8 PREFACE TO PARENTS. 



a hope. If to entertain reverence for our Maker, 

 to admire and adore his wisdom and goodness in 

 the illustrations of nature, thankfully to acknow- 

 ledge and duly to improve the superiority which 

 mind confers, be exercises in which a wise parent 

 would desire to train a child, the study of natu- 

 ral science is admirably adapted to the attainment 

 of these objects. Again, if it be desirable to en- 

 courage habits of patient observation, accuracy of 

 investigation, and soundness of thought ; let the vol- 

 ume of nature be opened before the youthful mind. 

 If to learn things be better than to learn words, it 

 is important to place things before the growing 

 intellects of the young. Let it not be supposed that 

 to present matters of science intelligibly to the minds 

 of children is a hopeless task. It requires not 

 learning or maturity of understanding to perceive 

 a fact ; it needs only the ordinary senses which God 

 has bestowed alike upon children and their parents. 

 Natural science is emphatically the science of 

 facts ; built upon any other foundation it becomes 

 conjecture merely : and he knows but little of the 

 mind of a child who is not aware of the facility with 

 which a fact is impressed upon it. The secret of 

 instructing the young will be found to consist more 

 in the mode of communication than in the nature 

 of the subject. 



