20 VALUE OF OBSERVATION. 



But though the mind cannot quit its unseen 

 citadel, and go forth in quest of the knowledge, it 

 can send out its messengers ; and it can send them 

 as far as sound reaches, or heat warms, or light 

 shines. Thence the senses are capable of bringing 

 the knowledge of all that affects them ; and the 

 mind can apply all the relations. Hence the great 

 value of OBSERVATION, and the ignorance, / blun- 

 dering, and misery of those who do not duly practise 

 it. The mind can compare subjects, or judge as we 

 are in the habit of calling it ; but the mind always 

 appeals to its witnesses, the senses, in the case of 

 subjects and existences ; and it can have firm 

 and absolute belief no further than it is borne out 

 by them. 



It is here that the obstacle lies which keeps so 

 many of us in ignorance, leads us into error, and 

 causes us to be miserable amid all the fascinations 

 of a world, the mere contemplation of which 

 would, if we knew better, fill us with perpetual 

 delight, and reduce to comparative nothing those 

 little disappointments and cares which keep us in 

 a state of annoyance, and hinder us from tasting 

 " the good which God has given us." We do not 

 distinguish between the purely mental act of per- 

 ceiving relation, and the mind's act through the 

 senses in perceiving reality ; and for that reason 

 we generally use only half our system work with 

 half our strength. Not half of it even no, not a 

 tenth ; for the real power is in the union of the 

 two. 



When we use our senses, we do not think ; and 



so the object of those senses can be turned to no 



profit, and give us no pleasure. If we do not 



think at the same time, the appearances of objects 



7 



