, without 

 distinction of religion, nation, or colour, to be regarded as one 

 great fraternity aspiring towards one common end, the free 

 development of their moral faculties. This is the ultimate and 

 highest object of society ; itis also the direction implanted in man's 

 nature, leading towards the indefinite expansion of his inner 

 being. He regards the earth and the starry heavens as inwardly 

 his own, given to him for the exercise of his intellectual and 

 physical activity. The child longs to pass the hills or the waters 

 which surround his native dwelling, and his wish indulged, as 

 the bent tree springs back to its first form of growth, he longs to 

 return to the home which he had left ; for by a double aspiration 

 after the unknown future and the un forgotten past, after that 

 which he desires and that which he has lost, man is preserved by 

 a beautiful and touching instinct from exclusive attachment to 

 that which is present. Deeply rooted in man's most innate 

 nature, as well as commanded by his highest tendencies, the full 

 recognition of the bond of humanity, of the community of the 

 whole human race with the sentiments and sympathies which 

 spring therefrom, becomes a leading principle in the history of 

 man." * 



69. When we come to trace the conduct of man as an individual 

 member of the social body and to connect it with his physical 

 organisation, we tread upon the interesting ground which forms 

 the confines between the legitimate territories of the physiologist 

 and psychologist, between the provinces of the natural philosopher 

 and the theologian; and however closely our vocation and habi- 

 tudes have attached us to the contemplation and investigation of 

 mere physical laws, we cannot forbear to throw a passing glance 

 into the spiritual world. 



70. Man's nature, according to the admission of all, is a com- 

 pound of the material and the intellectual. According to some, to 

 whom, on that account, the name of materialists has been given, 

 the intellectual is a mere function or property of the material part 

 of our nature. According to others, the intellectual is a function 

 of a spiritual essence, which is independent of our material organi- 



* Cosmos, translation, p. 354. 



87 



